Episode 203 · 5 June 2025 · 49:51
Where did everyone go? How to manage your team during the summer slowdown
Where did everyone go? How to manage your team during the summer slowdown
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The 8 questions we're answering today
Why the slowdown is real (and measurable)
Q1 — Maintaining engagement when half the team is on holiday
Q2 — Preventing burnout for the people left behind
Q3 — Supporting working parents through the summer
Q4 — Keeping projects moving with fewer hands
Q5 — Managing the invisible mental load
Q6 — Leveraging quiet summer weeks for strategic planning
Q7 — Keeping remote and hybrid workers included
Q8 — The role of positive psychology in the summer slump
Show notes
Where Did Everyone Go? How to Manage Your Team During the Summer Slowdown
Truth, Lies & Work — Al Elliott and Leanne Elliott (Chartered Occupational Psychologist) tackle the dreaded summer slowdown. The client comms go quiet, team motivation nosedives, and you start to wonder if it's just your business that's hit a wall. It's not. But it can cost you — if you're not prepared.
In this episode, they answer the eight biggest questions leaders face every June, including how to keep people engaged, prevent burnout, support working parents, and still get things done when half the team is on holiday. This one's for every founder, manager or team lead who's ever felt like summer is quietly wrecking their roadmap. It doesn't have to.
💡 Key Takeaways
The slowdown is real — and measurable. Harvard and HBR both confirm that heat, holidays and longer daylight hours all reduce focus, energy and output. Some businesses see up to a 20% productivity dip.
Engagement problems start long before July. Summer exposes issues, it doesn't cause them. If people feel disconnected, holidays give them time to reflect — and potentially resign. Expect an uptick in August resignations if engagement has been slipping.
Burnout risk spikes for those left behind. If workloads go up but support doesn't, motivation and wellbeing will crash. Plan handovers and give people fewer balls to juggle.
Support working parents like adults. Flexibility, open comms, and trust go further than token gestures. The mental load is real — and if you don't acknowledge it, they'll take it elsewhere.
Remote workers need context and connection. Summer's a great time to build async rituals, reset norms, and prevent "out of sight, out of mind" thinking.
Positive psychology works in summer too. Recognition, flow, learning and micro-wins boost motivation and protect energy — even during quieter weeks.
Now is the time for strategy. Summer can be your planning superpower. But only if you block the time and protect the space.
🎧 What We Cover
Why summer actually makes us slower (it's science, not slacking) Heat impairs cognitive function, poor sleep spikes, and longer daylight hours mess with our rhythms. Harvard research confirms it: summer literally slows our brains down. Combined with client engagement dropping and sales cycles stretching, it's no wonder small businesses see revenue dips.
The August resignation spike nobody sees coming Disengagement doesn't happen overnight. If your team has felt disconnected all year, summer holidays give them quiet time to reflect — and decide to leave. The fix? Anticipatory engagement. Don't wait until September to care.
Burnout for the people left behind When half the team is off, the other half absorbs the work. That's a micro-burnout risk. Spot the signs early — disengagement, withdrawal, reluctance to volunteer — and plan handovers properly. Give people fewer balls to juggle, not more.
Working parents aren't asking for special treatment They're asking for flexibility, clear expectations, and to be trusted like the adults they are. Organisation-wide policies matter — not just for fairness, but because resentment builds fast when flexibility looks like favouritism.
The invisible mental load Caring responsibilities don't stop in summer — for many, they intensify. The sandwich generation is juggling kids and ageing parents. Leaders who acknowledge this load, and build shared planning docs and async rituals to ease it, will keep their best people.
Summer as your strategic superpower Quieter weeks are perfect for the deep work you never have time for. Pulse surveys, planning days, process improvements — the teams that treat summer as an opportunity, not a write-off, come back stronger in September.
Positive psychology for the slump Recognition, flow states, learning and micro-wins. These aren't fluffy extras — they're evidence-based interventions that build resilience and protect energy when motivation dips.
🔗 Resources & Links
- Harvard Study — heat and cognitive performance: hsph.harvard.edu/news/press-releases/heat-impairs-student-learning
- HBR — making the most of the summer slowdown: hbr.org/2022/07/make-the-most-of-the-summer-slowdown
- Xero Insights — summer slowdown for small business: xero.com/blog/2023/06/summer-slowdown-small-business
- Mind UK: mind.org.uk
- Working Families: workingfamilies.org.uk
Connect With Us
Get in touch, book a call, or find Al and Leanne on LinkedIn — all in one place: truthliesandwork.com/connect
Mental health support: findahelpline.com — UK: Samaritans 116 123 · Mind 0300 123 3393 — US: 988 — Australia: Lifeline 13 11 14
Truth, Lies & Work is part of the HubSpot Podcast Network.
Full transcript
Expand full transcript
Al ElliottWhere did everybody go? That's the question that most business owners are asking around this time of year, sort of June, July, August. The projects slow down, meetings get canceled, and emails go unanswered. Are you sitting there thinking, is it me? Is it just my business?
Leanne ElliottNo, it's not just your business. It's summer, and it catches leaders out every year because while your team is trying to juggle childcare, heat waves, and holidays, You're still trying to run a business.
Al ElliottBut it's not July yet. It's early June. And if you're listening now, you've still got time to plan for this.
Leanne ElliottYeah. So this week, we're answering 8 of the biggest questions leaders ask during the summer slowdown. How do you keep people motivated? How do you stay productive when everyone is away? And how do you make sure your culture doesn't go on holiday too?
Al ElliottIt's not about clinging to control. It's about making smart decisions now So July and August don't feel like chaos.
Leanne ElliottThis is Truth, Lies and Work, the award-winning podcast where behavioral science meets workplace culture. We are brought to you by the HubSpot Podcast Network, the audio destination for business professionals. My name is Leanne. I'm a chartered occupational psychologist.
Al ElliottMy name is Al. I'm a business owner.
Leanne ElliottAnd together we help organizations build amazing workplace cultures. We'll be diving into the episode after this very short message from our sponsors. HubSpot's Inbound Event 2025 is bringing together the brightest minds in business, AI, and entrepreneurship. We're talking Amy Poehler, the genius behind ChatGPT, Dario Mordei, and Sean Evans from Hot Ones, because apparently even hot sauce interviews can teach us about business strategy.
