Email and paperwork have invaded homes. Most people know how to work on Sunday evening, but no one yet knows how to go to the cinema on Monday afternoon. A new way of work is needed. A new way of working has emerged at Semco of which the tell-tale signs are: hammocks where people rest during the day; Retire-a-Little plans; the end of the head office; and the abolition of control and boarding school mentality. The results have been inordinate success for 20 years; practically non-existent turnover; and an organization that covers an enormous range of business activity, from machinery to environmental consulting, and from real estate advisoy services to new business start-ups, smoothly and coherently. It's time for a new way of work to be created. This book shows how this can be achieved.
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
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Book Description
Editorial Reviews
From Publishers Weekly
Semler, the Brazil-based CEO of Semco, believes corporations and employees can become successful by bucking tradition and thinking wildly outside the box. He attempts to explain Semco’s success (a company with $212 million in annual revenue and "no official structure… no organizational chart… no business plan or company strategy") and how its principles can be applied in other companies to make working environments more appealing and opportunities for growth and achievement limitless. Nine chapters (one for each day of the week, as well as one for "Any Day" and one for "Every Day") explore the ways in which the traditional workweek stifles creativity and fosters distaste for working days. But Semler also looks at how to shake things up. The Wednesday chapter leads off with the following to-do list: attend a board of director’s meeting; dump a deal rather than pay a bribe; tell the company it sucks. While Semler’s ideas often seem counter-intuitive, the idea is not to provide specific guidelines but rather to encourage readers to view their organization and professional lives in a new way. The book’s premise is promising, but the actual steps to achieving a seven-day weekend still seem unattainable.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to an alternate Hardcover edition.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to an alternate Hardcover edition.
Review
"Ricardo Semler tells how Semco uses a revolutionary way of working to run a profit making company with a work force who love their jobs" The Sunday Times "The Seven-Day Weekend will certainly encourage managers to look very carefully at their management practices" -- Rocco Forte Management Today "Ricardo Semler is our kind of capitalist" The Guardian
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
22 of 22 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
Semco, Ricardo Semler's privately held Brazilian company is hard to describe, mostly because it looks and acts so different from what we expect a company to be. That's why Semler devotes the first chapter of Seven Day Weekend to telling us what Semco is and does and what makes it a different place to work. At the end of the chapter, he says this:
"Although I still can't definitely answer the question about what Semco does do, I can say we've changed the way work works and improved the quality of our lives - and so can you."
After reading Seven Day Weekend, I still can't tell you exactly what it's about. But I can say that it will change the way you think about work and open up new possibilities for you.
There's a lot of talk these days about changing the workplace and making it more democratic and self-organizing and participative. We've seen pieces of this at places like WL Gore and, more recently at Best Buy. We've read the business press articles and pundit opinions.
But the fact is that if we are going to see significant workplace change on a large scale, there will need to be more companies that act like Semco. The owners of those companies will have to try things out and show us. That's what Ricardo Semler has done.
If you want to see how the wisdom of crowds works out in a company, it's in here. If you want to see how democratic principles work out in management, that's here, too. And if you want to see things about self-organizing and self-managing work groups and chaos theory, that's here too.
But Seven Day Weekend is not a how-to manual. You won't come out of it with a bunch of checklists or bulleted lists of sure-fire techniques. You will improve your understanding of a few key points
* People can be trusted to make decisions that are not only in their best interests, but in the company's best interest.
* In most cases, following the natural law of things works at least as well and often better than trying to control and direct.
* Strategy Semco-style is about building on talents and following ideas and not about master plans.
You will want to know if Semco has been successful in a traditional business way. It has been extravagantly successful, growing revenue and profits at 40 percent per year for two decades. Not only that, the company survived the convulsions in the Brazilian economy in the 1980s and 1990s.
And you'll want to ask Ricardo Semler about how he works as CEO and how he controls things. Here's his answer.
"I don't. I let the system work for itself."
