Side Hustle Blues?

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As a leader, do you ever sing the side-hustle blues?

That's when your team seems distracted because they're tired from working multiple jobs. When I worked in food service it was all around me: team members who were already wrestling with variable schedules and also juggling multiple jobs.

Maybe because they enjoyed their other gigs -- like the musicians, actors, artists, and writers on the team.

Or maybe because otherwise they couldn't make ends meet so there were the side-hustles in driving, delivering, retailing, and add-on food service shifts.

People are wonderful and their potential is unlimited but their physical selves are not unlimited.

Which can bring on the side hustle blues when people are tough to schedule, hard to motivate, and just plain tired.

You'll never eliminate the gigs that team members enjoy, nor should you. Those are not the ones really sapping the energy as much as those that they are in only for the money.

Employees won't need an only-for-the-money side-hustle if you pay and appreciate them appropriately.

After all, it's so often true that you get what you pay for.

-- doug smith

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