Ben 0:06
Hello and welcome to Freelance Corner. I'm Ben and this is Orla.

Orla 0:09
Today we're speaking to Lizzie Penny. Lizzie is an entrepreneur, co founder of flexible working community The Hoxby Collective, and co author of the new book The Workstyle Revolution. Today, Lizzie will be speaking to us about the new book and the future of work.

Hi, Lizzie, welcome to the show. It's great to have you here.

Lizzie 0:28
Hello. Thanks for having me on!

Ben 0:30
It's great to have you here. I think the first thing our listeners want to know is what is the book that you wrote with your co author Alex Hirst and why should they buy it or read it?

Lizzie 0:38
The book is about a word that we invented, we came up with it in the pub, I think we're all the best ideas start. And that word is workstyle. The book is really about the freedom to choose when and where you work. And it was at a time when I had my first child. And I'm embarrassed to say that my eyes were opened for the first time to inequalities in the workplace. At that point, Alex had been through burnout. So he had his own mental health challenges. And as a result, we were discussing how we could work differently and better. And we came up with this concept of workstyle. You know, what if everyone could be judged on their output, and could choose when and where they worked. And we're not talking about flexible working or hybrid working or any of the other ways of working that tweak the nine to five, five day a week, we're talking about truly having the freedom to choose when and where you work. And so we came up with that idea. Eight years ago, we went out looking for an organisation that was doing it and found there wasn't one. So we founded a social enterprise and B Corp called hawks B. And we really did that to test the idea. And since then we've had 2500 freelancers go through that community, we do work for some of the biggest businesses in the world, Unilever, divine chocolate, Sony, AIA. And so we've been testing it in practice and doing our own research study. So we thought now was a good time to write a book, particularly post pandemic, when suddenly everyone seems to be thinking about working differently.

Orla 2:10
It would also be great to know how you found the process of writing that book.

Lizzie 2:14
It was tough, I don't think we're gonna be rushing to write another book. It's the biggest thing we've ever done, both in terms of writing lots of words, but also, it forced us to distil every idea to discuss everything, people always say to Alex and I, how did you divide it up? We didn't divide it up, we co wrote every single word we discussed every paragraph. And really the place that it came from was a desire to spread the word of workstyle, beyond our own network. And also for me, personally, I was diagnosed with breast cancer in 2020. And that really was a time when I was reflecting on what I wanted to leave behind as my legacy. And we wanted to make sure that for my children, they could read about what I was fighting for, even if I couldn't tell them myself. And so it felt like it's not like we're planning on writing a series of books. This is the book where we wanted to lay it all out and be really clear about how it works and why it's amazing. And really, how Workstyle can transform society, but also wellbeing and productivity, because that's what we found it's done for us in the last eight years.

Ben 3:26
How has the idea changed over the past eight years, because I assume like obviously, the pandemic, I had never worked from home until then, and I assume a lot of people hadn't thought of that. Like has the idea like progressed and changed, or was it quite similar for when you were at the pub, having a few drinks, talking about this word you've come up with?

Lizzie 3:44
It's the exact same as when we were in the pub is the truth. But what's changed is the world has really changed. When we came up with the idea. We used to tell people about it and it would take so much explaining, they just couldn't understand the freedom to choose when and where you work, they couldn't understand that you could work from a tree, you know, you can attach an Autodesk now to a tree and work from a tree. They just couldn't grasp that concept at all. Whereas as time's gone on, people have become more open minded to working from different places, coworking spaces have grown. But also during the pandemic, even the naysayers who used to say to us "This just can't be done", were forced to work in a different way. And I think that's the biggest shift that we've seen is that people have changed their perspectives. Now people are open to the idea of Workstyle. Whereas before, people still felt work should be office based and nine to five.

Orla 4:42
In reflection of what you've just said about the kind of culture post pandemic and how it really took a literal pandemic for people to see the kind of options available to them for remote working. So I thought it would be good to ask where did the nine to five come from? What happened to it and why do you think it's coming to an end?