Al ElliottYes, September 3rd until September 5th in San Francisco. And no, this isn't just another one of those conferences where you pretend to take notes while secretly checking your phone. This is 3 full days of actionable insights that you can actually use to grow your What I love about this is the focus on practical application.
Leanne ElliottWe enjoy applied science here. You're not just sitting through fluffy keynotes, you're getting tactical breakout sessions, networking with people who are actually building things, and learning from entrepreneurs who figured out how to thrive in this AI-powered world.
Al ElliottPlus, come on, you're in San Francisco, the global headquarters of let's disrupt everything and see what happens. It's the perfect place to meet your next customer. co-founder, investor, or just someone who gets why you're obsessed with optimizing your customer acquisition funnel.
Leanne ElliottHead to inbound.com/register to see the range of tickets, including VIP options. Fancy, fancy, fancy, fancy. Trust us, your future self will thank you for actually investing in learning something useful. Guess what, Al?
Al ElliottWhat?
Leanne ElliottWe're gonna be there.
Al ElliottNo, we're not.
Leanne ElliottI am. I'm manifesting.
Al ElliottOh, okay. Yeah, we're— yeah, you can come and meet us there. There you go. That's the reason to, to go and book your ticket today. VIP experience will no doubt include us. I'd imagine they'd invite us to the VIP area. So go and visit inbound.com/register to get your ticket today. Welcome back. If you are wondering why we sound a bit more echoey and we've got a different background, go back and listen to episode 201. It explains the whole reason why. And this is going to be us for summer now for the next couple of months. Um, but we're not going into it now. We've talked enough about it on, on episode 201. Today we are talking about where does everyone go? It's summertime. What's going on? So every July I sit at my desk, I send out emails, no one ever replies, no one ever answers the phone. Not that anyone calls anymore. No one ever answers the phone. These projects, they can kind of stall, clients disappear, decisions get delayed. Is this just bad luck or is there something deeper going on, Leanne?
Leanne ElliottNo, I mean, it's not just you. It's very real. There's actually a name for it. It's the summer slowdown or the summer slump. And it's very, it's very real. So, I think starting with the biology of it all, I actually came across a study from Harvard University, um, that was done during a heatwave in Boston. And they found that people living in non-air-conditioned buildings had slower reaction times and made more mistakes on basic cognitive tests. So, just simple maths, um, they didn't do as well. So, just an 8-degree temperature difference made a measurable impact on brain performance.
Al ElliottSo like hothead, should we call it hothead? That's the hothead syndrome.
Leanne ElliottYeah.
Al ElliottSo basically, summers actually literally slow down our cognitive process, i.e., the way that we think.
Leanne ElliottSummer is making us stupider.
Al ElliottStupid summer. Well, you know, hot girl summer.
Leanne ElliottYeah.
Al ElliottWe need to have like a similar kind of like stupid worker summer or something, or anyway.
Leanne ElliottMaybe. But you know, that's not the only thing that summer changes. Poor sleep. is also an issue during summer. We're talking about the Northern Hemisphere at this specific time of the year, but of course this will apply in the Southern Hemisphere, November, December, January. Um, so yeah, longer daylight hours typically disrupt our routines, um, especially for working parents trying to get the kids to bed when it's still light outside is a challenge. Um, and I think as well, just a general sense of, of exhaustion. Um, you know, it's kind of this halfway point of the year. Everyone looks forward to summer I don't know about you, Al, but I often arrive at summer not feeling quite as energetic as I thought I would. Um, so I think, yeah, there's a whole perfect storm of things. Energy dips, focus disappears, and even, yeah, the, the best performers in your business can find themselves running on empty.
Al ElliottYeah. So we, so this is the team. All right. So we now know that team, which we're all a bit more stupid in the summer. Um, but what about business, Leanne?
Leanne ElliottYeah. And this is where it gets a bit serious, actually, why it's so important for leaders to plan in advance for this. So, according to recent research, some companies see productivity drop by as much as 20% over the summer months.
Al ElliottSo, that's one day a week that you're basically losing.
Leanne ElliottYeah, exactly. Um, client engagement slows down massively, sales cycles stretch out, take much longer, projects stall, and it's not because you're doing anything wrong, but because, as you said before, Al, your holidays are— your clients are also on holiday too, um, and everyone's stretched thin.
Al ElliottSo, it really, it really does impact the whole So, I'm guessing this has got knock-on effects for everything, really?
Leanne ElliottYeah. So, another study I was reading from Xero, you know, the accounting platform.
Al ElliottI like Xero.
Leanne ElliottYeah, we like Xero. They did a study and found that UK small businesses see an average revenue dip of between 13% and 20% between June and August. I know, that's ouch, isn't it? And that's across industries. So, we're talking retail, B2B services, agencies, basically small businesses in general will lose up to 20% of their revenue over summer.
Al ElliottNow, this is going to be tough for small businesses because let's be honest, small businesses, and we're talking like probably up to about 250 people, lumpy cash flow as it is. And if you're suddenly getting that over summer, you've got a 20-30% dip in revenues, um, and then also projects aren't getting done, also your team are half on holiday, it sounds to me like it's kind of like a perfect storm. It could be like, It could end a couple of businesses.
Leanne ElliottI mean, it absolutely could, as you say, particularly those businesses that are in, are in that early startup mode. And I think for any leader, it's going to shake your confidence to see this blip and perhaps not really understand why. You can start questioning your business model, how you're managing people, how you're managing your culture, especially if you're seeing your team lose motivation. But the reality is, this is a cycle we see every summer. So, the more we can do now to prepare for it, the less impact it's going to have on your people and your bottom line.
Al ElliottSo, summer, summer, it affects our brains, it affects our productivity, it affects our revenue. But the fact is it's June, so we've got potentially 4 weeks to kind of do something about it.
Leanne ElliottYeah, there's, there's still a little bit of time to take the edge off, um, the summer slowdown. And it isn't trying to force productivity or squeeze the absolute last bits of juice you can out of your, your team. It's really just about recognising the pattern and managing it in a bit of a smarter way.
