Last week Liz Ryan of BusinessWeek had a great idea: use this time before New Year's – when, unless you're in the retail space, many of your customers are unavailable – to encourage your employees to "dig out, reorganize, and de-clutter their workstations and their minds."  In short, declare Production Bankruptcy for a day.

With 2009 action plans hot off the press (or printer, as it were) or getting dusted off starting next week, the remaining non-holiday days this week – Wednesday and Friday – would make ideal candidates for this cleansing process.  I especially like the personal touch Ryan endorses, which will certainly stand out for those customers you do reach this week:

Tell workers it's O.K. to do things the old-fashioned way that day.  Encourage them to write notes, make phone calls, and think about reducing the electronic information overload when they get back to "normal."  This is a good time for people to rethink their habits and start new ones.

We make New Year's resolutions for our personal lives, so why not for our work lives as well?

Regular Recharging at 2008 Top Small Workplaces

Recharging of individuals as well as teams is a regular occurrence at the 15 small firms that we honored as Top Small Workplaces in October along with The Wall Street Journal.  It's one of many employee engagement best practices that are built into their business models.

As our 2008 Top Small Workplaces Benchmarking and Best Practices Report explains, at California-based business consulting firm Jump Associates,

Teams are routinely encouraged to take breaks and have fun to recharge. The firm places a premium on holding retreats, allowing teams the time to step back, reflect on past work, acknowledge the group efforts and plan for the future.

And at another firm in the state in the biotech/pharaceuticals space, Phenomenex,

to relieve stress and recharge their hard-working employees, the firm has set aside a quiet room for them to take naps, read or meditate.

You might be asking what the bottom line benefits are from this type of employee engagement and team building.  Using this and other practices, on average our 2008 Top Small Workplaces:

• have grown 23% annually the last 2 years,
• have high employee tenure (6 years) and low turnover (13%),
• have more stable leadership – 17-year tenure for the CEOs, and
• enjoy a long lifespan – 42 years in business on average.

Does your organization do anything like what Liz Ryan suggests?  If so, how did you come out the better for your "bankruptcy"?