Lizzie 5:01
There's quite a bit in the book about the history of work. Alex and I are both geeks. So there's a fair amount of work geekery in there. So the nine to five working day is a 200 year old concept. And it was invented by this incredible social reformer called Sir Robert Owen, or Sir Bobby O, as we call him in the book, because we're mega fans. And when he came up with the concept of the eight hour day, that was totally revolutionary, you know, actually, that was really progressive, people were working much longer hours. And it was the first time where he split the day into three parts and essentially said that you should have eight hours labour, eight hours recreation and eight hours rest, and the eight hours rest totally still stands today, we should all be having eight hours rest if we can. But I think he would be turning in his grave to know that we still work eight hour days, 200 years later, when many things have transformed, but particularly technology has completely transformed the way that we work. Laptops are more portable. But also software has been invented that means we can collaborate asynchronously and we can tether to our phones so that we literally can work from anywhere that we can get reception. So I think the history of work is is really interesting, because there's this kind of 200 year old concept of the eight hour working day, the nine to five working day, which we still flex around. But there's also this concept of flexible working so people think that is really progressive. And actually, that's 70 years old. So that's actually quite an old concept now, flexible working. And we don't believe in flexible working because we believe in the individualization of work. So we think that we should fundamentally level the playing field so that everyone can choose when and where they work, rather than adjustments and tweaks being made to the nine to five, five day a week, working week. And that is different from the way most people work. But I think a lot of freelancers will understand that. And one example we give in the book is that we talk about, if you say to people in a traditional mindset, I work three days a week, they'll say what do you do with the other two days? Whereas if you talk to a Workstyler and you say I work three days a week, they'll say what do you do with the other four days? And I think that is a freelance mindset. There's a reason that Hoxby is a freelance community, we set it up as freelancers because we think it's freelancers that believe you can choose when and where you work, you have to have that autonomy in order to really adopt Workstyle working.

Ben 7:30
What would you say someone who is quite sceptical about Workstyle, who maybe goes "I want to go freelance, but my clients say I have to speak to someone these days and I have to be coming there." So it sort of forces them into a nine to five, what would you say to someone in that situation?

Lizzie 7:45
I think that's so interesting. So we are learning and experimenting all the time with Workstyle. But the reason that we're a community is because you cannot do this on your own. So it's about the individualization of work, it's about working in an autonomous way. But the only way we can do it is by working together as a community. What that means is you need to have people who in your team on your project, who between them can all respect their Workstyle. And that takes work. So the way that we set up projects at Hoxby means that at the start, we understand everyone's Workstyle, or will curate for specific opportunities based on Workstyle, if you need to be able to work at a particular time or happy to have a call at a particular time. So it's really when you work collaboratively, that Workstyle can work. And I think a really good example of that is Alex and I. So we're joint CEOs, we're co founders, and we can both respect our Workstyle because one or the other of us can always pick something up. For instance, I'm doing this recording, Alex is on holiday in Dorset. That I think is one of the things we've really found through Hoxby is you need to have the right size team we never do any work single-freelancer-to-client, it's always a team of at least two and normally it's a team of 10 or 20. Because that's the way that we know we can respect everyone's Workstyles. But we love a conversation with a sceptic, Ben, like any other questions like do grill us because we're still learning as we go.

Ben 9:14
No I just I just think it's very interesting, because I've never been freelancing myself. But I've worked at companies where they have freelancers, and it's always like, they say I'm working this time working that time. And if my idea if I've worked, for say, a big organisation, and we all had different Workstyles, I guess the handovers would have to be the most important thing.

Lizzie 9:37
Yeah. And I think it's also about the fundamental ways of working so that things don't need to be handed over. So for instance, at Hoxby, we've got 500 people working in 35 countries, and we use Slack. We don't have an office, Slack is our office. And what Slack does is it means you can have transparency of what's going on all the time and we have various other systems as well. But we've got the right systems in place to mean that you don't need handovers almost, you just need to be upfront about your work style and all have visibility of the rest of the project. So early on, we learned that this way of working requires a digital-first mentality and a trust based mode of operating. If you don't have those two things, it doesn't work. So you need to build a culture around it that fosters the trust. And you need the right systems in place to facilitate that digital-first asynchronous working.

Ben 10:34
Okay, well, you're convincing me, I don't know about you Orla.

Orla 10:38
I'm slowly getting more and more convinced. So as a freelancer, if I was interested in joining the Hoxby community, how would I go about doing that?

Lizzie 10:47
We are open for applications once a quarter, the first month of every quarter. And there is an application process because we want to make sure that everyone who joins the community does brilliant work, because ultimately, it's a trust based community. And also that everyone who joins the community really believes in our vision. So we have a vision to create a happier, more fulfilled society through a world of work without bias. And so we really want to make sure that everyone is, is kind of aligning behind that vision. We do accept applications year round from people who are in the seven excluded groups that we talk about in the book. So the way that we think workstyle can have a really big impact on society is through including people who are fundamentally excluded from work in the current nine to five, five day week model. So those seven groups are neurodiverse people, people with illness, carers, parents, ageing, mental health, people with mental health challenges, and people with physical disabilities. So from those groups, we accept applications at any any month of the year. So for anyone who's interested in joining, we would say go to Hoxby.com, forward slash apply. And we also have vacancies open all the time for specific areas where we need more people.

