Summary: Workstyle: A revolution for wellbeing, productivity and society

Work­style: A rebel­lion for wel­fare, effi­cien­cy and com­mu­ni­ty (2022) intro­duces the notion of work­style: the lib­er­ty to select when and where we work. By exam­in­ing the out­mod­ed nar­ra­tive of the typ­i­cal 9 to 5 work­ing week in the con­text of the con­tem­po­rary dig­i­tal era, the writ­ers estab­lish the basis for a tai­lored and self-direct­ed method of working.

Suggestion

Envi­sion man­ag­ing how, when, and where you work. Now con­ceive that the sole gauge of your per­for­mance is the cal­iber of your results. “Work­style” – the brain­child of Lizzie Pen­ny and Alex Hirst, co-founders of social ven­ture Hox­by – is an autonomous and per­son­al­ized approach to work that encour­ages well-being, ampli­fies effi­cien­cy, and empow­ers indi­vid­u­als to work accord­ing to their indi­vid­ual cir­cum­stances. The moment is right to reject the out­dat­ed nine-to-five realm, embrace the work­style upris­ing, and fos­ter a supe­ri­or way of work­ing that mesh­es with advance­ments in tech­nol­o­gy and community.

Key Points

• A work style that har­mo­nizes with your indi­vid­ual cir­cum­stances, pri­or­i­ties, and pas­sions enhances your wel­fare and ampli­fies your efficiency.
• The eight-hour work­day is an archa­ic rem­nant of the indus­tri­al age.
• The moment is ripe to cast off the con­straints of tra­di­tion­al employ­ment in favor of a per­son­al­ized approach.
• Inde­pen­dence can be a two-edged sword, so build the right con­di­tions for employ­ee autonomy.
• Work­style advances well-being through five avenues: “mind, pur­pose, learn­ing, con­nec­tion, and body.”
• Per­son­al­ized work height­ens effi­cien­cy across five facets: “ener­gy, clar­i­ty, mas­tery, trust and environment.”
• Work­style has the poten­tial to reshape lives and pro­pel human progress.

Commencement: Engage in the workstyle rebellion and shape a brighter future

Lizzie Pen­ny and Alex Hirst coined the term work­style in 2015. They desired to grant every­one the free­dom to choose when and where they work, and they estab­lished a com­pa­ny named Hox­by to actu­al­ize it. Hox­by exe­cutes projects for some of the largest busi­ness­es glob­al­ly and has aid­ed over 2,500 indi­vid­u­als in set­ting, man­ag­ing, and hon­or­ing their own work­styles. Sub­se­quent­ly, fol­low­ing the pan­dem­ic, peo­ple sought to com­pre­hend how the writ­ers oper­at­ed. Rec­og­niz­ing the oppor­tu­ni­ty, Pen­ny and Hirst resolved to craft Work­style: A rebel­lion for wel­fare, effi­cien­cy and community.

It begins with the premise that the 9 to 5 work­day is an arti­fact of the Indus­tri­al Rev­o­lu­tion – now over 200 years old. Even the more recent so-called “flex­i­ble” work­ing hours are con­struct­ed around this anti­quat­ed work frame­work. In this dig­i­tal age, amidst shift­ing glob­al atti­tudes towards work and an aging demo­graph­ic, we must tran­scend these cen­turies-old cus­toms. It’s a peri­od of transformation.

Work­style incen­tivizes work­ers for the out­comes they gen­er­ate – not the hours they clock at their desks. It’s root­ed in the aspects of asyn­chro­nous work, a dig­i­tal-first focus, and trust-cen­tric work envi­ron­ments. The inde­pen­dence of work­style can be rev­o­lu­tion­ary for numer­ous indi­vid­u­als, specif­i­cal­ly for those mar­gin­al­ized by the tra­di­tion­al way of work­ing: elder employ­ees, par­ents, care­givers, those grap­pling with a dis­abil­i­ty, endur­ing a chron­ic ail­ment or men­tal health dif­fi­cul­ties, or those who are neu­ro­log­i­cal­ly atypical.

Workstyle – the notion

Work is an intrin­sic com­po­nent of life. For most of us, it occu­pies approx­i­mate­ly a third of our time and con­sti­tutes a fair­ly sub­stan­tial seg­ment of our iden­ti­ty. How­ev­er, the way most of us work – sit­u­at­ed in an office from morn­ing till evening, inter­act­ing with the same col­leagues – is ground­ed in an age-old tra­di­tion. It emerged with the indus­tri­al rev­o­lu­tion around 200 years ago. The real­i­ty is, this way of work­ing is out­mod­ed and superfluous.

An aging work­force, recent tech­no­log­i­cal strides, and a shift towards more inde­pen­dent work­ing have pre­pared the stage for us to fun­da­men­tal­ly alter our out­look on work. This is where work­style comes into play.

Sim­i­lar to how your lifestyle denotes the way you lead your life, your work style is the auton­o­my to choose when and where you work. It’s pred­i­cat­ed on three principles.

• Pri­mar­i­ly, asyn­chro­nous work­ing. Essen­tial­ly, this means that you do not have to be work­ing simul­ta­ne­ous­ly with your col­leagues. Per­haps you con­clude work just as your col­league on the oppo­site side of the globe wakes up to take over from where you left off.
• This is facil­i­tat­ed by the sec­ond prin­ci­ple: dig­i­tal-first. Every­one oper­ates with a com­put­er in the present day, Wi-Fi is ubiq­ui­tous, and recent inci­dents have shown that much of our work can exist in a dig­i­tal domain. Plat­forms like Slack can be our office space. Let’s embrace it.
• Ulti­mate­ly, the work­style relies on a trust-cen­tered atmos­phere. You must trust that your team­mates will deliv­er with­out a man­ag­er peer­ing over their shoulders.

Fol­low­ing the work­style approach results in a stim­u­lat­ing change in focus in com­par­i­son to tra­di­tion­al work. It shifts the author­i­ty to deter­mine the work­day away from the orga­ni­za­tions and vests it in the people.

