Asynchronous Work: How Digital Platforms Can Enforce the Boundaries of Work and Life
In this article, Christina Janzer, senior director of research and analytics, Slack, elaborates on how although remote/hybrid work offers many flexibility benefits and asynchronous work has proven effective, 24/7 connectivity can be invasive, disruptive, and stressful. Companies are responsible for helping re-establish boundaries and making fundamental changes to the technology we work on, as well as the culture and norms we work with.
For all its flaws, 9-to-5 office-based work had one major benefit: it created neat boundaries between work and life. While there were always moments when work was overwhelming, the average day followed a more predictable schedule of working hours meant for dialogue and decision-making (meetings) or doing work (not in meetings), followed by dedicated personal or family time.
The great promise of remote work is that it provides flexibility, giving people more choice over where and when they work. Future Forum research shows that flexible work is already proving effective. A study of 3,480 knowledge workers found that the ability to work a flexible schedule was the single most important factor driving employee satisfaction. Those working flexible schedules report 53% higher productivity scores and 57% higher work-life balance scores than those working a traditional 9-5 schedule.
Learn More: 5 Ways Remote Teams Can Collaborate Better and Meet Business Goals
Finding a sustainable, flexible working model may prove more elusive. For example, “asynchronous work” has emerged as one of the most frequently cited, at least understood, working models that can enable flexibility. At its core, asynchronous work means giving people and teams the ability to collaborate without having to operate on a shared schedule.
But the reality is that for many, asynchronous work is a catch-22. It depends on using modern digital platforms that provide access to information and the ability to collaborate from anywhere at any time. Connecting to these digital platforms means you’re able to stay in sync with people no matter where you are, but it also means you’re always connected. The constant flow of information can be beneficial, but it can also be distracting.
At the worst extremes, the tools that enable asynchronous work can evaporate the space and time so neatly allocated in a physical office into a muddle of digital channels. Instead of flexibility, it becomes an exhausting battle against a constant flow of information, endless notifications, and the perpetual worry that an important message has been missed.
How, then, can we take back control, reclaim our personal time, and re-establish boundaries so that we have space to actually do work? It starts with an acknowledgment that fundamental change is required to both the technology we work on and the culture and norms we work with.
Most companies have, understandably, accommodated the turn to remote work by using digital tools to replicate office-based routines. Employees work the same hours and follow the same cadence of meetings — work just happens over email, in virtual meetings, and on instant messaging instead of an office. This isn’t sustainable.
At Slack, for example, we’ve accepted that we need to use Slack the product in a radically different way than we did in the office. A year of remote work has taught us that the true power of our platform comes from occasionally turning it off. It’s not about being always on and having information constantly pushed out. The true benefit is using it asynchronously, giving everyone a shared view into information and dialogue that they can pull from on their own terms. Ultimately, it’s about transparency — access to information is no longer limited to the select few invited to a meeting. It’s available to everyone who finds it useful.
We’ve made a number of significant changes to the way we work to adapt to this asynchronous cadence. For example, our teams are encouraged to establish both “sync hours,” when people are available and fully present, and “maker hours,” when people have time and space for deep, focused work. During “sync” hours (these vary by team but are frequently a block of 4-5 hours in the middle of the day), everyone is engaged in meetings or responding to messages in real-time. During “maker hours”, the opposite is true: individuals use custom status to make clear that they aren’t immediately available and use the “Do Not Disturb” mode to pause all notifications.
We’ve also dramatically reduced meetings. For example, we’ve changed the way we run our vital weekly product and engineering meeting. Instead of rapid-fire live updates from dozens of people, teams share written updates in a dedicated channel, giving everyone the ability to consume the information when convenient. The leadership team then focuses on the two or three key issues that warrant a live discussion among a core group of impacted teams.
Learn More: COVID-19 Brought Band-Aid Solutions for Collaboration; Now It Is Time for Long-Term Strategies
Flexible work is here to stay. Future Forum data shows that 83% of knowledge workers do not want to return to five days a week in a physical office, with 63% favoring the flexibility of a hybrid model, and 20% want to work remotely full-time. Modern communications tools can play an important role in the transition to this new way of working. But technology alone is not enough. Lasting success depends on making deep changes to the work culture and establishing new working rhythms that don’t simply replicate the old 9-to-5. It depends on giving employees the permission to disconnect and to rebuild boundaries between work and life.
