I’ve talked about Results Oriented Work Environment (ROWE) before. It still continues to be something I’m fascinated by, especially as it evolves as a practice at Best Buy, a Fortune 100 company. Tim Ferriss at Four Hour Work Week has an interview with Cali Ressler, one of the architects of ROWE, that sheds some light on how it’s working:

ROWE stands for Results-Only Work Environment. In a ROWE, each person is free to do whatever they want, whenever they want, as long as the work gets done. Currently, there are two authentic ROWEs—Fortune 100 retailer Best Buy Co, Inc. and J. A. Counter & Associates, a small brokerage firm in New Richmond, WI. At both organizations, the old rules that govern a traditional work environment—core hours, “face time,” pointless meetings, etc.—have been replaced by one rule: focus only on results.

Read both part one and part two. I really think this ROWE has a lot to do with the future of work, especially as more Gen Ys take up careers.

On the newsfeed today is an article all the way from the Kannakee Daily Journal in Illinois titled Twentysomethings expect more than other employees. The article refers to a 2007 CareerBuilder.com survey that found that “employees younger than 29, which it refers to as Generation Y, expect more from their jobs than do older generations.”

That’s kind of obvious, isn’t it? I do kind of wonder if this isn’t just a constant feeling amongst newer workers, though. Did young workers in the 60s, 70s and 80s really walk into their first real career-style job expecting nothing but hardship and strife? Are we really the first generation that expects better than that?

The article does touch on what I think is the real reason behind this supposed phenomenon: “There is more job availability today, so this generation isn’t afraid to change jobs, and it’s used to adapting.”

So, really, maybe it isn’t that Gen Y is unique in expecting better, but rather that we’re the first to actually get it?

I spent a lot of time debating before deciding to launch this blog. One of the key articles that pushed me towards it I read almost a year ago. Business Week’s Smashing the Clock: No schedules. No mandatory meetings. Inside Best Buy’s radical reshaping of the workplace is a fascinating story that reveals a lot about the changing nature of work.

The official policy for this post-face-time, location-agnostic way of working is that people are free to work wherever they want, whenever they want, as long as they get their work done. “This is like TiVo (TIVO ) for your work,” says the program’s co-founder, Jody Thompson.

The comparison to TiVO is particularly apt, because it underlines one of the less obvious connections between new technologies and our working lives: that technology brings choice. For some reason, a lot of people tend to assume technology is all about efficiency, but that’s not really the case. It’s always been about choice. The choice to send a quick e-mail as opposed to writing and mailing a letter. The choice to edit those photos in-house with the click of a button instead of sending them off to a third-party with an X-acto knife and a darkroom. And, now, the choice to work a schedule that isn’t rigidly defined by your daily access to some largely irrelevant building.

It seems to be working. Since the program’s implementation, average voluntary turnover has fallen drastically, CultureRx says. Meanwhile, Best Buy notes that productivity is up an average 35% in departments that have switched to ROWE. Employee engagement, which measures employee satisfaction and is often a barometer for retention, is way up too, according to the Gallup Organization, which audits corporate cultures.

This is an old article, so I’d be interested in any kind of a follow-up on how it’s going now, but I suspect it’s largely the same. People, when not told exactly when they need to work, will tend to work more, not less. I think the big barrier management needs to get over when it comes to policy’s like Best Buy’s ROWE has nothing to do with any valid concerns of productivity, but rather losing control.

Photo by Ian Muttoo. Licensed under Creative Commons