Instead of gaug­ing an employee’s worth by the hours they spend in their seat, in front of their com­put­er, it evolves into the out­comes they pro­duce, irre­spec­tive of when or where they car­ry out the work. Devoid of the neces­si­ty to syn­chro­nize hours and loca­tions with col­leagues, indi­vid­u­als have the free­dom to work in man­ners that suit them. This idea of inde­pen­dence has pro­found impli­ca­tions for the essence and impact of the work we engage in.

In the sub­se­quent sec­tions, you will see how sub­stan­tial­ly work­style can enhance your wel­fare, and con­se­quent­ly your effi­cien­cy. But ini­tial­ly, you must pre­pare for the fun­da­men­tal par­a­digm shift in com­pre­hen­sion that work­style necessitates.

Vocal­ize the term “work­style” aloud to your­self, or per­haps the feline. How does it res­onate? Allow your­self to envi­sion a world where that term is com­pre­hend­ed by those around you. Then, nar­rate your exist­ing work­style, com­menc­ing with “My work­style is…”. Pon­der over the days and hours you work, when you take breaks and vaca­tions, and the facets of your life that you fit your work around – pick­ing up chil­dren, chores, and pas­times. Odds are you pos­sess lit­tle con­trol over the specifics of your cur­rent work style. That’s why it’s time to explore the advan­tages of a realm where you do.

Workstyle aids in your well-being

Envi­sion you are vis­it­ed by an inquis­i­tive extrater­res­tri­al who requests an elu­ci­da­tion of your typ­i­cal work­day. If you are akin to a siz­able seg­ment of the labor force, you would elu­ci­date that you rouse your­self with a rau­cous alarm before dawn, then vacate your cozy abode and loved ones to perch on a crowd­ed train trans­port­ing you to an arti­fi­cial­ly illu­mi­nat­ed office edi­fice where you will sit rel­a­tive­ly sta­tion­ary for the ensu­ing ten hours while uti­liz­ing your phone and lap­top to com­mu­ni­cate with oth­ers who aren’t even in the same loca­tion as you. Once the nat­ur­al light out­doors is near­ly van­ish­ing, you depart this struc­ture, return home to spend a few brief hours with your fam­i­ly, and then retire to bed so you can arise and repeat the cycle.

Aghast, and per­haps a tad bewil­dered, the alien might inquire: is it salu­bri­ous for you? Take a moment to pon­der your response.

The stud­ies reveal that work wields a sub­stan­tial impact on our well-being. There are near­ly one bil­lion indi­vid­u­als resid­ing with psy­cho­log­i­cal well-being con­di­tions, and employ­ment is a sub­stan­tial fac­tor. How can one’s work habits con­tribute to alter­ing this?

Indeed, a con­sid­er­able amount. The lib­er­ty to mod­i­fy and adapt your work to your pref­er­ences elim­i­nates the stress of con­form­ing. This enables you to live and work as your gen­uine self, enrich­ing both self-assur­ance and gratification.

Fash­ion­ing your indi­vid­ual work prac­tices empow­ers you to estab­lish lim­its in your life, enabling you to con­cen­trate on incor­po­rat­ing the aspects of work that gen­er­ate pos­i­tiv­i­ty. The charm of this approach is that it per­mits you to sculpt your timetable around ele­ments impor­tant to you. Con­se­quent­ly, you can lead a more whole­some way of life. Per­haps you aspire to pre­pare a delight­ful meal instead of hasti­ly grab­bing a sand­wich. Or maybe you pre­fer an ear­ly morn­ing run before com­menc­ing work. Adher­ing to a per­son­al­ized work approach facil­i­tates you in work­ing in the man­ner that is most suit­able for you.

Embrac­ing a work­style endows you with auton­o­my over your own life. Since you are not con­fined by the cus­tom­ary ‘when’ and ‘where’ of a stan­dard 9 to 5 occu­pa­tion, you are at lib­er­ty to indulge more in activ­i­ties you rel­ish. You can opt to work in a man­ner that aligns with your own feel­ing of purpose.

An illus­tra­tion of this is the capa­bil­i­ty to adapt your work duties to coin­cide with the var­i­ous phas­es of your life. Whether you are relo­cat­ing, recu­per­at­ing from an ail­ment, or becom­ing a par­ent, work­style con­stant­ly safe­guards your capa­bil­i­ty to adhere to your life’s pur­pose. As a result, you can lead a life teem­ing with work that you can take pride in. You can forego the approach of liv­ing only to embell­ish a CV, con­cen­trat­ing on achieve­ments and advance­ments. Instead, you can start reflect­ing on the lega­cy you will leave behind.

An inte­gral com­po­nent of liv­ing life on your own terms is pos­sess­ing the free­dom to evolve and advance in a sig­nif­i­cant and sat­is­fy­ing man­ner. The chance to acquire fresh knowl­edge plays a piv­otal role in work con­tent­ment, where­in the absence of it is a pri­ma­ry trig­ger for depart­ing a job. Nonethe­less, insti­tu­tions usu­al­ly present learn­ing prospects linked to the busi­ness’s prin­ci­ples. Imag­ine if we had the free­dom to select how and what we learn?

Being con­fined to an office tremen­dous­ly restricts the diverse range of view­points we are exposed to. The dig­i­tal-ori­ent­ed essence of work­style negates the neces­si­ty to sole­ly asso­ciate with those who are phys­i­cal­ly present. It broad­ens the hori­zons for inter­ac­tion and learn­ing from indi­vid­u­als across the globe, regard­ing sub­jects that hold sig­nif­i­cance for you.

Just as we oper­ate in var­ied man­ners, we also absorb knowl­edge dif­fer­ent­ly. Do you absorb more infor­ma­tion in a bustling lec­ture hall, study­ing in soli­tude, or mere­ly watch­ing a con­cise TED talk? Work­style allows you to struc­ture your sched­ule around incor­po­rat­ing the learn­ing mode that res­onates with you.