Al ElliottOkay. So in this episode, we've put together 8 big questions that people ask around this sort of summer slump. And so we'll go through each one of these and we'll get Leanne's opinion. And then if there's something applicable that I can add to it, then obviously I will add to it. Does that sound good, Leanne?
Leanne ElliottSounds good to me.
Al ElliottSo question 1 is, how can we maintain team engagement when half the team is on holiday? So basically, I mean, this one comes up a lot really, doesn't it? Because basically what we're saying is half the team are off, so projects aren't getting completed, momentum is slipping. Oh, at that point, are we in danger of people disengaging, Leanne?
Leanne ElliottNot exactly. I think it's important to say that disengagement doesn't happen overnight. This would've been slowly potentially degrading. Engagement could be degrading over the last 6 months, even the last 12 months. So, people feeling disconnected in the summer isn't because it's summer, it's just that summer exposes it. Because the thing is, what holidays do is they give people space. They give people time to rest and reflect, and particularly with their partner, their family, their friends, that reflection often leads to quite big decisions. And it's actually why August is consistently the peak month for resignations in the UK.
Al ElliottIs that right?
Leanne ElliottYeah, yeah. So, you're likely to see an uptick in resignations in August if your engagement hasn't been going well. the year so far. Um, so yeah, it is, it's all about that perspective, isn't it? You know, Al, you'll have anecdotal, um, stories yourself of when you've had a break and started to reflect and then started to make big decisions in terms of, of work. Um, so if engagement is, has been low previously, it's likely to have an impact in summer. That's, you'll likely start to see people leave. On the flip side though, because there could be business leaders going, well, I'll just reduce the amount of time people can take off so they can't reflect. Yeah, that doesn't really work. And also what we know is that time off is essential for engagement. When people take the proper holidays, disconnect, they come back sharper, healthier, happier, and much more committed to the organisation. So, simply skipping rest will lead to disengagement and burnout anyway. So, it's not really the solution to prevent people from taking holidays. And I think we talked about on the show, didn't we, a few weeks ago about the holiday effect, how actually people do disconnect.
Al ElliottYeah.
Leanne Elliottproperly whilst they're on holiday. So, don't be calling them, don't be emailing them. Then they feel the benefits for much longer once they return, and those benefits include their performance and their productivity. So, it's a double-edged sword, really. You have to let people take that time off. You have to be prepared that if you haven't been investing in engagement so far in the year, you might be seeing a peak in resignations in August.
Al ElliottSo, now we're aware of that, we know that potentially If engagement hasn't been brilliant through the year, then August is that trippy— tripping point? No, what do I mean? Tipping point is exactly right. No R in there. Is that tipping point. So, is there anything from a psychological point of view, is there anything that we can be doing as leaders to sort of mitigate against that or stop that from happening?
Leanne ElliottIt's gonna be really hard if you haven't been investing in engagement already, but probably the best thing you can do is give people clarity because people will, your team will also be aware of the summer slump or the summer slowdown or the, you know, the impact summer has. So, I think really being upfront about the priorities of what the business is and where people's efforts are needed over summer is going to be really helpful and reduce some of that anticipatory— I never know that hashtag, anticipatory?
Al ElliottAnticipatory, that sounds fancy.
Leanne ElliottAnticipatory? Anticipatory anxiety.
Al ElliottLet's go for anticipatory.
Leanne ElliottAnticipatory anxiety. That's what I tell you. So, yeah, you're anxious because you can see the pain coming. Second, as I said, encourage time off, don't just approve it, promote it, because it's one of the strongest things you can do to show as a business owner you're investing in people's wellbeing, you're prioritising their rest and recovery time. And as we've seen from lots of studies recently, it's not about the kind of financial reward and perks that are really keeping employees sticking around. It is an understanding that their employer is invested in their own wellbeing. Wellbeing. So, definitely make sure that people are taking their holidays. And I think finally, recognise the effort for any of those who are going to be picking up the extra work potentially whilst others are away. Again, acknowledging that upfront, but also a simple thank you when they're covering perhaps for a colleague. I think summer doesn't have to be a threat to engagement, but it will potentially mirror where your engagement is currently at. So, if you start to see a bit of infighting, if you start to see resignations or people taking time off sick, then it's probably a really good indicator that your team is disengaged, and that needs to be a priority come the autumn.
Al ElliottOkay, that makes perfect sense. And I think also, just most people know this, when you take some time off, you go on holiday, if you're enjoying your work beforehand, but you might be slightly burnt out, Oftentimes when you go on holiday, you're sitting there, you're having— by the pool or whatever, and you feel like you renew your excitement for it because you've sort of just given yourself a little bit of a break. But talking of burnout, I think what we're saying here is that it's cool for those people who are sitting by a pool somewhere hot, but all the people who are left behind in the office are kind of picking up the slack. Now, we know it's going to be their time soon, but still, is that not a risk of burning out the people who are left?
Leanne ElliottMassive risk. Absolutely massive. risk. And this is really rooted in, in old-school occupational psychology. It's called the job demands-resources model, which is really quite intuitive. It basically says that when demands outweigh resources, people burn out, which is, you know, kind of makes sense. So if people are covering the extra work, if they're having to respond to more emails, or they're picking up extra clients to look after, or they're making decisions they wouldn't normally have to, When those demands spike, but you're not providing the people any extra resource in terms of time, support, autonomy, or even training, then yes, burnout will become more likely.
Al ElliottI know we've covered burnout a lot on this, but this is kind of like, sounds like a little sort of micro burnout. Uh, so what signs should we as leaders or business owners be looking for, for, to, to know that the, the, the people left behind might be getting to the edge of, of what they can cope with?
Leanne ElliottI think people tend to associate burnout, first of all, with exhaustion, and you might not necessarily see that initially. If it does show up, it might be somebody not looking as put together as they normally are, looking particularly tired, potentially being late. I think more than likely you're going to see cynicism, you're going to see resentment, you're going to see pushback when you ask them to do something, huffing, puffing, eye rolling, and potential detachment as well from work. So, maybe people who aren't as keen to organise the team lunch or stay after work.
Al ElliottMm-hmm.
Leanne ElliottOr even volunteer for certain things within the business they normally would have, that's probably a sign that these people are starting to burn out.
