Mondays, or the start to your work week, are often characterized to be less motivating and more stressful. But they can also be ways to reset goals and build productive and healthy habits. Fisheye Learning is here to give you the inside scoop!
Lots of research has linked the Monday spooks to changes in sleep patterns. According to an article in The Age, Professor Leon Lack of Flinders University shared that they “discovered that these [weekend] sleep-ins are actually putting your body out of whack enough to change your Sunday night bedtime and set you up for Monday blues.” When conducting his research, his team found that the “participants’ body clocks had been delayed by 45 minutes” after going to bed later on the weekends.
How you feel on a Monday is also likely to depend on how you feel about your job, too. A Gallup poll found that “only 15% of the world’s one billion full-time workers are engaged at work. It is significantly better in the US, at around 30% engaged, but this still means that roughly 70% of American workers aren’t engaged.” It can be mentally challenging to get back into the work mindset when you lack engagement and motivation.
So how do we mend this?
At Fisheye Learning, we like to look at improving teams from different lenses. Whether you're the employee or the manager, there's always a way to improve your productivity and team engagement, especially on a tough Monday.
Employees
Build a better routine. That means monitoring your sleep and activity levels consistently. Maybe even start your Mondays with something that you enjoy and excites you to start every week.
Plan your Monday on Friday. Organize your work area and your to-do list before leaving the office on Friday so that you’re not thinking about the smaller tasks that you need to prepare for the coming Monday.
Focus on the elements that motivate you most from your job.
Managers
Setting a positive and friendly tone on a Monday. Emailing something funny or lighthearted for folks to see in their inbox day their first day back from their weekend.
Encourage teams to complete their projects on Friday so that they do not have upcoming deadlines weighing over their weekend and into their Monday.
Minimizing meetings on Monday or adapting them to be more informal. Minimizing meetings can give staff time to get back into their routine and lessening the pressure of preparedness for check-ins can ease the stress of needing to be fully prepared on a Monday.
Check out some more ideas from Indeed!
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