Nev­er­the­less, it is imper­a­tive to keep in mind that work­style hinges on respon­si­bil­i­ty. It is the pre­rog­a­tive of the indi­vid­ual with a dis­tinct work approach to deter­mine when and how they work, and this free­dom extends to learn­ing. If there isn’t a fig­ure direct­ing you on what should be done, you must be delib­er­ate in fram­ing and fos­ter­ing your per­son­al growth.

Exer­cis­ing author­i­ty over your own work, life, and learn­ing neces­si­tates you to set and accom­plish objec­tives, enroll in class­es, and plan the tra­jec­to­ry of your devel­op­ment. Sim­i­lar to a sun­flower instinc­tive­ly fac­ing the sun, you can mature in a way that is delib­er­ate and mean­ing­ful to you.

You can com­mence inte­grat­ing these work­style ide­olo­gies to uplift your phys­i­cal and psy­cho­log­i­cal well-being at present! Ini­tial­ly, iden­ti­fy facets where you per­ceive work hin­der­ing your well­ness. Then, ques­tion your­self, is it manda­to­ry to con­tin­ue in this man­ner? Enroll in a mid-morn­ing work­out class dur­ing a work­day, and assess its impact on your mood and vig­or. Endeav­or to incor­po­rate more activ­i­ties through­out the day that invig­o­rate you with opti­mism. You would be tak­en aback by how inte­grat­ing a bit of vari­ety into your work­day can bol­ster your health.

Now that the poten­tial of work­style to great­ly boost your well-being is evi­dent, it is time to inves­ti­gate how it can enrich what essen­tial­ly forms the core of any flour­ish­ing career: productivity.

Workstyle enhances your work performance

When do you exhib­it max­i­mum pro­duc­tiv­i­ty? Per­haps you are most effi­cient in the morn­ing, com­plet­ing all tasks before the rest of the house­hold awak­ens. Alter­na­tive­ly, you may only hit your stride after engag­ing in a morn­ing work­out and accom­plish­ing minor tasks, set­tling in front of your com­put­er short­ly before noon. Pro­duc­tiv­i­ty is a per­son­al affair. Every­one oper­ates dis­tinc­tive­ly. Thus, why should we be con­tent with a work­ing sys­tem that cat­e­go­rizes every­one uniformly?

Achiev­ing pro­duc­tiv­i­ty cen­ters around ener­gy – where it orig­i­nates from and how it is chan­neled. Through­out a 24-hour cycle, our ener­gy lev­els nat­u­ral­ly ebb and flow. This is a con­se­quence of our indi­vid­ual cir­ca­di­an rhythm that gov­erns our body tem­per­a­ture — and con­se­quent­ly, when we are most productive.

Adher­ing to pre­de­ter­mined work hours pri­or­i­tizes pres­ence over pro­duc­tiv­i­ty. What pur­pose does a 9 to 5 sched­ule serve if you are pro­duc­ing your opti­mum out­put sole­ly dur­ing the ini­tial or final hours? Work­style enables night owls and ear­ly birds to con­tribute when their ener­gy lev­els are at their peak, lead­ing to esca­lat­ed pro­duc­tiv­i­ty all around.

Do you thrive amidst oth­ers, exchang­ing ideas back and forth? Spec­tac­u­lar! Or do you pre­fer con­cen­trat­ing by immers­ing your­self in your cher­ished playlist with­in the con­fines of your room? Equal­ly fan­tas­tic. Work­style fur­nish­es you with the lib­er­ty to pin­point your rhythm and hone in on the cur­rent task.

Workstyle supports the positive impact

Pic­ture a globe where work­style stands as the stan­dard con­ven­tion. You set­tle in with your lap­top at the near­by café post com­plet­ing your morn­ing exer­cise and tasks, ful­ly aware that the upcom­ing hours will be your most fruit­ful. Per­haps you arrange a vir­tu­al meet­ing with your cowork­er from Aus­tralia, who has just put their chil­dren to sleep. You respond to a few mes­sages from your col­leagues in Argenti­na for them to review in a cou­ple of hours.

You can hope­ful­ly already per­ceive how this form of work­style can aug­ment your wel­fare, and sub­se­quent­ly your pro­duc­tiv­i­ty. How­ev­er, it’s cru­cial to acknowl­edge that the reper­cus­sions extend beyond the indi­vid­ual. Work­style has the poten­tial for a last­ing pos­i­tive influ­ence on soci­ety as a whole.

Cur­rent­ly, numer­ous groups of indi­vid­u­als are exclud­ed from the con­ven­tion­al 9 to 5 work rou­tine. These may include per­sons liv­ing with phys­i­cal or men­tal dis­abil­i­ties, those bat­tling chron­ic ail­ments, the elder­ly, or busy parents.

Con­sid­er the indi­vid­ual with autism strug­gling in a bustling office envi­ron­ment, or the indi­vid­ual in a wheel­chair fac­ing dai­ly com­mut­ing chal­lenges. Envi­sion the wealth of tal­ent that could be tapped into if these bar­ri­ers were eradicated.

Work­place dis­crim­i­na­tion is also a sig­nif­i­cant issue that can be reme­died by work­style. Despite recent soci­etal advance­ments, dis­crim­i­na­tion based on fac­tors like gen­der, race, or sex­u­al ori­en­ta­tion remains preva­lent. The asyn­chro­nous, per­son­al­ized essence of work­style empow­ers employ­ees to choose what infor­ma­tion to dis­close about them­selves. When phys­i­cal prox­im­i­ty is not a require­ment, it becomes eas­i­er to engage with indi­vid­u­als on a per­son­al lev­el, avoid­ing assump­tions or hasty judg­ments. This would sig­nif­i­cant­ly aid in erad­i­cat­ing dis­crim­i­na­tion in the work­place and ensur­ing inclu­sive collaboration.