Orla 12:06
Fab, I think that's a really good point about, you know, the accessibility for people who you know, maybe have identify as neurodiverse or, you know, have a chronic illness or something like that. So it's really great in that regard as well.

Lizzie 12:20
And, and I think what's interesting for me is I started Hoxby, and Alex and I came up with the word workstyle when I was in one of those excluded groups. I had just become a parent. And since then, I've actually stretched across a couple of the other ones with my own experience of breast cancer and with taking on more of a caring role within my family for a family member. So that's really helped me to understand the power of workstyle. How it means you can keep working, you can maintain financial independence, you can stay distracted, you know, for me not being defined by cancer was so important to me. The other thing that I would say is that for freelancers thinking of applying to join Hoxby, it's not just about the work. So many people join for paid work and we do have paid work for many people, but other people join just for the sense of community for being a part of a movement that they believe in and getting inspiration from other brilliant freelancers.

Orla 13:22
That's really exciting. I'm actually like, really excited to buy this book, I'm totally sold now. You've got me!

Lizzie 13:30
You can tell Alex and I are extremely passionate about this. And we really think it can change the world. Like it really can fundamentally change how we work if people adopt this kind of individualised approach to work.

Ben 13:43
Do you find with how you're sort of describing it to people, that it works for certain industries over others. So maybe it works more creative than let's say I was to just think of a random job like a just someone who's like a gig economy worker, like, is it, does it lend itself more to others?

Lizzie 14:00
I think this works better for knowledge workers than, for instance, frontline workers. And that's something that often people will say to us, well, this only applies to people who can, you know, don't have to go into an office, which is true to some extent. But there is a case study in the book about a nursing organisation that essentially uses workstyle autonomous working, so it can be applied to other industries, as well. But I think within freelancing, you know, or within knowledge work, it can be applied to anything, it really can. It just takes the visionary leadership to be willing to try it. And I think it's partly down to an organisation to say we're going to run a pilot of workstyle but it's also partly down to individuals to start using the word workstyle. And saying when they're getting involved in new projects, this is my work style and trying to set those boundaries. We talk in the book about set, project and respect that you almost need to understand yourself, know your circadian rhythms, know the environment that you best work in, set the times that you think you're most productive for doing deep work, shallow work, whatever it might be, then project that by telling other people about your work style, and then try and respect it as far as possible. And we tend to find people are better at respecting other people's work styles than respecting their own, everyone's really good about respecting other people's but their own, they kind of feel feel bad. So that's something that we try and support lots of Hoxby's with.

Ben 15:35
Has it been hard to explain it to like clients or potential businesses, because obviously, there'll be like, I just want to hire a freelancer to do X or Y or Z, you know, rather than hiring a group who will then sort of do a baton, although not Not, not giving it to the other, you know, I mean.

Lizzie 15:51
No, yeah. collaborate in new ways. Yeah. So I think to begin with, we didn't tell clients, particularly, we didn't hide it from them. But we didn't, we said, look, we're just another agency, don't worry about the way that we work. And for instance, when we started working with Amazon, they said to us, well, I don't care how you work, what I care is that you deliver brilliant work, and you're brilliant, so we're gonna keep working with you, which was very nice of them. But over time, the more we've become campaigners for workstyle, and wanted to see the societal change that could come off the back of it, the more we do make it clear with our clients that this is how we work. And actually, for them, it's a benefit, they get a better level of service, because often we'll have people across different time zones, turning things around quickly or being more available. It's partly that we're we're working with more and more impact led clients. But also I think the world is moving on, I think more and more organisations are open to different ways of working. And if you're delivering great output, ultimately, they're happy to try something different. But we do, though we're a freelance community, we to our clients, we are an agency or a consultancy in working practices, or HR or creative comms marketing, rather than them seeing us as somewhere where I go to get a freelancer to do a particular project.

Orla 17:16
Why was Hoxby set up as a freelancer model rather than an employer model?