Al ElliottSo, I think the key question here has got to be, what can we do? Because it sounds like, this sounds a little bit depressing to me because I'm like, I don't know what I can do apart from not let people go on holiday or just expect or accept that things are going to be, you know, levels are going to be dropping. Is there anything we can actually do as leaders?
Leanne ElliottThere's loads that we can do, and this is a really good example of how We often forget that people and culture is also really closely linked to systems and processes and operations. So, this is actually really practical in terms of how you can manage it and really simple things like proper handovers. Like, you know, you, you actually set aside time in the diary before that person goes on holiday to hand over anything that they're working on, hand over any projects, know who they're handing over to and what needs to be picked up. And then with that, hand backs when they return, so they're not having to like trawl through 300 emails to get up to date. That should be the first thing that that person does on their first day back. It doesn't need to be particularly long. A 30-minute meeting is probably gonna be enough to catch somebody up. What works particularly well with that is if you have a buddy system, and it can be tricky to coordinate because you don't necessarily want to have a rule of, oh, if John's off, then Sarah can't be. But if you have a buddy system in terms of roles, Then it typically goes a bit easier because somebody will be so appreciative of a really good, um, handover to them. And, and likewise, the person coming back, that hand back, they'll want to do the same for that person in return when they're away. It breeds this kind of, um, civility and respect in the workplace, which is really, really helpful. One thing I think is super important is decide what your Organisational policy is going to be around emails, because there is nothing worse than coming back from holiday and feeling like you've got 2 weeks' work to catch up on, and you've got 1,000 emails to go through. One of the most brilliant out-of-offices I've ever seen, and I think it was maybe from somebody at a fairly— I want to say Metro Bank. I think it might have been one of the colleagues that we know at Metro Bank, and it said something like, this email isn't monitored.
Al ElliottHmm.
Leanne ElliottThis email inbox isn't monitored. I'm on holiday. This email will be deleted in 24 hours. If it's urgent, email this person.
Al ElliottOh, I like that.
Leanne ElliottYeah, so it's like, I'm not coming back to any emails at all. Um, and I thought that was a really smart way of kind of going, right, it's not just about who's going to monitor it and kind of put stuff on hold, it's going to be who's actually going to deal with any situation or query that is escalated to the point where we're going to have to get in touch with somebody else. I thought that was really smart because you know that probably 90% of those people will never forward on that email again. They'll just make a note to get back in touch when they're back. And I think the final thing as well is just looking at anything that can be trimmed within the organisation. Meetings, can you just reduce the number of meetings that you have over summer? Reporting, if people are spending ages on reporting, can that be reduced? And particularly now with AI, is there anything you can replace in terms of that automation? So, I think Looking at internal processes as well, and actually where people are spending their time can be a really helpful way to just kind of reduce that workload during these disruptive few months.
Al ElliottYeah, and I think AI is particularly good at taking a load of information and boiling it down to the important stuff. If you've got Google Workspace, then I think Gemini is now included in it, and it can actually start to respond to your email. I saw something this morning, actually, on X, a guy who'd created an entire workflow, a agentic workflow for his email. And essentially what it does is every incoming email, then it will put it into, does it need a response or not? If it needs a response, it'll draft a response and then send a Slack message to this person saying, right, these are in your drafts box to go and review that. And then if it needs a meeting, then it'll send the scheduling link. But, um, the prompt says something like, meetings are very rarely required. And so this guy had essentially just automated the entire inbox. Now, What about, Leigh, what about, so someone's away for 2 weeks and they're on a project. Um, the temptation is during those 2 weeks to CC someone in on emails. I'm sensing that's not a great idea.
Leanne ElliottNo. And this is where that handover and handback is so important. Like, I'm not, everything is going to be covered in those 2 meetings, those 2 conversations, everything you need to know about before I go and everything I need to know about when I come back. So you won't need the The CC'd in emails. Um, if something's particularly important in terms of having that audit trail, then maybe you'd request that certain emails get sent to you or that, or that you control that. I would like to be CC'd into any email from this person. But really, if the team is working well and that handover is, is in place, it's not really necessary for you to be CC'd in everything that happens.
Al ElliottYeah. And if you're a smaller business and you have control over what applications you can use, then something like Basecamp is a really, really good application because Not only does it allow you to have a little sort of catch-up thing, so it'll tell you what you've missed, but also it's just kind of like, we have a friend whose sort of tagline is anything but email. So do not send me an email unless you absolutely have to. And like you said, there doesn't seem anything more depressing than coming back to work and looking and seeing you've got 1,000 emails in your inbox.
Leanne ElliottYeah. And that's why a lot of employees are reluctant to take time off and why a lot of employees, particularly in small businesses or in In startup or scale-up mode, very few employees will take their full holiday allowance, which is really bad for our wellbeing and rest and recovery time anyway. And I think that the final thing I'd say on this is that leaders, it's really important that you model these behaviours too. Remember, holidays are only impactful if we actually properly disconnect from work. That means that if you are on holiday, senior leader, you are not checking your email, you are not replying to an email, you're not just calling the office to see if everything's okay. You are offline, because then that shows that that is the expectation of when you have time off, is that you are able to and have permission to fully disconnect.
Al ElliottOkay, so the third question that comes up a lot is, how do leaders and managers and business owners deal with people with kids? Now, obviously, we don't have kids, very happily kid-free, but my sister and my brother and your sister and brother do. Yeah, so if you've got kids, you're kind of juggling childcare. It's probably more expensive time for you because the kids are off school, but you're not. Um, there's lots of stuff to think about. So, is there kind of something which a leader or manager can do to help people who have got kids? And the second question I've got, which I'll ask you later on, is, are we giving them special treatment if they've got kids compared to if they're not? But we'll come back to that in a second.
Leanne ElliottI think, first of all, it is understanding, particularly if you're a business owner or a leader who doesn't have children, is having some empathy that summer is one of the hardest times of the year for, for parents and, and carers. Because you're trying to do your job, you're trying to organise childcare, you're trying to plan activities and cover, you know, the additional costs that, that your kids being off bring. And then also you're trying to be emotionally available and stable for those children all the time as well. So, it's a lot. As a mental load, it's really quite, really quite massive. So, I think for any leader, it's first of all empathising that the parents would probably prefer their kids to be in school too.
