WiseWork is now the brand name for an exciting new approach to work design, based on a set of principles designed by Peter Thomson. It builds on his experience as a director of Wisework Ltd for the past 17 years and his work running the Future Work Forum at Henley Business School. He remains the sole Director of Wisework Ltd and continues to speak and write about all aspects of the future of work. He now has a team of Partners who help him to deliver WiseWork advisory services.
In a nutshell, WiseWork is a way of working that has been consciously designed to adapt to a continually changing future. It builds on experience gained from the development of flexible, mobile and agile work practices, but takes an innovative approach. A longer description is available in the What is WiseWork guide?
There are many good business reasons for implementing WiseWork. We’ve gathered together 26 of them in the form of an A to Z guide.
WiseWork is about getting work done in a way that meets the needs of the employee and the employer. It’s about:
- defining outcomes and agreeing results
- giving people the flexibility to choose how to get the work done
- trusting people to get on with the work
- designing adaptable workspaces (real and virtual)
- creating a highly engaged and productive culture
This is not just another form of flexible working. It’s an approach to work design that assumes people will rise to a challenge and will respond positively to taking on new tasks. It’s about job enrichment, encouraging people to find new ways of getting their work done instead of asking them to follow rigid procedures.
WiseWork taps into the talents of the workforce by encouraging people to use their initiative. It does not assume that all wisdom emanates from the top of the organisation. It’s the reverse. It assumes that the person doing the job is most likely to come up with better ways of doing it, if they are encouraged to do so. This means giving the maximum freedom to individuals to decide how to get their work done and measuring them on their results.
WiseWork combines the best ideas about high performing organisations with the latest thinking about employee engagement to produce increased productivity and job satisfaction. It challenges some conventional management thinking along the way and requires leaders to take a critical look at the way they run their operations.