My co-workers had many excellent suggestions: timely and appropriate equity increases (from my professional experience that was accomplished by changing jobs), less segregated and more teamwork design of responsibilities, outside work team-building activities.
I realized that one of the things I would love to see is compensation based on direct output. It might be hard to quantify in accounting but I think it is possible. Starting with base line of expectations and compensation the focus could be on overall company's goals simplified to smaller projects. Project could be assigned a dollar amount. I realize that this would entail close management-staff interaction and much greater preparation, training and time investment on management's part. Annual goal setting would become more meaningful. Such change would redesign management's role in itself, which often times entails more work upfront. Over the long run this effort would result in higher employee development and satisfaction, higher amount of work entrusted to employees with appropriate skill set (as upper management would be closely familiar with their staff, their current skill level, as well as possibilities and interests of future development). Such approach to work would result in more rapid company's advancement due to facilitation of all inclusive and highly participatory environment.
Another item on my list is flexible work hours and work arrangements. There are times that everybody need to be together at the office to produce results, like month end close in accounting. On a regular month busy time lasts a week or so when quarter or year-end close last longer. For the rest of the month accountant's time is occupied with preparation of various schedules and/or projects. Many of those items can be completed outside the office. As long as an accountant has internet access many tasks can be completed at the office, home or anywhere else in the world. Most still commute to the office on the daily basis. Interesting phenomena is becoming increasingly obvious that physical presence does not necessarily means more face-to-face, personal interaction. For convenience and documentation purposes email is used to communicate information to the person sitting next to you! I believe that overall flexible schedule and work arrangements would help improve health of organization. Commuters will have more precious time to spend with their families, working out or maybe even working instead of being stuck in traffic. The increased quality of life would increase productivity per employee as well as rate of retention. I realize that this would be a big shift from how work has been done in the past and might require appropriate adjustments based on the events and activities at hand. Overall I believe that suggested flexibility and openness would give more ownership to the person in charge resulting in higher rate of retention and production per employee.
Third item on my list is more time off in vacation days. In the United States two weeks vacation package seems to be pretty standard. In many developed world countries vacation time average four weeks. I think there are many benefits for increased time off. Today we are increasingly more dependent on each other than ever before and such trend will continue. World wide communication takes place via our smartphones, which at this point never leave our sight. Yet best experiences and friendships are formed on a face-to-face basis. Human is a curious creature and the charm of packing your car for a road trip or boarding a plane for a new destination is as present as ever. Not until you walk the streets of a city, sit down for a meal at a local eatery or have a chat with a stranger you can receive a gift of understanding of oneness. Even with all the changes in the world over last 30 years, friendships and recognition of yourself in the other person is accomplished by an old fashioned and outdated face to face interaction. This is accomplished by taking yourself out of your daily circumstances and going on a trip, which is accomplished via time off from work. It is also quite beneficial if a person decides to use his or her time off by relaxing or organizing their home. The house work will get done physically present in the office or not. By having an opportunity to live a life outside the office people will be more refreshed and productive at work.
Last point I decided to leave for meditation. I am not fully convinced if meditation is an individual or company wide decision as benefits such as stress relief, higher clarity, productivity and creativity would be highly desirable for any company in any field. Oprah, Dr Oz and many others sponsored and hold twice a day meditation sessions in their companies; they have been outspoken about many benefits not only to individual employees and their personal lives but the company's bottom line as well. It is an investment for a company and just like anything else it depends on a case-to-case basis how much willingness there is to invest. Here is an example of how Wall Street using TM to help with their stress.
