Our employees describe innovation time at 1904labs.
Transcript
Innovation time in 1904 is kind of a time to do your own little projects, get help from everybody else in the company. We get to work on whatever project we want to for a couple of hours twice a week. Nowhere else do companies tell you, "Hey, stop working at 3:00. Go better yourselves. Work on your own projects. Further your careers..." It just doesn't happen. Ten percent of your work would be available to work on your own personal projects, charitable works, team projects, things like that, whatever you want. The innovation time allowed me the ability to continue working with my previous boss on this other awesome startup, while being engaged in my full time position. I had a thought, wanted to run it down, and this gave me the opportunity to do it.
So I've had some breakthroughs here, personally, with projects I work on in innovation hours and the time that they allow me to do that has really helped out. Being a father, of four, and a husband, you know, time at home is very scarce. Using my innovation time gave me a lot more time to dedicate to Launch Code. Personally and specifically, I've been using it to further my startup, and also to invest in my girlfriend's company. And I've also used it for volunteering and community projects. We've got a lot of different skills from a lot of different groups that kind of come together, and so that's where we start to see learning about what I can learn from my other co-workers, and what I can help them out with.
Everyone that I work with is super useful for you know just asking questions and they help me out, and the allotted time every week, I mean, you can't beat it. You can jump back into work fresh, and sometimes it inspires you to try something a new way. Getting that extra time every week to work on my own project during company time has helped tremendously. And I'm really appreciative to have a company that supports me to do that.
