Brilliant nonprofit strategist Brooke Richie-Babbage recently asked what's the one thing nonprofit leaders should do over the summer? Here's my reply:
One of the best ways to bring joy to your team this summer is summer hours!
I’m very lucky to have worked for many years in higher education and was a beneficiary of summer hours. While I deeply enjoyed what was usually an early dismissal for Fridays in sunny Southern California, I’d encourage you to consider how you can implement these in your workplace, especially if you are located somewhere with less that ideal weather during the rest of the year.
So what does this look like? That really depends on the type of organization you run and the responsibilities of your employees.
I love showing appreciation for staff by using the platinum rule and letting them choose what works best for them, so one way of having summer hours is to let everyone pick a day of the week that works best for them to leave at lunch, 2 pm, 3 pm - whatever makes sense for your team. But you can also dismiss everyone daily at 4:30, or choose a handful of Fridays to give as early release or days off during the summer.
If you do this, it’s important to make sure you’re working with program and people managers to ensure that this doesn’t create equity issues around various roles, fits the work needs of your nonprofit, and is communicated clearly. Make sure your staff knows what to do if they feel like there is a conflict between meeting a priority or leaving early for summer hours so that this perk can be well enjoyed and not lead to extra stress. You don’t want something that is meant to be rad to not go down well for your team.
And lastly, if you jump into summer hours, OWN IT! Make sure you are modeling using them as a leader, and make it clear to external stakeholders, vendors, and anyone else that this is a boundary to respect for your staff.
