May Day! May Day! Productivity For Business Owners

Want your business to rock when it comes to productivity in the workplace? It probably doesn’t seem obvious, but May Day celebrations can help you get there.

There are two very different celebrations on May 1, which are both celebrated more in Europe than here. But that doesn’t mean you can’t adopt their lessons for productivity and time management skills in your business. 

One is more of a folk tradition welcoming the advance of spring, with maypoles, dancing, May queens, and the like. The other is an acknowledgment of all the gains workers have achieved through labor unions. 

I’m sure you’re wondering how labor unions and May queens make anyone more productive in the workplace. Well…

Contributions of labor unions to productivity in the workplace

Misguided beliefs about productivity coupled with greed killed factory workers up into the 19th century. Before labor unions won the concession of an eight-hour day, workers often had to spend their time from dusk to dawn on the floor. 

We know that the human brain didn’t develop to work all those hours, and being tired around dangerous machinery costs lives. Back then there was no OSHA or even class action lawsuits, so there weren’t good mechanisms to prevent these deaths. Until workers were able to bargain collectively for an eight-hour day.

Managers and business owners also wanted to make sure that their employees weren’t taking too many breaks, which led to the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire in the early 1900s. Most of those employees were young women, and their employer locked them into the sewing rooms so they couldn’t get out to take breaks. When a fire broke out, there was nowhere for them to go. Some died in the fire, and others died when they jumped out of windows to try to avoid the fire.

Unfortunately for the women who died or were seriously injured, the fire did wake people up to the fact that business owners of the time didn’t always have the best interests of their employees at heart. Safety regulations appeared so that tragedy couldn’t happen again. That’s why you might notice the sign, “These doors to remain unlocked during business hours” at certain businesses.

Unfortunately, it looks like in some states greed has reared its ugly head again, in the form of undoing child labor protection laws (which are also a result of labor unions). Children, who will work for lower pay and tend not to sue, will be allowed to toil on top of their school hours and with dangerous machinery. We’re not talking about babysitting, but dangerous farm and slaughterhouse work. 

All so that the business owners can get away with paying lower wages. Training isn’t a given in these jobs. Plus kids who’ve been in school all day will be tired and more likely to make mistakes that could cause serious injury or even death.

Business owners who aren’t greedy recognize that treating workers well actually helps them retain staff. That’s much cheaper anyway than churning through employees, because finding, hiring, and training new people is a lot more expensive than retaining existing talent.

What makes workers more efficient also gives business owners better time management skills

Workers won the right to take breaks, which helps them reset and recharge. That’s also important for business owners. The human brain is not a computer, and after concentrated work, it really needs to rest. 

That doesn’t have to mean staring out the window. Although from time to time that’s actually good for your brain and helps you be more creative. Breaks could mean stretching, hydrating, having lunch with someone, playing, reading, etc.

The eight-hour day is more or less random. At the time (early 1900s), it was believed that was the ideal amount of time a worker could spend on the factory floor. The “studies” done at the time are a little sus, frankly. 

But we also didn’t know as much about the human brain back then, and the nature of business is different. Most Americans aren’t on a factory floor, and most of you reading this post work in the “knowledge economy” so your work is mostly dependent on your brain.

What we do know about the brain is that we only get about 4 ½ hours of cognitively demanding or “thinky” work in a day. Spreadsheets, dealing with numbers, tax returns, developing strategies: all of those are thinky work. (If you’re having an issue with distraction during your thinky work, click here.) The eight-hour factory day isn’t meaningful when it comes to knowledge work.

But one thing you can take from the eight hours is the idea that work has an end to the day. Technically, there’s probably another email you could send out in the evening, or another “social” media post. But is that going to move your business forward? Probably not. 

You’re better off giving your brain what it needs. Time away from work to do hobbies, talk to family and friends (“social” media doesn’t count), and get some resting and recharging in. That way you’ll be ready to go the next day.

May Day festivities may seem like a waste of time, BUT…

Parties and celebrations outside the workday can actually help you have a more productive workplace. That doesn’t mean asking your staff to join you for some unpaid overtime, but for you to enjoy time away from work with other people.

Festivals like May Day that occur at specific times of the year related to the season do a few things for you. For one, they’re social, and your brain does need you to be with other people in a non-business context. (Remember, if it’s good for the brain, it’s good for productivity!)

Seasonality helps with time management skills because you have to carve some time out for a specific reason. May Day only happens once a year. You might celebrate it on the weekend around the holiday, but it’s still once a year. The same goes for other holidays that you celebrate. 

May Day specifically encourages you to be out in nature, instead of at home staring at a screen. Our brains love nature and prefer to be outside. Business owners that spend too much time inside working on screens can get a big boost of productivity just from taking some time out for May Day.

Recap (tl;dr)

Whether you celebrate the achievements of labor unions for workers or the season of spring on May Day, you’ll experience more productivity in the workplace. Take breaks and have a firm end to the business day, even if you work from home, and also take some time out to revel in nature in the spring.

Too distracted to think about taking breaks? Take the quiz and get help for your biggest distractions.