Lizzie 17:21
So I think we wanted everyone to really have autonomy to choose when and where they worked. And we felt the only way they could do that is if they weren't employed, because that implied a level of control. But also, we already knew that freelance working is fundamentally better for diversity and inclusion. So for example, research that has been done at Trinity College, Dublin, found that the earnings differential between men and women is 72% less amongst freelance workers than it is in the employed workforce. So already, we knew that freelance working was more inclusive. And that was what we wanted to perpetuate. In the book, we talk about closing gaps with those excluded groups that I've mentioned, each of them have a gap that we want to close. So for instance, 77% of people with autism want to work, but only 32% do so there's a 45% gap. And we felt that the best structure for Hoxby in order to try and close that gap was to work with freelancers.

Ben 18:24
Speaking about sort of workstyle, how do you convince businesses about workstyle? And how do you convince them to work with you?

Lizzie 18:33
It's a challenge that everyone says to us, well, no one actually works nine to five, because I work flexibly or whatever. When there are some fundamental problems with flexible working, you know, it creates in group out group dynamics, which means there's kind of the main group who work nine to five, five days a week, and everyone else is feels a bit left out. It's also flexing around an old system rather than being progressive. And it also hasn't closed those gaps that I was talking about earlier. So in terms of the excluded groups, it hasn't made any difference to six of the seven groups. So it isn't a universal, universally beneficial way of working. But yes, that is a barrier we face. But then that's also why we've written the book, which is we've been testing this and proving it for the last eight years. And now we want to tell everyone about that. And so we're hopeful that the book will be the thing that makes people realise that this is actually something really important that can be done. And in the book, we use workstyle stories, which is there are stories from people who are actually workstylers across those excluded groups that show the power of workstyle. But also we have geek boxes, which are expert contributors. And it really lays out the robust research based, you know, rationale, as well. So it's kind of across everything, but it is a challenge. Everyone wants to work flexible working except us, or four day work week, anything like that where we're not fans.

Ben 20:06
Yeah, no, I hear a lot of four day work week in the press nowadays. I think it's, it sounds appealing, but then I sort of think what if you, you know, when you're going on a bank holiday, and I always find like the Tuesday have to take up everything that you did the day before. I guess workstyle that wouldn't be the case, you're not always catching up?

Lizzie 20:26
That's what's amazing, you know, I didn't work on a Wednesday during term time. It's brilliant. I come back on a Thursday and everything's move forward without me, just brilliant. And there's always someone working we have a channel called the water cooler, there's always someone hanging out in the water cooler. So it's also really sociable and you connect with people all around the world. I think one of the things you will often say is if you're not meeting people in real life, how are you building relationships? How can you build connections, and there's a chapter on it in the book, but we build really deep connections through Hoxby. Because of my breast cancer, I'm going through early menopause and there's an interest menopause group in Hoxby. And I've met some incredible people from around the world who I would never have had the confidence to talk to in real life. And I feel really close to them for understanding what they've been through and for their support of me. And so I think that whilst meetings in real life, have a place, you can also build deep and different connection by not being together, we have a big annual meet up once a year. But that's for fun, not for work. We think work should happen asynchronously. And fun, fun is the thing that you can occasionally meet in real life to do.

Ben 21:37
Definitely a good point. I don't think I'd ever want to go to like a pub or like, you know, when people are doing like drinks and quizzes during the pandemic. I'm not going I'm not going back to that.

Orla 21:46
Don't send me back, please!

Ben 21:51
Not to be a sceptic again, but

Lizzie 21:54
Be a sceptic it's fine.

Ben 21:56
Is workstyle only for people that have worked a nine to five first or have gone through university.

Lizzie 22:01
No, no, it's not. No, it's not. Absolutely not. There are a number of people, but one in particular within Hoxby who actually shared something on LinkedIn last week about how she was a school leaver, and she joined Hoxby, and she just hasn't looked back. She's your classic digital nomad. We never know where she's gonna be. She gets on a plane. And you know, and she is amazing, you know, she's progressed at lightning speed in Hoxby, she does huge projects by herself, she's on our leadership team. And she didn't go to university. And she also didn't work in a traditional business first to learn the ropes. In fact, I would say she's better at workstyle working. And so are all of those kinds of people within Hoxby than for instance, Alex and I are because we have to unlearn all of our conditioning to think we should be working five days a week, nine to five, whereas she literally will work two in the morning on a Saturday, because she wants to be able to go out on a Thursday night instead. So I would say the opposite. I would say that we actually see a generation that's coming into the workforce with fundamentally different expectations of work, who will embrace and thrive in this environment in a way that actually those of us who have a bit more experience in traditional working, find it much harder to adjust to.

