Sometimes you really need to go that extra mile for a project (or for whatever reason), but then again—it makes no sense at all to kill yourself trying to do something that’s just not working at that moment.

In this profession, we are used to long hours. 12-14 working hour days come as no surprise to us. But what I want to emphasize here, is that it’s just as important to turn off the computer every once in a while and just relax. Make time for it, it is important that you allow yourself to rest and for all the information you have running around in your head settle in, so you can process and make sense of them. That’s how wise decisions are made.

At Superawesome we have what we call “team building Thursdays” and every Thursday we go out for lunch together, have a couple of drinks and generally take it easy for the day. When we come back to the office we take care of smaller tasks that don’t require much involvement and brainpower. This does wonders for our team as we get a chance to talk about non-work and non-profession related topics, which rarely happens as we’re always working when we’re with each other. Also it obviously provides time off from a stressful day and a chance to do something different.

In respect to Thursdays (which are not off, just relaxed) we never work weekends. Saturday and Sunday are personal time, and we never schedule any client work, meetings or anything else related to work for that matter. Weekends are used to recharge batteries and come back fresh on Monday. I see people drained like lemons from fatigue and exhaustion because they are “working hard.” Are you kidding me?! You can’t work hard when you’re exhausted! You’re at 50% at best. Go home, take an afternoon off, get some good sleep, come back late in the morning and then continue. I was like this myself not too long ago, I even had health problems and that’s something that has made me think really hard¹ about how I’m going about things and what I am sacrificing for work.

Socialize, develop outside interests (from work), have personal projects, because things like this bring people together, and as a result a better working climate is created. I really recommend something along these lines to every small team out there.

¹ “That’s what she said.”