As a creature of habit, I’ve never been one of those people that counts the minutes until Friday afternoons. Maybe it is because I’ve never really had the traditional 9a-5p schedule, but I like to think that it is because I really love the work that I do so the idea of taking time away isn’t overly appealing. Trust me, I’m not sitting here saying that I don’t crave a break as much as anyone else - I do, but I also thrive during the week and want to help others do the same.
Here are a few tips we have to help make Mondays your favorite day!
Make the office somewhere people want to be.
Okay, I get it. The likelihood of someone preferring the office to their freedom is probably not a close race, but the office is definitely a place people can want to be. When people associate the office with stress, chaos, or deadlines - they will naturally want to avoid it. That’s like someone wanting to walk straight into a dumpster fire. Fat chance. Instead, having a lower-stress environment where people can feel comfortable being themselves, creating their schedules, and even having fun is a really important element of today’s work culture. Sure, work is work and deadlines matter, but the expectation of work being completed yet giving the freedom to let your folks work how they do their best work is an incredibly liberating feeling from the days of stuffy office culture.
Don’t overschedule.
We do it to ourselves, you know. We often try to get ahead and that causes our Mondays to be overscheduled nightmares that leave us frazzled and stressed. Instead of scheduling every second of your Mondays, be mindful to leave open space in your calendar. When you’re proactively scheduling things for the upcoming week, utilize the full week! This will allow you to approach Monday productively while still leaving space for things that came up since Friday.
Be a proactive planner.
Mondays are often high-stress because we leave everything to first thing Monday morning in an attempt to soak up every last second of football, Netflix binges, and comfy clothes on Sunday nights. While I can certainly appreciate wanting to take advantage of your time off, taking just 20 minutes on a Sunday evening to plan your week ahead can pay dividends on Monday morning. It allows you to hit the ground running and start your week with productive activities versus stress.
When you think about how to make Mondays exciting, you need not look any further than what makes weekends so appealing - freedom, flexibility, designing your own timelines, and even your own well-being. As a leader, it is imperative that you carve out the time to not only focus on production metrics, but what contributes to those production metrics such as environment, culture, morale, or anything else. Helping people start the week right will pay dividends!