Orla 23:19
Yeah, no, I absolutely love that. And you know, the thing where, you mentioned about unlearning what we've been conditioned in terms of structure and our work culture. I was thinking about that while you're speaking and it's so true. But also harking back to when you mentioned circadian rhythms. So that really plays into it as well. And I find that concept and reality quite interesting.

Lizzie 23:42
There's a workflow story in the book of a guy who does his best work at night. And he spent years trying to fit in to working in a nine to five job and hated it, and then went to work for himself and now works in the night and often works with clients in the US, who is perfect for to work in the middle of the night. When we talk in the book about productivity, I think it's really interesting the levels of personal productivity that you can create, by designing your own work environment, for instance, can make you up to 35% more productive just from choosing what you have around you. But also being able to work as it fits with your circadian rhythm, which is proven to make you more productive. So there are lots of elements like that, that really do make you more productive if you work in an individualised way. We also know that going to an office and for instance, working in an open plan office is bad in a myriad of ways. There are so many ways that makes you less productive. And yet still organisations seem keen to kind of press on with doing that and I think it's because of presenteeism. I think it's because organisations only believe people are working if they can see them. When of course we know that that is just not true.

Orla 24:58
Yeah, and I suppose the pandemic just threw that all out of the window unexpectedly.

Lizzie 25:02
I think what happened in the pandemic, though, was that there was this kind of enlightenment for individuals, that, that we almost went through a phase where individuals understood that actually they can work in their own way, they can fit work around their lives rather than the other way around. But politicians and organisations are still looking at it through the old lens and are thinking, okay, the pandemic is, you know, over which for starters is not. But yeah, panic and say, well, let's all go back to the office, which I think for us is almost the most devastating thing, which is that this is our opportunities for innovation and for change. And the thought that we would just go back to how we were is, you know, it's just awful, particularly for those excluded by that kind of working.

Ben 25:49
Yeah no Jacob Rees-Moggs going around the civil service, putting a card going "we miss you".

Lizzie 25:55
Well, and the same with Boris Johnson, you know, saying that he couldn't work from home because he got distracted by cheese and coffee, you know, these, like, regardless of what political party you support, these are leaders, visible leaders of our country, who are not advocating trust based working, which directly erodes autonomous working and the individualization of work, which, as we lay out in the book could make massive progress for the economy, as well as for society. So yeah, it's pretty, pretty bleak at times, but we're still hopeful. If enough people can read the book, then maybe that'll all change.

Ben 26:29
We'll put it in the show notes.

Lizzie 26:31
Yeah thank you.

Orla 26:34
And finally, if you had to pick three things that you've found useful or inspiring for your career, what would they be? And why?

Lizzie 26:42
Oh, question. Okay, so So the first thing would be a person, which is Dame Stephanie Shirley named Stephanie, Steve Shirley, who we are very lucky to have written the foreword for the book. She was really the workstyle Trailblazer 50 years ago, when she sets up freelance programmers, only for her crusade to be swept aside by the invention of far less progressive, flexible working, she had to change her name and call herself, Steve, because gender equality was so poor at that time, so she was an inspiration for us that if she could do that back then and turn it into a multimillion pound business, then we can definitely do this now and change some people's lives. So that was the first thing. The second inspiration would be my family. Because I think having children was the catalyst for all of this, but it's also the thing that inspires me to create change for future generations. And to kind of consider what my legacy might be. And then the third thing would be Alex, my partner in crime, who's made it such a fun roller coaster, the last eight years, anyone who works for themselves knows that the highs are very high and the lows are very low. And I couldn't have done it on my own. And I would definitely never have written a book if it hadn't been for Alex. So he's kept it fun the whole way through. So I'm very grateful for that.

Ben 28:07
I think that's a really good note to end things on. Thanks so much, Lizzie. It's been great speaking to you.

Orla 28:12
Thanks so much, Lizzie. It's really great to hear of your inspiring journey and I can't wait to read the book.

Lizzie 28:18
Thank you for having me.

Ben 28:23
That's it for this week's episode. You'll find information on freelancing in the show notes below. And on the Freelance Corner website. As promised, you'll also be able to find the direct links where you can buy Lizzie's book, The Workstyle Revolution.

Orla 28:35
Do you have a question about freelancing that you want us to put to an expert? Drop us an email at content at freelance corner.co.uk We'd love to hear your queries.

Ben 28:48
If you enjoyed the show, make sure you follow us so you don't miss out on our next episode. You can find us on all major platforms and let us know what we should quiz an expert on next time.