A post on Linkedin by a North East Marketing agency caused quite a stir on Tuesday morning. David Porter, Director of Surge Marketing Solutions, decided to let his staff have half a day on the hottest day of the year.
In an email from David, he said, “Having spent the afternoon melting, I have made the decision to allow everyone to work 8am till 12pm tomorrow. Take the rest of the day off and enjoy the sunshine.”
Marketing Manager, Georgia Murphy, posted the email to her Linkedin to share her joy with her connections. In the post Georgia stated, “My boss > Your Boss. Waking up to emails like this remind me exactly why I work for Surge Marketing Solutions.”
The post accumulated over 42,000 likes and over 3,000,000 impressions within 24 hours. Users flooded to the comments to share their opinions on the situation. Whilst the majority of comments were positive, there were also a few negative users.
One user said, “Not sure telling people to enjoy the sunshine when they should be seeking shade, but really I know it’s forecast to be the hottest day ever but how much drama and attention can the UK press give?” whilst another said, “Lovely way to allow your team to not feel guilty too, it’s incredibly hard to focus. Please ignore the negative comments.”
The post itself raises the question on whether the 9-5 working routine is outdated. The North East Marketing Agency has adopted flexible working hours, meaning employees can pick and choose when and where they want to work.
Whilst the staff at Surge were incredibly happy to enjoy their afternoon off in the sun, Georgia commented on what it was like to go viral, “I love sharing about Surge’s positive culture on LinkedIn. I came from a company that spent so much time making it look like they had a positive culture when in reality it was actually a really toxic environment.
I’m so grateful that I now work somewhere where there are real staff benefits and perks that help us thrive as a team! We actually get treated like people! Not just as a number or another cog in a machine.
It’s hard to explain what makes Surge so special. I think it has something to do with the energy of the people that work here, but also David’s dedication to making sure we are all happy and healthy. So, consider this post to show how much I love working at Surge, and how great a boss David is!”
David also commented on the situation, “Most homes in the UK are designed to retain heat and have no air conditioning so I knew everyone would be sitting at home and really uncomfortable.
It is unrealistic to expect people to be productive for 8 hours in this heat, so I gave people the option to do 4 hours in the morning whilst it was cooler. Then take the hottest part of the day off to “enjoy the sunshine.
You cannot put a price on team morale and the important people, my team were really happy with my decision!”