To Retain Employees, Support Their Passions Outside Work

April 8, 2022 Harvard Business Review

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Recent research pinpoints that the most attractive jobs that are currently under recognized: jobs that are designed to enable employees to pursue their out-of-work passions. That is, many employees may benefit from viewing their jobs as conduits to pursue their passion outside of work, and jobs that allow employees to do so may not only draw in talented employees butcan help them maintain their productivity and well-being over the long-term. Some of the steps we could take to make this work as below:

​​What prevents employees from pursuing activities outside of work that make their lives meaningful? It’s clear that passions require time — but with ever-more-packed workdays and constantly surging to-do lists, employees struggle to find it. To support employees’ passions outside of work, leaders need to work with them to create this time. Some examples as below:

Adobe offers employees who have been at the company for at least five years four weeks of paid leave to “plan their dream vacation” or “finally write that novel.” Google started a fellowship program that allowed employees to spend up to six months working for non-profits on special projects. Even industries considered more traditional, like investment banking, have started adopting similar policies.

There is no support for the idea that competing passions weaken work performance. In fact, research suggests that people who have a “side hustle,” or another income-generating job performed along full-time work, perform better at their main job. This happens because side hustles boost a sense of empowerment and positive emotion. Passions boost engagement in a similar way. Further, working all the time, especially on holidays and off-hours, actually backfires by sapping people’s intrinsic motivation for work.

​Leaders can play a role in dispelling myths about out-of-work passions and help their pursuits to become normalized. For instance, you can share the passions you have outside of work with your employees. Explain how you see passions as fuel that re-energizes you to do your best — and critically, tell employees that they can, and should, make time for the same.

Given the benefits of passion on work performance, a growing number of companies have started to financially support passion pursuits outside of work. The expenses for these programs are easily offset through the additional motivation and commitment that employees subsequently bring to work.

For example, Edelman employees can apply for up to $2,500 in funding to devote to a cause they care about, or for an “Edelman Escape,” a one-week break from work and $1,500 stipend to pursue a “once-in-a-lifetime” experience. The clothing company Betabrand pays for its employees to travel to an international destination they’ve always dreamed of visiting — whether seeing where one’s grandmother was born in Ireland or skipping off to Paris in pursuit of romance — as part of their Flyaway Program. The software company FullContact offers a practice called “Paid Paid vacation,” including a $7,500 stipend on top of paid vacation time that employees can use for whatever they want, with one caveat: They must disconnect and do something completely non-work-related

To conclude some of these ideas we could use to motivate our big teams too and ensure they stay motivated and perform with innovation and passion!