Al ElliottTo a certain extent, it's not just a question of actually doing all the stuff. You've kind of, you kind of got all this, all these questions and problems and concerns in your head already. Like, are the kids in childcare? Are they okay because they're not at school?
Leanne ElliottYeah, exactly. It's what I mentioned about the mental load. It does go up when you've got these demanding priorities in more than one aspect of your life at once. And when it builds up without that support, then it will turn into stress. And as we know, prolonged stress results in burnout. What I think is good news for an organisation is there's so much opportunity here to do better. I was reading an article by Mind and was interviewing Kooth, who I think we've had somebody on the podcast before from Kooth.
Al ElliottYes, we have, I think.
Leanne ElliottA platform that kind of offers support around this type of coordination of people and workforce. And it says something like, in the research they've done, half of working parents don't feel their workplace supports their needs. And only 1 in 4, oh sorry, and 1 in 4 have taken time off due to poor mental health as a result of this lack of support. Yeah, so it's really kind of a call to action, I think, for business owners to step up and kind of think, how can we support our parents and carers during this period?
Al ElliottSo, talking of supporting, give us some practical steps. Give us something which leaders and owners and managers can actually do.
Leanne ElliottFlexibility. And that is going back to your earlier question in terms of, are we giving people preferential treatment? No, because you should be offering everybody these things. It just happens that certain times of year is going to be more relevant to certain people, certain demographics in your workplace than others. So, can start times be adjusted? You know, can someone start a bit, a bit later and finish a bit later or split their working day? Remote working.
Al ElliottYeah.
Leanne Elliottcould be really helpful. It could be the exact opposite. It could be actually it's much more beneficial for the parent to come into the office on their workdays. Permission to step away for 20 minutes if, you know, something's going on with the children or something needs to be coordinated or handed over. And I think as well, it's understanding that it's not about a massive policy change. It's, as you said before, it's about trust. It's about making sure that people are still clear about what they have to deliver.
Al ElliottMm-hmm.
Leanne Elliottwhat the expectations are and giving people the autonomy and flexibility within their working day to manage that through.
Al ElliottYeah, and I think as non-parents, like, we don't really work in a conventional office, but I'd imagine that if you weren't a parent, then you feel probably quite resentful if you're taking on the work of someone because they've got kids. And it's like, you know, it's, it just doesn't seem that fair.
Leanne ElliottNo, it doesn't, which is why it's so important that all of these policies are organisation-wide. It's so important we have those, those handovers and handbacks of what we— what is happening with email, so it's not one person actually picking up the work. This is all so much of an operational problem as it is a cultural problem. It's understanding that workflow and making sure that the same people aren't always picking up the, the extra work. And I think with that, in terms of culture, it's normalising that this is going to be the case for everybody at some point, whether they have You know, a health concern, depending on their religion, they might need different times off of the year that are a bit more unconventional than typical Western Christian calendars. It could be that somebody has a family member who is unwell, or their pet needs to go to the vet, or, you know, there's a whole host of reasons why people will need this flexibility and will benefit from a really robust operational process around annual leave. This is going to benefit everybody. If it's applied to everybody and it's an organisational-wide policy. So yeah, I think that's the thing. And I think finally with that, with any issue around individuals within the workplace, is what resources can you offer as an organisation in terms of signposting? What do you know about children's clubs that are happening? What do you know about reduced childcare or childcare vouchers, that type of thing? There's lots of different resources that you can use. Coth is one of them that—
Al ElliottCoth.
Leanne ElliottThat we mentioned. So, yeah, I think it's really looking at all your EAP programme, for example, actually what practical support could be in place for parents as well, and of course, training managers, so they're having these conversations ahead of time to understand what individual needs somebody is going to need moving into summer.
Al ElliottOkay, some really good tips there. Question number 4 I've got here is, what strategies can we implement to prevent project delays during summer? Now, this is one which I think gets a lot of people. Because the work doesn't stop, but people do. And you're left wondering, like, is this project going to get finished at all? Are we going to let some people down? Are we going to get in trouble with our clients? So, what is it we can do to ensure projects stay on track, or is there anything we can do?
Leanne ElliottThere's loads we can do. And again, this is all about operations. I think, do you know what? I almost think that this period in terms of annual leave or annual leave in general over the, over the whole year. Should be project managed by somebody. Because if you think about all of the different combinations of people being off that might cause a challenge, you don't want to, you know, the 3 people who know about this one thing to all be off at the same time, or 3 people who look after a particular client or region at the same time. Um, I actually think this is a project in itself for somebody in HR or somebody in ops who's going to lead this and, and make sure everything's happening, that leave requests are getting processed. quickly and fairly, not to the detriment of any one person picking up extra work, and that these handovers and handbacks are really happening. So, I think first of all is actually look for somebody in your organisation who can project manage annual leave, because I think that would be a really helpful thing for you to do, because you're not going to get caught off guard, because you're going to plan and prepare for it in advance.
Al ElliottAnd just a little aside to that, I'm guessing that AI or ChatGPT or Claude or someone, that would be a perfect project for them. To just input all the people, what they're responsible for in a spreadsheet and say, right, make sure they don't overlap.
Leanne ElliottYeah, absolutely. Absolutely. That aside, in terms of individual projects, it's things that you should be building in anyway is contingency plans. You know, if somebody goes off sick or breaks a leg or suddenly leaves the business, it's no different really. So, I think the key things are, in terms of the actual project management side of it, if you've got key deadlines, try and get them in before that 6-week rush, that mid-July to the end of August, because it's not just your team that's going to have people off, it's going to be other businesses and your clients as well. So I'd say if there's anything that's like a really important deadline, aim to get it done before this 6-week period, or agree that it can be completed in mid-September, whatever that project needs. So you've got that cushion. Again, I think it's, you know, it's creating that handover process for each project, which will be part of the bigger handover for for the individual, but in terms of what's done, what's next, what can wait, who's covering what. Um, so, you know, if there are any red flags there and any gaps. Um, and again, it's those handbacks with that that are going to be really important. I think finally, what can be really effective— but I appreciate you're a bit short on time now— but something to, to think about and start investing in is start to cross-train. So, if you've got critical tasks or critical things in your business that need to be done, Make sure everybody's able to do it. For example, as simple as client onboarding, you know, that was, that was a job of, of, um, of the team that was kind of 2 below me, um, in one of my roles, but I was trained on how to onboard. My managers were trained on how to onboard, our admin staff were, our engagement partners were, everyone was trained on that because it's one of the most important aspects of, of the contract to keep performance moving. So, if there are any key things that, um, could really damage the momentum or revenue of your business. Make sure people are cross-trained. And I think if you've got somebody project managing all of this as well, then there's going to be priorities in place. There's not going to be panic. There's not going to be any shock surprises. There's not going to be any kind of Monday morning where you go, oh my gosh, I can't believe that, that Jo and Amanda are off at the same time for 2 weeks. Who's going to look after this client? That's just not going to happen.