Ulti­mate­ly, adopt­ing a work­style approach nur­tures col­lec­tive intel­li­gence that could poten­tial­ly address glob­al chal­lenges. It’s no secret that human­i­ty is con­fronting major hur­dles on a world­wide scale. Indi­vid­u­als tend to grav­i­tate towards like-mind­ed groups, which is evi­dent in cur­rent hir­ing process­es — com­pa­nies pri­or­i­tize ‘fit­ting in’ with the orga­ni­za­tion­al cul­ture over diversity.

Work­style fos­ters and pro­motes diver­si­ty, cre­at­ing an envi­ron­ment where diverse per­spec­tives can col­lab­o­rate. In such set­tings, indi­vid­u­als feel secure to chal­lenge the sta­tus quo and take risks in solv­ing intri­cate prob­lems. Research indi­cates that engag­ing in con­struc­tive debates with­in a coop­er­a­tive team leads to enhanced work out­comes and finan­cial per­for­mance for organizations.

Fur­ther­more, the ben­e­fits extend beyond orga­ni­za­tion­al realms. Large-scale human col­lab­o­ra­tion is already con­tribut­ing to solu­tions for com­mon glob­al issues. For instance, the nav­i­ga­tion app Waze uti­lizes crowd­sourced data on road inci­dents to alle­vi­ate traf­fic con­ges­tion, while the Bread­line app allows users to report left­over bak­ery items for redis­tri­b­u­tion to those in need.

Work­style brings indi­vid­u­als togeth­er and pro­vides them with the plat­form to address chal­lenges in ways that tra­di­tion­al work arrange­ments do not per­mit. By tap­ping into the col­lec­tive minds from across the world, work­style can make a sub­stan­tial impact in areas such as health­care, gen­der equal­i­ty, and eco­nom­ic development.

Summary

A workstyle tailored to suit your unique circumstances, priorities, and interests enhances your well-being and boosts your efficiency.

Hav­ing the free­dom to choose how, when, and where you work is incred­i­bly empow­er­ing. Whether you are jug­gling care­giv­ing respon­si­bil­i­ties with your career, man­ag­ing men­tal or phys­i­cal chal­lenges, or sim­ply need­ing more time for your pas­sions, cus­tomiz­ing your work approach can be transformative.

“What if indi­vid­u­als could be eval­u­at­ed based on their results rather than their work hours and loca­tion? What if there exist­ed a term devoid of bias­es like ‘part-timer’ or ‘flex pest’ that peo­ple could use to describe their unique work method? What if design­ing your work style was akin to craft­ing your lifestyle? What is your ‘work­style’?”

In 2014, Lizzie Pen­ny and Alex Hirst, authors who under­went life-alter­ing expe­ri­ences, arrived at a com­mon real­iza­tion: the con­ven­tion­al work mod­el is out­dat­ed. Par­ent­hood led Pen­ny to rec­og­nize how the inflex­i­ble nine-to-five work struc­ture lim­it­ed ful­fill­ing careers for those unable to con­form to stan­dard work norms. A chal­leng­ing preg­nan­cy in 2017 reaf­firmed the appeal of ‘work­style,’ a term they coined to describe a fresh, per­son­al­ized approach to work. Pen­ny and Hirst launched Hox­by, a social enter­prise, to val­i­date the fea­si­bil­i­ty of this new par­a­digm. When Pen­ny was diag­nosed with breast can­cer in 2020 and under­went chemother­a­py, work­style became her sanc­tu­ary as she could con­tribute based on her dai­ly ener­gy lev­els. Her jour­ney through par­ent­hood, ill­ness, a glob­al pan­dem­ic, and relo­ca­tion show­cased how work­style can adapt to accom­mo­date life’s changes and surprises.

For years, Hirst labored at a start-up that reward­ed pres­ence over pro­duc­tiv­i­ty. He spent ten hours com­mut­ing to the office week­ly. Ini­tial­ly, he found the fast pace and long hours exhil­a­rat­ing. Yet, the relent­less sched­ule took a toll on his men­tal well-being. Feel­ing despon­dent and dis­con­nect­ed, the turn­ing point came when he co-found­ed Hox­by with Pen­ny and embraced his work­style. As his men­tal health improved, Hirst, along­side his wife Sarah, became par­ents, trav­eled glob­al­ly, and relo­cat­ed to the coun­try­side. Work­style enables him to be present for his fam­i­ly’s mile­stones and con­tin­u­al­ly tai­lor his work approach to nav­i­gate life’s shifts and challenges.

The traditional eight-hour workday is a relic of the past era

The con­cept of the eight-hour work­day was con­ceived two cen­turies ago by Sir Robert Owen, a pro­gres­sive social reformer. Owen pro­posed an ide­al day com­pris­ing eight hours of work, eight hours of rest, and eight hours of recre­ation. He test­ed this con­cept in his cot­ton mill. In the ear­ly 1900s, Hen­ry Ford pop­u­lar­ized the 40-hour work­week, lead­ing to the estab­lish­ment of work hol­i­days and work­place safe­ty stan­dards over time. How­ev­er, the rigid nine-to-five, five-day work mod­el has out­lived its usefulness.

“It’s aston­ish­ing to pon­der the progress made over the past two cen­turies while lag­ging behind in advanc­ing the way we work.”

In the 1930s, indus­tri­al­ist W.K. Kel­logg intro­duced flex­i­ble work by short­en­ing shifts from eight to six hours, a change he lat­er reversed post-World War II. In the 1960s, com­pa­nies in West Ger­many adopt­ed flex­i­ble work hours to alle­vi­ate peak com­mute con­ges­tion. This flex­i­ble work con­cept grad­u­al­ly infil­trat­ed cor­po­rate Amer­i­ca. While the ben­e­fits of flex­i­ble work are extolled today, the stan­dard remains insuf­fi­cient­ly rad­i­cal to insti­gate true dis­rup­tion; the flex­i­bil­i­ty often amounts to minor vari­a­tions with­in the con­fines of a five-day, 40-hour work­week. Addi­tion­al­ly, only a lim­it­ed seg­ment of the work­force enjoys flex­i­ble work options, cre­at­ing a divide between those who have access and those who do not. Remote flex work­ers often feel exclud­ed, under­val­ued, or mar­gin­al­ized com­pared to their in-office counterparts.