The bottom line is that you should read this book because it will give you a window into a very different way of working and organizing a business. It's a system that's uncommon as well as uncommonly successful. And it's a system we can learn from.
"Although I still can't definitely answer the question about what Semco does do, I can say we've changed the way work works and improved the quality of our lives - and so can you."
After reading Seven Day Weekend, I still can't tell you exactly what it's about. But I can say that it will change the way you think about work and open up new possibilities for you.
There's a lot of talk these days about changing the workplace and making it more democratic and self-organizing and participative. We've seen pieces of this at places like WL Gore and, more recently at Best Buy. We've read the business press articles and pundit opinions.
But the fact is that if we are going to see significant workplace change on a large scale, there will need to be more companies that act like Semco. The owners of those companies will have to try things out and show us. That's what Ricardo Semler has done.
If you want to see how the wisdom of crowds works out in a company, it's in here. If you want to see how democratic principles work out in management, that's here, too. And if you want to see things about self-organizing and self-managing work groups and chaos theory, that's here too.
But Seven Day Weekend is not a how-to manual. You won't come out of it with a bunch of checklists or bulleted lists of sure-fire techniques. You will improve your understanding of a few key points
* People can be trusted to make decisions that are not only in their best interests, but in the company's best interest.
* In most cases, following the natural law of things works at least as well and often better than trying to control and direct.
* Strategy Semco-style is about building on talents and following ideas and not about master plans.
You will want to know if Semco has been successful in a traditional business way. It has been extravagantly successful, growing revenue and profits at 40 percent per year for two decades. Not only that, the company survived the convulsions in the Brazilian economy in the 1980s and 1990s.
And you'll want to ask Ricardo Semler about how he works as CEO and how he controls things. Here's his answer.
"I don't. I let the system work for itself."
The bottom line is that you should read this book because it will give you a window into a very different way of working and organizing a business. It's a system that's uncommon as well as uncommonly successful. And it's a system we can learn from.
12 of 12 people found the following review helpful
By Bill Godfrey
Format:Hardcover
Written with engaging enthusiasm and frankness, the 14 essays in this book have titles like 'Let the Followers Lead', 'Do it your Way - See if I Care', 'Too Much Talent is as Bad as Too Little'.
Collectively they demonstrate the enormous business success - over 20 years - of a philosophy, culture and practices that are totally radical in comparison with 'conventional' business.
Yet they are based on the commonsense principles of democracy, trust, transparency, a shared search for new opportunities and better ways of doing things, and guardianship by the community of a shared set of values, beliefs and principles.
In the process of explaining how these principles work in practice, Semler blows apart just about every piece of conventional wisdom underpinning the behaviour of large public companies - Semler's Semco remains privately owned. It is reasonable to question to what extent it could operate as it does if it were a public company - and whether it could be as successful as it is. Is the classic joint stock form becoming a 'dead hand', rather than a driver of progress?
Collectively they demonstrate the enormous business success - over 20 years - of a philosophy, culture and practices that are totally radical in comparison with 'conventional' business.
Yet they are based on the commonsense principles of democracy, trust, transparency, a shared search for new opportunities and better ways of doing things, and guardianship by the community of a shared set of values, beliefs and principles.
In the process of explaining how these principles work in practice, Semler blows apart just about every piece of conventional wisdom underpinning the behaviour of large public companies - Semler's Semco remains privately owned. It is reasonable to question to what extent it could operate as it does if it were a public company - and whether it could be as successful as it is. Is the classic joint stock form becoming a 'dead hand', rather than a driver of progress?
13 of 14 people found the following review helpful
By Bas Vodde
Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase
Seven-Day weekend is the second (English) book by Richardo Semler, the CEO of Semco. Semco is a weird Brazilian company known for it's modern HR practices. The history of Semco and Ricardo Semler was explained well in his first English book: Maverick.
The author makes a point that the workweek has invaded the weekend via internet and email. Now it's time to abandon the standard week/weekend thinking and have weekend whenever we want and have week whenever we want. So we'll have a seven day workweek AND a seven day weekend.
