Is More Workplace Flexibility a Fad or a Trend?

When I trav­el, I take, on aver­age, three or four Uber trips a day. And I love to strike up a con­ver­sa­tion with dri­vers to get local infor­ma­tion and dif­fer­ent per­spec­tives on how they see the world.

When I ask why they dri­ve for Uber, many say they love the incred­i­ble auton­o­my to live their lives in way that works for them and are often will­ing to make less mon­ey to get it. Like the sin­gle moth­er who works around her daughter’s school sched­ule, the ath­lete who fol­lows a spe­cif­ic train­ing sched­ule, and a retiree who wants to engage with oth­er people.

The dri­ver I met on a recent trip to Las Vegas to speak at a con­fer­ence, was a real pro. He pulled up with my name on a sign and took pride in his ser­vice, which he knows yields big­ger tips. Then he told me that while he could make almost the same mon­ey at his old job as a big-hotel ban­quet serv­er, he pre­ferred the flex­i­bil­i­ty of work­ing hours and time off when he want­ed it. He no longer had to put in a request, months in advance, deal with oth­er lev­els of senior­i­ty and nego­ti­ate with oth­er workers.

Fad or trend?

As well as a shift from author­i­tar­i­an to more demo­c­ra­t­ic lead­er­ship styles, I’m watch­ing this trend of people’s desire for more flex­i­bil­i­ty and auton­o­my, and the rise of the gig economy.

I’m always fas­ci­nat­ed by new trends, par­tic­u­lar­ly those that shape the way peo­ple think and behave. Like life before and after the inven­tion of com­put­ers, then the inter­net. Or the demand for, and con­ve­nience of, ready-made foods, which can now be deliv­ered to your door.

Fads fade away like the lat­est fash­ion. Trend shape how peo­ple think and behave and can be adopt­ed into more last­ing behav­iours that become fun­da­men­tal and foun­da­tion­al to our lives.

Pen­du­lum swings

It’ll be inter­est­ing to see how these evolve, over time. Trends often pen­du­lum swing from one extreme to anoth­er and then find a bal­ance, as every­one adapts.

Not every com­pa­ny can func­tion and serve their cus­tomers well with­out struc­ture and time com­mit­ments from employ­ees. Oth­ers, like Uber, ben­e­fit from very inde­pen­dent gig work­ers. Look at these stats:

• With­in six­teen months of being launched, Uber hit $1 bil­lion in annu­al­ized gross bookings
• Today, 93 mil­lion cus­tomers use the Uber plat­form, served by 3.5 mil­lion drivers
• Uber gen­er­at­ed $31.8 bil­lion rev­enue in 2022, an 82% increase on the pre­vi­ous year
• 131 mil­lion peo­ple use Uber or Uber Eats once a month, an 11% increase year-on-year
• Uber dri­vers com­plet­ed 7.6 bil­lion trips in 2022, sur­pass­ing its pre­vi­ous peak of 6.9 bil­lion trips made in 2019.
• https://www.businessofapps.com/data/über-statistics/
• https://backlinko.com/über-users

Look ahead

Fads come and go. But trends, short or long term, can affect our abil­i­ty to recruit the tal­ent we need and to stay com­pet­i­tive. Our job, as lead­ers, is pay attention.

The Chal­lenge

• If this is a fad, what could you do to cap­i­tal­ize on it?
• If this is a trend, what can you do to win and con­tin­ue to com­pete for the best talent?

Addi­tion­al Podcasts

• How to Encour­age More Can­di­dates to Apply for Job Vacancies
• How to Iden­ti­fy A‑Players Dur­ing an Interview
• What is Onboard­ing & Why Does it Matter?

Addi­tion­al Blogs

• Proac­tive Recruit­ing Helps Stack Your Tal­ent Deep
• Top­grad­ing: Hire & Keep the Best Talent
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Lawrence & Co’s work focus­es on sus­tain­able and enhanced growth for you and your busi­ness. Our diverse and expe­ri­enced group of advi­sors can help your lead­ers and exec­u­tive teams stay com­pet­i­tive through the use of var­i­ous learn­ing tools includ­ing work­shops, webi­na­rs, exec­u­tive retreats, or one-to-one coaching.

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