The era is ripe to discard the constraints of traditional employment in favor of a personalized approach.

By 2014, as Pen­ny and Hirst under­went sig­nif­i­cant life changes, three soci­etal trends — “the increase in the num­ber of old­er peo­ple, advance­ments in tech­nol­o­gy, and the rise of self-employ­ment” were com­ing togeth­er, set­ting the stage for dis­rupt­ing the exist­ing state of affairs. Life expectan­cies had gone up. Most employ­ees would live beyond the tra­di­tion­al retire­ment age, yet only a few had saved enough mon­ey to sup­port them­selves in their lat­er years. Coun­tries would face chal­lenges in financ­ing retire­ment pen­sions and social ser­vices for the grow­ing elder­ly pop­u­la­tion. There­fore, it was cru­cial to find ways to enable old­er indi­vid­u­als to con­tin­ue work­ing. Addi­tion­al­ly, improve­ments in dig­i­tal tech­nolo­gies and inter­net acces­si­bil­i­ty have lib­er­at­ed employ­ees from tra­di­tion­al office set­tings. This lib­er­a­tion fos­tered inde­pen­dent work, with more indi­vid­u­als free­lanc­ing, cre­at­ing diverse career port­fo­lios, engag­ing in the shar­ing econ­o­my, mon­e­tiz­ing their skills, or start­ing their own ventures.

“In 2014, we rec­og­nized the oppor­tu­ni­ty to shift our per­spec­tive on work from a phys­i­cal loca­tion to an activ­i­ty that could be done any­where and any­time with access to Wi-Fi or a space for our laptops.”

These merg­ing trends led Pen­ny and Hirst to intro­duce the term “work­style,” which they described as “the free­dom to select when and where you work.” They estab­lished Hox­by based on a work­style cul­ture. Pen­ny and Hirst soon dis­cov­ered that this inno­v­a­tive approach to work depend­ed on three key elements:

1. “Asyn­chro­nous work” – By allow­ing indi­vid­u­als to work based on their pre­ferred sched­ules, unnec­es­sary meet­ings could be elim­i­nat­ed. Employ­ees devel­oped patience as they stopped expect­ing imme­di­ate respons­es. Col­lab­o­rat­ing on cloud-host­ed shared doc­u­ments enabled col­leagues to work seam­less­ly and independently.
2. “A dig­i­tal-first mind­set” – Par­tic­i­pants com­mit­ted to work­ing and col­lab­o­rat­ing using dig­i­tal tools like Slack and Google Suite.
3. “A cul­ture of trust” – When team mem­bers had mutu­al trust and eval­u­at­ed each oth­er’s work based on the qual­i­ty of out­comes, com­mu­ni­ca­tion improved, fos­ter­ing trans­paren­cy and openness.

Granted Autonomy can be a two-edged sword, so establish the appropriate conditions for employee independence.

Work­style, in essence, rep­re­sents work auton­o­my. Research sup­port­ed the advan­tages of increased auton­o­my: it height­ened employ­ees’ sense of well-being, engage­ment, and job sat­is­fac­tion, lead­ing to enhanced pro­duc­tiv­i­ty. It also low­ered turnover rates, stress lev­els, and burnout and increased effi­cien­cy by reduc­ing com­mute time, while the phys­i­cal dis­tance com­pelled bet­ter communication.

How­ev­er, auton­o­my could some­times have adverse effects. Some ful­ly inde­pen­dent employ­ees strug­gled to main­tain a healthy work-life bal­ance, feel­ing over­whelmed and unable to dis­con­nect from work. To reap the ben­e­fits of full auton­o­my, two pre­req­ui­sites must be met: first­ly, rec­og­niz­ing your respon­si­bil­i­ty towards your work and defin­ing your own work­style. Avoid tak­ing on projects that demand more time than you can real­is­ti­cal­ly devote. Sec­ond­ly, auton­o­my must be a vol­un­tary choice; if imposed on you, it does not equate to gen­uine freedom.

Workstyle enhances well-being through five channels: “mind, purpose, learning, connection, and body.”

Attain­ing well-being stands as one of human­i­ty’s fun­da­men­tal aims. Despite con­sid­er­able social and tech­no­log­i­cal advance­ments, peo­ple today are not hap­pi­er than they were decades ago. Hav­ing a work­style that aligns with your indi­vid­u­al­i­ty paves the way for con­tent, mean­ing­ful, and bal­anced life.

“When we feel free to be our­selves and are acknowl­edged for our unique con­tri­bu­tions, we expe­ri­ence greater happiness.”

Work­style fos­ters well-being through the fol­low­ing five avenues:

1. Mind – Research by the World Health Orga­ni­za­tion revealed that approx­i­mate­ly one bil­lion indi­vid­u­als suf­fered from some form of men­tal health dis­or­der, with near­ly one in six attribut­ing it to their work. Work­style pro­motes bet­ter men­tal well-being since peo­ple can be them­selves at work with­out hav­ing to con­form. Suc­cess in work is mea­sured by out­put rather than the time spent at a desk, decreas­ing the pres­sure to work long hours to prove one­self, a com­mon cause of burnout. Addi­tion­al­ly, tai­lor­ing your work con­di­tions allows you to chan­nel your ener­gy into your innate pas­sions and inclinations.
2. Pur­pose – When your work aligns with your val­ues, you expe­ri­ence high lev­els of sat­is­fac­tion. Work-stylers choose to work for orga­ni­za­tions that res­onate with their val­ues and con­tribute to their sense of pur­pose. This pur­pose guides your career deci­sions through life’s ups and downs, keep­ing you on track. Con­tribut­ing to some­thing mean­ing­ful helps you cre­ate a lega­cy that fills you with pride.
3. Learn­ing – Work­stylers have the free­dom to decide how, when, and from whom they learn. Engag­ing and col­lab­o­rat­ing with indi­vid­u­als from diverse back­grounds and cul­tures with var­ied per­spec­tives and expe­ri­ences fos­ters per­son­al growth. Fur­ther­more, with work auton­o­my, peo­ple pur­sue cus­tomized learn­ing based on their pre­ferred learn­ing meth­ods and exist­ing knowl­edge lev­els. Tak­ing greater account­abil­i­ty for learn­ing leads to increased moti­va­tion to acquire new knowledge.
4. Con­nec­tion – With a work­style that fits around your life, you gain more time to con­nect with your loved ones. More­over, work­styles devel­op strong bonds with their col­leagues in a col­lab­o­ra­tive rather than com­pet­i­tive work envi­ron­ment. They also estab­lish sig­nif­i­cant dig­i­tal and asyn­chro­nous con­nec­tions with indi­vid­u­als world­wide. The sense of anonymi­ty in remote work reduces social anx­i­eties, encour­ag­ing con­sid­er­ate and sup­port­ive inter­ac­tions. Through work­style, you decide how, when, and if you want to con­nect with others.
5. Body – Tra­di­tion­al work often involves pro­longed peri­ods of sit­ting, which may lead to chron­ic health issues like heart dis­ease, obe­si­ty, and dia­betes. Work­style lib­er­ates you from your desk, allow­ing you to take charge of your diet and deter­mine when and how you engage in phys­i­cal activities.

Customized work enhances efficiency across five aspects: “energy, clarity, mastery, trust, and environment.”

Exten­sive stud­ies have ver­i­fied the pos­i­tive cor­re­la­tion between work auton­o­my and pro­duc­tiv­i­ty. Work­style empow­ers indi­vid­u­als to tai­lor their work to suit their per­son­al pref­er­ences and cir­cum­stances, there­by enhanc­ing the qual­i­ty of their work output.

“The more con­trol we have over our work, the more moti­vat­ed we are to invest our ener­gy in it.”

Work­style boosts pro­duc­tiv­i­ty through the fol­low­ing five means:

1. Ener­gy – Avoid con­form­ing to a tra­di­tion­al work sched­ule. Rec­og­nize when you are most ener­getic and pro­duc­tive. You may be most effec­tive in the morn­ing or per­haps a night per­son. Uti­lize your ener­gy to work when you are at your best and sur­round your­self with peo­ple who uplift rather than deplete your ener­gy. Try­ing to main­tain pro­duc­tiv­i­ty dur­ing stress­ful peri­ods or fit­ting in all life’s respon­si­bil­i­ties out­side of work hours is often unfea­si­ble. Bal­anc­ing your work and per­son­al com­mit­ments equi­tably helps you accom­plish more.
2. Clar­i­ty – Tra­di­tion­al work struc­tures, with mul­ti­ple meet­ings and tight dead­lines, can hin­der your abil­i­ty to work with opti­mal clar­i­ty. Enter a flow state by work­ing dur­ing peri­ods of peak ener­gy. Engage in “deep” work that demands focus and effort when your cog­ni­tive abil­i­ties are at their peak and han­dle “shal­low” tasks like respond­ing to rou­tine emails dur­ing low-ener­gy times. Tak­ing breaks to day­dream or do mind­less tasks allows your sub­con­scious mind to form valu­able connections.
3. Mas­tery –Reach­ing great­ness requires time and ded­i­ca­tion, and adopt­ing a par­tic­u­lar approach to work allows for that adapt­abil­i­ty. Once you have mas­tered your skills, your effi­cien­cy increas­es as you are dri­ven to uti­lize your exper­tise to accom­plish objec­tives or solve chal­lenges. Those who fol­low this work method allo­cate their time to acquir­ing new knowl­edge or refin­ing exist­ing abil­i­ties, even amidst life’s var­i­ous fluc­tu­a­tions. They con­cen­trate on areas that inter­sect with their inter­ests and objec­tives. Trust­wor­thi­ness – Eval­u­at­ing the val­ue of employ­ees based on the qual­i­ty of their input rather than the hours they clock in demon­strates a strong lev­el of con­fi­dence, which empow­ers indi­vid­u­als to deliv­er their opti­mum per­for­mance. Trust enhances employ­ees’ com­mit­ment to respon­si­bil­i­ty and fos­ters col­lab­o­ra­tion. Fur­ther­more, staff rec­i­p­ro­cate this trust as they col­lab­o­rate towards com­mon goals. Open and hon­est com­mu­ni­ca­tion enhances team­work, irre­spec­tive of cul­tur­al, lin­guis­tic, or time zone dis­par­i­ties. Envi­ron­ment – By fol­low­ing a work style, you can per­form your tasks in an envi­ron­ment that inspires your high­est lev­el of pro­duc­tiv­i­ty, whether it’s a seclud­ed cab­in in the for­est or a cus­tomized home office. Giv­en that most work now relies on tech­nol­o­gy, it is cru­cial to take con­trol of your dig­i­tal sur­round­ings to min­i­mize dis­trac­tions. Work method­ol­o­gy pos­sess­es the poten­tial to rev­o­lu­tion­ize lives and pro­pel human progress. In the 1990s, econ­o­mist Mah­bub ul Haq devel­oped the Human Devel­op­ment Approach, which gauges soci­etal suc­cess in terms of indi­vid­ual well-being. With­in this frame­work, adopt­ing a spe­cif­ic work style pos­i­tive­ly impacts soci­ety by enhanc­ing indi­vid­u­als’ lives, cre­at­ing more prospects, and empow­er­ing indi­vid­u­als to chart their own jour­neys. “Work style can insti­gate the sub­stan­tial changes nec­es­sary to begin address­ing the inter­con­nect­ed chal­lenges with­in our soci­ety.” Work style holds the abil­i­ty to rev­o­lu­tion­ize lives and dri­ve human advance­ment in var­i­ous man­ners. Below are three hypothe­ses sup­port­ing this claim: Inclu­siv­i­ty – Tra­di­tion­al employ­ment excludes vast seg­ments of soci­ety, such as indi­vid­u­als with dis­abil­i­ties, those man­ag­ing men­tal health issues or chron­ic ail­ments, care­givers, elder­ly indi­vid­u­als, and those with neu­ro­log­i­cal dif­fer­ences. Work style estab­lish­es an inclu­sive atmos­phere where every­one can tai­lor their work to accom­mo­date their unique sit­u­a­tions. It coun­ters bias­es and mis­un­der­stand­ings and elim­i­nates obsta­cles like onsite work require­ments and fixed work sched­ules, enabling peo­ple from these groups to engage ful­ly in employ­ment. Atti­tudes – One-third of UK employ­ees have encoun­tered dis­crim­i­na­tion at work. Con­ven­tion­al work setups often reward con­for­mi­ty to the major­i­ty over out­put and com­pe­ten­cy. Work style fos­ters inclu­siv­i­ty and com­bats inequal­i­ty through asyn­chro­nous and remote work that does­n’t demand employ­ees to dis­close their age, gen­der, sex­u­al­i­ty, or oth­er char­ac­ter­is­tics. If indi­vid­u­als opt to share per­son­al infor­ma­tion, they do so with­in a space of psy­cho­log­i­cal safe­ty. Intel­li­gence – Stud­ies demon­strate that teams com­pris­ing indi­vid­u­als with var­ied cog­ni­tive approach­es exhib­it high­er col­lec­tive intel­li­gence than homo­ge­neous groups. Work style embraces diverse thought process­es. It estab­lish­es an envi­ron­ment where indi­vid­u­als feel com­fort­able express­ing dis­sent­ing views with­out fear­ing reper­cus­sions. This lib­er­ty to chal­lenge the sta­tus quo, ques­tion assump­tions, and wel­come dif­fer­ing view­points is what enables indi­vid­u­als to tack­le some of the world’s most intri­cate prob­lems. Final Words: Work style has the poten­tial to rev­o­lu­tion­ize the world. The con­ven­tion­al notion of what con­sti­tutes “nor­mal” work does not have to remain unchal­lenged. Present­ly, we are bet­ter posi­tioned than ever to boost our well-being and effi­cien­cy by adher­ing to the prin­ci­ples of work style — dig­i­tal-cen­tric, asyn­chro­nous, and found­ed on trust. Work style offers us the chance and mind­set to col­lab­o­rate and become more than the mere sum of our parts. How­ev­er, like any trans­for­ma­tion, it neces­si­tates sup­port and dri­ve. This is where you step in. By engag­ing with this overview, you have tak­en the ini­tial stride in chang­ing the world. Now, you must uphold this momen­tum. Stay attuned to your per­son­al work style. Share it with oth­ers and ensure its recog­ni­tion. Encour­age indi­vid­u­als to cre­ate their own work styles and fos­ter dia­logues among their acquain­tances and col­leagues. Work style enhances your well-being, which in turn boosts pro­duc­tiv­i­ty. More­over, the inclu­siv­i­ty that the work style pro­motes has the poten­tial to trans­form the world. Addi­tion­al­ly, here’s some action­able coun­sel: Craft your per­son­al work style blue­print. For­mu­late a doc­u­ment clear­ly out­lin­ing your dis­tinct work style. Con­sid­er your peak and low ener­gy peri­ods through­out the day. Iden­ti­fy the types of indi­vid­u­als and envi­ron­ments that boost your pro­duc­tiv­i­ty and hap­pi­ness. Allo­cate time for non-work relat­ed pur­suits like exer­cise and fam­i­ly time, and then struc­ture your work style around them. Once you have final­ized your work style doc­u­ment, eval­u­ate it against your cur­rent work­ing week. What adjust­ments can you make to align it more close­ly with your ide­al work style? Encour­age your peers and co-work­ers to under­go the same process, and assist in fos­ter­ing the momen­tum of the work style rev­o­lu­tion. About the author: Lizzie Pen­ny and Alex Hirst, esteemed friends, entre­pre­neurs, and cat­a­lysts for change, con­ceived the idea of work­style as a response to their adverse expe­ri­ences with­in the con­ven­tion­al 9–5 work­week. Lizzie, a Bris­tol res­i­dent with three young chil­dren who recent­ly tri­umphed over breast can­cer, and Alex, who bat­tled severe burnout before relo­cat­ing from Lon­don to a rur­al vil­lage in Oxford­shire, joined forces to coin the term “work­style” while in a pub. They co-estab­lished the mul­ti-mil­lion-pound social enter­prise Hox­by in 2014 to val­i­date the work­style con­cept, aid­ing numer­ous work­styles world­wide in estab­lish­ing, pro­ject­ing, and hon­or­ing their indi­vid­ual work styles. They are con­duct­ing an in-depth lon­gi­tu­di­nal study on the cor­re­la­tion between auton­o­my, pro­duc­tiv­i­ty, and well-being and have under­tak­en projects for promi­nent glob­al enti­ties such as Unilever, Ama­zon, AIA, and Mer­ck. Their efforts have been rec­og­nized by Forbes.com as spear­head­ing the free­lance rev­o­lu­tion 3.0, and they have been fea­tured in var­i­ous rep­utable pub­li­ca­tions includ­ing the Finan­cial Times, The Times, The Tele­graph, Styl­ist, Marie Claire, The Metro, and The Guardian, among oth­ers. They have gar­nered acco­lades from dis­tin­guished bod­ies such as the Insti­tute of Direc­tors, Social Enter­prise UK, the RSA, and the Nation­al Busi­ness Wom­en’s Awards, in addi­tion to being named “Top 50 advo­cates for equal­i­ty in Mar­ket­ing & Media” by DIMA and clinch­ing the #Work­That­Works Award at the Women In Mar­ket­ing Awards. Their pur­suits are sole­ly geared towards fos­ter­ing a pos­i­tive impact on the world by trans­form­ing the way indi­vid­u­als work. Lizzie Pen­ny and Alex Hirst, two well-regard­ed friends, entre­pre­neurs, change agents, and authors have been pio­neer­ing the work­style move­ment for a decade. Hav­ing co-found­ed Hox­by in 2014 to sub­stan­ti­ate the con­cept, they now pro­vide advi­so­ry ser­vices to those keen on adopt­ing this approach. They have facil­i­tat­ed numer­ous indi­vid­u­als in estab­lish­ing, pro­ject­ing, and respect­ing their own work styles. Their ongo­ing research explores the link between auton­o­my, pro­duc­tiv­i­ty, and well-being. Gen­res: Pro­duc­tiv­i­ty, Orga­ni­za­tion­al Cul­ture, Career Advance­ment, Voca­tion­al Guid­ance, Career Hand­book Review: “Work­style: A Rev­o­lu­tion for Well­be­ing, Pro­duc­tiv­i­ty, and Soci­ety” by Alex Hirst and Lizzie Pen­ny is an enlight­en­ing book that delves into the shift­ing work land­scape and offers prac­ti­cal tech­niques for attain­ing a health­i­er work-life equi­lib­ri­um, enhanc­ing pro­duc­tiv­i­ty, and effect­ing pos­i­tive soci­etal change. The authors present a com­pelling case for reimag­in­ing work prac­tices in the con­tem­po­rary era and impart valu­able coun­sel for indi­vid­u­als and com­pa­nies seek­ing to embrace this fresh work style. The book com­mences tack­ling the obsta­cles encoun­tered by many indi­vid­u­als today, includ­ing exhaus­tion, ten­sion, and the blend­ing of bound­aries between work and per­son­al life. Hirst and Pen­ny assert that the con­ven­tion­al 9‑to‑5, office-focused mod­el of work is no longer viable and sug­gest a new per­spec­tive that pri­or­i­tizes com­pre­hen­sive well-being and work-life fusion. They intro­duce the notion of “work style,” which includes not just the duties and oblig­a­tions of work but also the prin­ci­ples, mis­sion, and over­all encounter asso­ci­at­ed with it.