The book is a collection of stories and opinions by Richardo which are organized according to the days of the week. Every day a couple of stories, mostly about Semco but also about other activities in which Richardo was involved in.
Some of the more interesting points and stories are, for example, where the author is questioning the need to always grow. In business it seems to be the purpose of the business to grow bigger. Richardo questions this purpose and asks why this is. Cannot companies stay small and then still be successful?
Seven-day weekend is certainly worth reading. It's a small book it takes maybe a day to read it. Its well written, it keeps you awake and the stories are interesting. Though, I personally found it less interesting than Maverick (which I had read first). If you need to chose between the seven day weekend or Maverick, I'd go for Maverick. If, after Maverick, you still do not have enough of Semler, then the seven-day weekend is for you.
The author makes a point that the workweek has invaded the weekend via internet and email. Now it's time to abandon the standard week/weekend thinking and have weekend whenever we want and have week whenever we want. So we'll have a seven day workweek AND a seven day weekend.
The book is a collection of stories and opinions by Richardo which are organized according to the days of the week. Every day a couple of stories, mostly about Semco but also about other activities in which Richardo was involved in.
Some of the more interesting points and stories are, for example, where the author is questioning the need to always grow. In business it seems to be the purpose of the business to grow bigger. Richardo questions this purpose and asks why this is. Cannot companies stay small and then still be successful?
Seven-day weekend is certainly worth reading. It's a small book it takes maybe a day to read it. Its well written, it keeps you awake and the stories are interesting. Though, I personally found it less interesting than Maverick (which I had read first). If you need to chose between the seven day weekend or Maverick, I'd go for Maverick. If, after Maverick, you still do not have enough of Semler, then the seven-day weekend is for you.
Most Recent Customer Reviews
4.0 out of 5 stars
Great book
Semler's perspective is impressive. He's taken knowledge from all areas of decentralized structures and built a functioning business. Read more
Published 2 months ago by Mike
4.0 out of 5 stars
Thinking outside the box
Actually the headline should be: how can you think outside the box when there's not even a box?!
This is what Ricardo Semler brilliantly brings us with his mind-blowing story... Read more
This is what Ricardo Semler brilliantly brings us with his mind-blowing story... Read more
Published 6 months ago by rkiperman
5.0 out of 5 stars
Definitely an interesting read.
This book explores a totally different way of thinking when it comes to the business world and the workday. Read more
Published 6 months ago by Romeo Richards
4.0 out of 5 stars
Interesting and challenging business book
This book provides an interesting insight into how one company has untethered its workforce from traditional management techniques and structures. Read more
Published 7 months ago by J. BROWN
5.0 out of 5 stars
Management the way it should be.
I think this will be the way all businesses will work in the future. This book details the story about SEMCO a business with no work schedule, no imposed meetings, no job titles,... Read more
Published 13 months ago by Oscar C.
4.0 out of 5 stars
Great, but also some rehashing
I read this book after I read Ricardo Semler's first book Maverick. This book continues where the first book stopped. Read more
Published on November 30, 2010 by Gerard Van Stijn
5.0 out of 5 stars
Secret to understanding The Seven Day Weekend
A lot people who read this book are baffled as to what exactly Semco and Ricardo Semler are doing that is so revolutionary. Read more
Published on May 30, 2008 by David Chu
5.0 out of 5 stars
Very Provocative Book Will Make You Think
I had read sound bites from Semler over the past few months, but finally got the book and devoured it over a holiday weekend. It did not disappoint. Read more
Published on February 23, 2008 by Jennifer B. Davis
5.0 out of 5 stars
How Work Should Be
What an amazing story this book recounts. I kept reading of ideas they had and thinking - Well of course that would never work - and then read on to discover that they did indeed... Read more
Published on December 23, 2007 by Georgina Reidy
5.0 out of 5 stars
Business, the way it should be?
I really enjoyed this book because it seems to be the antithesis of so many standard biz books out there. Read more
Published on November 24, 2007 by Jonathan Licis