Al ElliottOkay, so there's the first 4 questions. We've got 4 questions coming after the break. Don't go anywhere. Billion Dollar Moves, hosted by Sarah Chen Spellings, is brought to you by the HubSpot Podcast Network, the audio destination for business professionals.
Leanne ElliottJoin venture capitalist and strategist Sarah Chen Spellings as she asks the hard questions and learns through the triumphs, failures, and hard lessons of the crème de la crème so you too can make billion-dollar moves in venture, in business, and in life.
Al ElliottMaybe start with episode 124, where you're going to hear how industry giants from Canva to Listen to Billion Dollar Moves wherever you get your podcasts. So, welcome back. We are talking about the 8 major questions that people have around the summer slump, I think was what we called it. So, question number 5 is, how do we address the mental load that some employees may be experiencing? So, I think what we're saying is that if you've got half your staff away, Then essentially the remaining people are juggling more than just their job description. They're juggling all the other stuff, plus in their head, they've still got, oh my God, right, Derek's away. So we need to make sure X happens and who's gonna do that?
Leanne ElliottYeah. And the key to this is making sure that you're not missing any of the invisible stuff. And this is where training your managers and having these regular, regular check-ins are so important. There might be an assumption that if somebody doesn't have children, summer is gonna be business as usual for them. That's not to say they've not got lots of other things happening outside of work. It could be anything that's happening, just as it can at any point of the year. It just happens to fall in summer. So, I think making sure that you know what's going on behind the scenes of people who work for you in terms of any other responsibilities that they might be dealing with, because it's that cumulative strain that's going to add up. And then similarly for your parents as well, what other What other challenges are they battling? One that's getting increasingly common, actually, particularly with the kind of Gen X, older millennials, is that sandwich generation where you're caring for an elder parent and you've got fairly young children.
Al ElliottThat's called a sandwich generation?
Leanne ElliottI think it's called a sandwich generation.
Al ElliottI like that.
Leanne ElliottI've never heard that before. Unless I misunderstood that. But yeah, it's the people in the middle, right?
Al ElliottYeah, yeah, yeah. That makes sense.
Leanne ElliottSo, there's lots of different caring responsibilities going on. So, I think again, it's just really making sure that you're having those those check-ins, um, so you're not just kind of seeing dips in performance or low motivation as a sign of that, that's just not that interest in the job anymore. It might be they're dealing with lots of different things, and because of this summer, um, period, it's going to be a lot more, um, a lot more pressured.
Al ElliottNow, I know you, and I'm guessing you'll have done some reading around this, so go on, hit us. What's, what's the, uh, what does, what's the research say?
Leanne ElliottIt's, again, it's quite intuitive. You know, employees that are carrying this high cognitive load, so lots competing priorities in work and life, um, they're twice as likely to support symptoms of burnout. It's as simple as that. It's not, it's not really a surprise, but what the research has found that working parents in particular, um, can, can struggle. Um, I think there was actually, um, people in, in the study that I read, the qualitative study where they gather feedback, um, that parents basically said it's like a permanent sense of anxiety. Because there's so much to be juggling. So, with that as well, people do potentially, you know, might pull back, might start to disconnect from people at work, might start to make more mistakes. It's just being mindful that people might be trapped in this cycle of pressure and guilt, and they really need that support to help manage their priorities and time during that period.
Al ElliottCool. So, strategies for dealing with this. What can we do?
Leanne ElliottTalk to your people. It's, um, it's really not more difficult than that. It's making sure that people feel seen, people feel heard, people feel understood. And again, this is everybody in the organization, but you're going to have an idea at this point in time who are the people to prioritize in terms of those conversations. And everything we've said previously in terms of automating processes where you can, having those handovers, rotating responsibilities.
Al ElliottYeah.
Leanne ElliottYou know, these shared documents in terms of planning, or as you said, Basecamp, Al, having the platforms in place. It's really just making sure that you're being very transparent about it with your people. We understand this is a tricky time of year for some people. We're having those check-ins with everyone to make sure they're okay and that we can do, and then we're actually putting together some operational processes in place as well to make this period work more smoothly.
Al ElliottYeah, and I suppose no matter where you are in the year, you've always got this mental load, this kind of like, You've got stuck. You ever wake up and you're just like, oh my God, there's so much to do today. And then you start to do one thing, you start thinking about something else, something else. Um, I personally find that, um, I use Claude, uh, quite a lot and I'll very often just open a thread with Claude and just talk to him. Him? I'm sure he's a him. That's my, that's my thoughts anyway. I just talk to them and get it all out of my head, all the stuff I'm stressing about, maybe when I'm out with the dogs or perhaps having a cup of coffee in the morning. And then I go, right, okay, can you list out all the things I've told you and help me to prioritize those?
Leanne ElliottYeah.
Al ElliottAnd even just the, just the fact of just talking and getting it out a little bit, sort of, I feel, I find it takes a little bit of a mind off. The other thing which I do, which I think people must think I'm a little bit crazy, is quite often I'll put my AirPods in and then I'll go out for a walk with the dog and I'll just chat. I'm not chatting to anyone. I'm just chatting to myself. But just by talking out loud again, that really, really helps me. And that's possibly because I'm a bit more of an extrovert. So I tend to say things out loud and then start thinking about them as opposed to Leanne, who tends to think about them and then say them out loud. But all this is just helping to sort of just lighten that mental load a little bit.