One of the strong points of this man­u­script is its focus on indi­vid­ual auton­o­my and empow­er­ment. The writ­ers prompt read­ers to con­tem­plate their own work­style incli­na­tions, prin­ci­ples, and aspi­ra­tions, and pro­vide func­tion­al exer­cis­es and frame­works to nav­i­gate this process of self-dis­cov­ery. By under­stand­ing their dis­tinct strengths and moti­va­tions, indi­vid­u­als can craft a work­style that fits with their per­son­al neces­si­ties and encour­ages a sen­sa­tion of grat­i­fi­ca­tion and purpose.

Hirst and Pen­ny also inves­ti­gate the part of insti­tu­tions in mold­ing work­styles. They assert that busi­ness­es must adopt a more adapt­able and exten­sive approach, allow­ing employ­ees to pos­sess more self-gov­er­nance over their work and per­son­al lives. The writ­ers offer numer­ous instances and real-life illus­tra­tions of com­pa­nies that have effec­tive­ly exe­cut­ed inno­v­a­tive work­style meth­ods, spot­light­ing the pos­i­tive influ­ence on employ­ee engage­ment, effi­cien­cy, and gen­er­al orga­ni­za­tion­al performance.

Through the man­u­script, the writ­ers high­light the sig­nif­i­cance of work­style in craft­ing a con­struc­tive soci­etal influ­ence. They delib­er­ate the prospect of work to play a role in broad­er social mat­ters, such as envi­ron­men­tal dura­bil­i­ty and com­mu­ni­ty growth. By har­mo­niz­ing work with per­son­al prin­ci­ples and soci­etal neces­si­ties, indi­vid­u­als and orga­ni­za­tions can turn into agents of con­struc­tive trans­for­ma­tion and add to a more sus­tain­able and equi­table future.

The prose of Work­style is cap­ti­vat­ing and sim­ple to fol­low, ren­der­ing intri­cate ideas and notions uncom­pli­cat­ed to grasp. The man­u­script is well-orga­nized, with each seg­ment estab­lish­ing upon the pri­or ones, estab­lish­ing a uni­fied and ratio­nal flow. The writ­ers offer a mix­ture of research and imple­mentable obser­va­tions, draw­ing from schol­ar­ly inves­ti­ga­tions as well as their own back­grounds of col­lab­o­rat­ing with indi­vid­u­als and organizations.

Nev­er­the­less, one poten­tial draw­back of this book is the focus on the West­ern view­point of work. While the rudi­ments and tac­tics dis­cussed are unques­tion­ably per­ti­nent to a diverse array of indi­vid­u­als and orga­ni­za­tions, the writ­ers could have fur­ther explored the sub­tleties and cul­tur­al changes of work­styles across var­ied regions and settings.

To sum­ma­rize, Work­style: A Rev­o­lu­tion for Well-being, Pro­duc­tiv­i­ty, and Soci­ety is a per­sua­sive and time­ly man­u­script that chal­lenges tra­di­tion­al con­cepts of work and presents a path for forg­ing a more sat­is­fy­ing and sus­tain­able work-life equi­lib­ri­um. Hirst and Pen­ny offer price­less insights, func­tion­al coun­sel, and inspir­ing instances that will res­onate with indi­vid­u­als and insti­tu­tions endeav­or­ing to rethink work in the con­tem­po­rary realm. By embrac­ing the notions and tac­tics put forth in this book, read­ers pos­sess the chance to reshape their work­style and con­tribute to a health­i­er, more effi­cient, and social­ly account­able society.