Leanne ElliottYeah, that's a really good tip, Al, for an individual who's feeling a bit overwhelmed. Introverts, you might prefer to write it down if you don't want to speak it out loud.
Al ElliottOkay, so question number 6, can we leverage the quieter summer period for strategic planning? Now, this I really like. Funnily enough, we've been doing this over the last couple of days. So, coming up for June, July, August, we tend to, I think we go down to one episode a week in August, don't we, Leanne?
Leanne ElliottSo, We did last year.
Al ElliottYeah. So we, and we might do again this year, uh, because we want to, uh, we, we just literally want to have a little bit more time off over summer. But we have found this time of year sitting down and working out what we want to do, we have such a— oh God, I almost can't say this. We, we call it the North Star metric. And every— I've become a corporate knobhead, haven't I? Every quarter we'll have a North Star metric, and sometimes they'll be the same one, but they'll be like, right, okay, what are we— this, this quarter, what Whatever you're writing, talking about, whatever you're doing, what is the metric we're working towards? And we found that summer, it was really easy to talk about yesterday. We sat down for an afternoon, chatted about it, came up with that North Star, and then we were like, okay, right, we know what we're doing for summer. So if all we do is just that and hit that North Star, that's great. Anyway, I'm waffling a little bit. Strategic planning. Is this the time to do it? Or are we just actually just pretending that we're doing busywork because not everyone's here?
Leanne ElliottI think, I think it is potentially a time to do it. I think that it provides a really important temporal landmark, that midpoint of the year, when you're kind of at that, particularly in June, where we're like, we're looking back 6 months and we're looking forward 6 months. It provides a good, uh, natural time to reflect, just as typically spring and autumn tend to be, um, much more about planning and creating new habits and changes. Summer is a really good opportunity to reflect and, as you say, refine the direction of the business, the strategy of the business. I think what's really interesting about what you said, Al, is about understanding what your targets are for this period. It might be that you need to reduce some targets. It might be that there's others that you can increase, but it's kind of, again, that transparency over what people need to deliver.
Al ElliottYeah.
Leanne ElliottThere has actually been some research on this, which I was quite— I thought was quite interesting, that if it does have, um, if you do have a period of reduced reactive workloads of things that have to be very immediate, um, which might come in summer because you may be dialling down certain clients or other clients are away as well, so there's not as much crisis happening, um, that actually people kind of feel more psychologically safe, um, and introspective to undertake that type of strategy-type work. So, It won't be right for every organisation, depending on what it looks like for you over summer, but if it is a bit quieter, then it could actually be a really good time to look at strategy, look at what you've achieved so far, and look at what your goals are for the rest of the year.
Al ElliottYeah, so, I mean, I think from a business owner's point of view, it's a really good time just to sit down and start thinking about just literally reflective thinking. So, book an entire afternoon off, go somewhere else outside the office if you can. Go and just, I mean, I don't want to say the word journal because I think that's way overused, but if you can start writing down things, you can ask sort of 3 main questions here. Like, what should we stop? What should we start? What should we double down on? You know, these are the important questions. This gives you the brilliant period of time in order to start making some strategic decisions, but you've still got the time before the end of the year. You've still got half the year left to actually implement all these.
Leanne ElliottYeah, and another really great thing to do is potentially do a little pulse survey. I wouldn't recommend doing a full engagement survey, an insight survey, at this point of year, just because with people being off, it's gonna be hard to collect, um, probably the response rate that you'd need. But little pulse checks here and there, particularly within certain teams, just to give you an idea, particularly if, you know, going back to the very first thing we talked about, if you're a bit concerned that actually your engagement isn't great right now, and you might be getting a lot of resignations in. in August, it could be a nice little just temperature check to see how people are doing.
Al ElliottYeah, love it, love it. Okay, so question number 7, how do we ensure that remote or hybrid workers feel included during the summer? Great question. I think a lot of the— I think particularly if you're in the Northern Hemisphere, then you'll be thinking summertime, it's summer, it's lovely. If you've got people who are working perhaps in the Southern Hemisphere, it's different for them. How do we make sure they still feel included? How do you make sure that They don't feel invisible or worse, that they might feel overworked because if they're in Australia and it's not summer in Australia, then, you know, they might go, oh, they'll be fine. Just give them a bit of extra work.
Leanne ElliottAgain, I think when we talked about engagement, if your remote and hybrid workers are already disconnecting, this could be a time where that's going to really become very obvious. It shouldn't just be a case of, well, how are we going to keep our remote people engaged during these periods? You should be thinking about that all All year round. But again, I think it's, it's understanding that it's as much an operational conversation as it is a people and culture conversation. If you do have employees internationally, if you do have freelancers that are in the southern hemisphere, this could be a really good opportunity to sit down with them and go, look, do you want extra workload right now? Do you want to take on extra projects and responsibilities? We've got, you know, that, that work available with the understanding that come Your summer, you know, you would expect the same situation where we'll offload some of the work that you're doing. So, again, it's that workflow that really needs looking at in terms of your people. I think the thing I would mention as well about remote workers or hybrid workers is don't make any assumptions about where they want to work during this period. As we mentioned earlier, it might be that parents are much more productive and would want to be in the office more. They might want to go up to 4 days a week in the office.
Al ElliottYeah.
Leanne ElliottIt might be that actually they're much better remote because it's easier for them to pick up their kids because their mum lives down the street and looks after them during the day. So, I think again, it's having that conversation, allowing that flexibility, and not making any assumptions. And I think finally, I'd make it very clear for your remote and hybrid workers, and this is true at any time of the year, but particularly in summer, is for them to feel free to use their time and go outside if they want to. We've heard so much research on this recently in terms of touching grass and Forest bathing, being in nature is really productive. So, give them permission to do that Monday check-in on a walk. Give them permission to sit outside for an hour over lunch, or take that dog walk during the day and make up that work later on. Again, it's that flexibility and that trust. It's all about managing by outcome. So, make sure your remote teams also feel able to—
Al ElliottYeah.
Leanne ElliottTo enjoy and embrace the nicer weather if we have it.
Al ElliottYeah. And I suppose just one last tip around that is just if you do work remotely, either as a contractor or perhaps you do work literally remotely in a different country or something, it's always, you've got to make sure that people feel in the loop. And I think over summer, you've got to be even more careful of that because fewer people are off. So they might already be dealing with 3 members of staff and over summer, 2 of them might be off. So they could feel a little bit like, they're being left out. So just sort of being a bit more, what's the word you use? Intentionally. Is that the one you use?
Leanne ElliottYeah.
Al ElliottA bit more intentionality about everything you do. Um, and I suppose there's always like, you can do sort of like, um, events and sort of games and photo of the week. And I mean, it sounds a bit cheesy, but, um, there is a great company called, um, what's it called when, when, when there's loads of glitter, but it's like confetti. Uh-huh. getconfetti.com, I think it is. We had the, um, we had the founder on, um, a year or so ago, and she puts together virtual events. Um, and they're not cheesy, they're really good. Um, and there'll be, there's just some really good ideas on the website of how you can include more people.
Leanne ElliottYeah. And again, it's if you've got that flexibility. I know on a contract that I worked on, lots of our customers had children, so we switched up our, our kind of service delivery in the summer to include them as well. So, if we had courses around kind of parenting or social connection or that type of thing, we'd actually look at, or even healthy living. We did food courses with the children as well. Obviously, there's a bit more complications of insurance and consent and all that type of stuff. But yeah, there's a way that you can also switch around your actual service delivery over summer. It can have really great, great benefits, and the staff loved it as well, having all the kids in.
Al ElliottGreat. So, last question here, number 8, I've got, what role does positive psychology play in navigating the summer slowdown? I think this is— Leanne talks a lot about positive psychology. Um, I'm gonna ask Leanne just to define it quickly before she goes and answers this question in case you've not come across it. But I feel that if we can use science to make us all feel good, then we should definitely be using that. Le, so tell us, what is positive psychology and can it help us?
Leanne ElliottVery briefly, psychology traditionally focused on how do we get somebody from being broken to surviving. What positive psychology was the first to introduce an idea is how do we use psychology to get somebody from surviving to thriving? So, very in line with that normal psychology in inverted commas there. What is really interesting about positive psychology and about psychology in general in terms of seasonal impacts on us, we know seasonal affective disorder is a thing. We know that vitamin D deficiency significantly impacts our mood, our immune system, our health in general. So, there's lots of really nice health benefits that just come with summer in terms of more light exposure, more vitamin D, feeling, you know, that you have more energy. People are just typically in a better mood, which then boosts your mood. So, there's lots of different things that happen in summer that we can really take advantage of.
Al ElliottYeah.
Leanne Elliottto build our resilience during that, that period. Um, and it is those typical positive psychology interventions, things like, um, gratitude journaling, things like noticing achievements, encouraging people in meetings to, to share, you know, feedback in terms of what's been really impressed them that week. Because when you're already in a good mood, when you're already kind of starting at 6, it's really easy to push somebody to a 10. Um, there's loads of different things. There's random acts of kindness and all that, that typical thing. Um, so I think anything that can help people reflect on their strengths, how well things have gone so far in the year, things that they're excited about moving into, into the autumn— it, it— we just have a really nice context to be able to do all of these type of positive psychology interventions that they're going to have even more impact than they normally would.
Al ElliottCool. So there you go, there's your 8 questions all answered perfectly. Um, uh, there's obviously gonna be a transcript of this as well, so you can go through that because we've covered a lot here today. Leanne, if, if the listeners, if listeners are thinking, oh my God, that is quite a lot, is there one thing that we can do that will hopefully make summer better for us? What would you say?
Leanne ElliottThere's one thing that you can do operationally, and there's one thing that you can do psychologically.
Al ElliottOkay.
Leanne ElliottSo I think psychologically, make sure that, um, that people are, are feeling optimistic about The summer, they're looking forward to their time off, being reassured that they're appreciated for what they've done. They'll be very welcome back. Everything will be managed whilst you're away. We'll try and make this transition as easy as possible for you. Give people that, that reassurance that they can take their holiday and really enjoy it without spending it dreading coming back to work and all the work they're going to come back to. And I think operationally, get somebody now to project manage the summer, project manage annual leave within your business, and start to figure out who's on leave where.
Al ElliottYeah.
Leanne ElliottWhat needs to happen, who's doing the handoffs, the handbacks, actually plan that workflow through to give you transparency, your people transparency, and everybody, including your commercial performance, some reassurance that everything's going to be okay.
Al ElliottFabulous. And I suppose the one thing that I'm getting from what you said there is treating people like adults, and just also just being a little bit more empathetic, just thinking about other people, you know, and Um, and just being, being a bit nicer to each other, I suppose. You could talk about civility a lot, but actually, you know, if everyone's in this together, then yeah, very good. Okay, so we're back on Tuesday with another edition of This Week in Work, which we've got lots of bits and pieces in, including the news roundup, including a hot take, and including the world-famous weekly workplace surgery where I put your questions to Leanne. And next Thursday, uh, we've got 2 interviews. We haven't decided which one's going to go in, so we're not going to spoil it. We've got 2 interviews that we're not sure which one's going to go in next Thursday, one's going to go in the following Thursday.
Leanne ElliottYeah.
Al ElliottBut both of them are brilliant.
Leanne ElliottI think it's usually much more organized, but if you did listen to last Thursday, you'll realize why we're chasing our tails a little bit.
Al ElliottBut, uh, yeah, I was— see, Leanne, I was trying to pretend that we were just— just hadn't yet decided. In actual fact, we haven't actually had the conversation about which one's which. So we will see you next week. If you have enjoyed this, then some of the most important things, or some of the most things— the best things you can do for us is leave us a review. Um, I think the more people leave us a review, the higher up the search we come, and the more people find our stuff. And it's not for us, we do it all for you. Listen, well, not all of it for you because of sponsorship, but we do some of it. We do most of it for you to make things better.
Leanne ElliottYes. Um, I'm back on LinkedIn. Come over and say hi. Um, yeah, get in touch. All the links to, to book a call, follow us across wherever we're— we are. We're on LinkedIn really. Well, I'm on Instagram from time to time. And, and yeah, anyway, all the links are there. Come follow. We'll See you there.
Al ElliottSee you soon. Bye-bye.