Today’s workplace is different, diverse, and constantly changing. The typical employer-employee relationship of old has been turned upside down. Workers are living in a growing economy and have almost limitless job opportunities; at the same time, the workplace offers less incentive for employee loyalty and lifetime employment. This combination of factors has created an environment where the business needs its employees more than the employees need the business—especially in the Information Technology (IT) industry.
Harnessing brainpower and expanding productivity, IT workers have helped fuel corporate profits in most organizations. But retaining and motivating IT workers requires special attention. Sometimes stubborn and demanding, they have a tendency to rebel against perceived trivial or meaningless tasks. They work best when kept informed and given independence, challenging assignments, and additional responsibilities. The underlying thread is this: Management must realize that if its employees are dissatisfied, they can—and will—easily find employment elsewhere. The managers and businesses that create the high performance work environment will be the winners of tomorrow’s workplace.
Leadership Needed More Than Before
Management’s new challenge is to create a work environment that attracts, keeps, and motivates its IT workforce. Management by status quo or dictatorship can have disastrous results. The responsibility for creating the high performance workplace is not the sole responsibility of just the senior executives. In fact, managers and supervisors at all levels must step outside their traditional roles and comfort zones to look at new ways of working. They have to create a work environment where people enjoy what they do, feel like they have a purpose, have pride in what they do, and can reach their potential. It requires more time, more skill, and more managers who care about people. It takes true leadership.
Leadership is not a position, a job title, or merely being the “Captain of the Ship.” Leadership is not power, ego, and pride. Leadership is both science and art. Leadership is ever present: touching, motivating, talking, checking, barrier-removing, training, preparing, breathing, activating, and moving.
The tragic maiden voyage of the RMS Titanic was supposed to be Captain E.J. Smith’s retirement trip. All he had to do was get to New York. No one knows why he ignored the facts; why he ignored seven iceberg warnings from his crew and other ships. Responsibility can’t be delegated. Leadership is responsible for everything the organization does or fails to do.
Technology is never a substitute for leadership. Someone said, “The danger is not that computers will replace us. The real danger is when we start acting like computers.” When technology fails, leadership must prevail. Captain E.J. Smith said years before the Titanic’s voyage, “I cannot imagine any condition which would cause a ship to founder. Modern shipbuilding has gone beyond that.” Many businesses today have replaced their leaders with technicians; their brains with a hard drive. So, when disaster strikes, will your technology pull you under, or will someone take the lead?
The Five-Step PRIDE Model
To navigate a sea of change, the workplace of today must place a high priority on human resources. A work environment that attracts, keeps, and motivates its workforce is one that gives workers a sense of pride and purpose in what they do. The most successful businesses are those that provide motivating environments. Managers have the sole responsibility for creating this work environment. It is up to them to provide the leadership and set the tone for the rest of the organization. Managers can improve their leadership position and motivate individuals within their organizations by following the five-step PRIDE model:
• P—Provide a positive working environment
• R—Recognize, reinforce, and reward everyone’s efforts
• I—Involve everyone
• D—Develop skills and potential
• E—Evaluate for continuous improvement
Provide a Positive Working Environment
Happy employees make productive employees. One of the most important factors is the work environment itself—how employees “feel” about the company. The motivated worker is more committed to the job and to the customer. On the other hand, demotivating jobs force workers to vote with their feet.
Another motivator is a comprehensive employee benefits program. Benefits have become just as important as the pay workers receive, and they go beyond the traditional medical and dental insurance options. William M. Mercer, Inc., conducted a survey and asked 25,000 employees at nine large companies their opinions of 65 potential benefit programs, policies, and practices. Of those who said they would probably use or might use a particular benefit, they identified the following as the most important for productivity:
1. Flex time: 90 percent
2. Clear sense of organizational purpose: 89 percent
3. Employee provided or subsidized office equipment for work at home: 87 percent
4. A comfortable, attractive workspace: 86 percent
5. Telecommuting: 84 percent
6. On-site fitness center or subsidized health-club membership: 78 percent
7. Work schedule compatible with school calendar: 75 percent
8. Career planning and appraisal: 74 percent
9. Child care center at or near work site: 73 percent
10. Job sharing: 72 percent
In addition to the above benefits, many businesses are going a step further by providing more family-friendly benefits. The Families and Work Institute released a study focusing on companies that employ 100 or more workers. This study is a benchmark to corporate work life policies and practices. It denotes the following trends in employer benefit offerings:
• Ninety percent of the 1,000 companies surveyed currently allow workers to take time off to attend school events.
• Two-thirds permit flextime, defined as allowing employees to adjust work hours on a daily basis.
• Half let workers stay home with mildly ill children without using vacation or sick days.
• Half provide dependent care assistance plans.
• Forty-four percent hold supervisors accountable for sensitivity to their employee’s work/family needs.
• Thirty-three percent offer maternity leaves longer than 13 weeks.
• Twenty-three percent offer elder care resources and referral services.
• Nine percent offer childcare at or near the workplace.
Recognize, Reinforce, and Reward Everyone’s Efforts
Money may attract people to the front door, but something else has to keep them from going out the back. Statistics show that the number one reason people quit their jobs is a lack of recognition and praise. It was Mark Twain who once said, “I can live for two months on a good compliment.”
The Gwinnett County Tax Commissioner’s office, located in Lawrenceville, Georgia, has developed a motivation program called “Shining Stars.” Workers have an unlimited supply of “Shining Star” forms to hand-write a little note about the good job their co-workers did. They can either hand it directly to the co-worker or send it through distribution to the person. Katherine Sherrington, the Tax Commissioner, realizes that employees themselves know who works hard and deserves recognition. Managers can’t be everywhere all the time. Therefore, the employees are in the best position to catch people doing the right things. With Shining Stars, high performance is instantly rewarded and recognized.
For added recognition, the office formally recognizes the employee who received the highest number of forms at the end of each month. That person receives a special reward from the commissioner. Then all the forms given out during the month are put into a basket, and names are randomly drawn for additional prizes. The forms are read aloud and recognition is given to the awardee, as well as the person submitting the form.
Building a motivating reward and recognition program such as the one in Gwinnett County follows the FAST-FUN formula:
• F—Focus on the behavior you want to reward
• A—Avoid bureaucratic judging and committees
• S—Simplicity: do not make your program too complicated or formal
• T—Team Ownership: let the employees run it and own it
• FUN—Make it fun, entertaining, and as spontaneous as possible.
Involve Everyone
Studies show that having workers involved at all levels has a major impact on creating a high performance organization. The best way to involve workers is the use of teams and teamwork. Many businesses have found that teams improve productivity, increase morale, and empower workers
Johnsonville Foods located in Sheboygan Falls, Wisconsin, has been a flagship of productivity improvement. Almost 90 percent of the workforce belongs to some type of team. The team—not management—decides who is hired, who is fired, and who gets a pay raise. Johnsonville CEO Ralph Stayer reports that since going to a team style of management, his company’s productivity has risen by at least 50 percent.
TD Industries in Dallas, Texas, has a unique way of making its employees feel valued and involved. One wall in the company has the photographs of all employees who have been with the company more than five years. This “equality” program goes beyond the typical slogans, posters, and HR policies. There are no reserved parking spaces for executives. Everyone uses the same bathrooms and water fountains. Everyone is an equal. Maybe that’s why TD Industries was listed last year by Fortune magazine as one of the Top 100 Best Companies.
Despite these success stories, most businesses do a poor job listening to and involving their employees. A Towers Perrin survey of 3,300 employees showed an increase from 25 percent to 30 percent last year of employees who say supervisors have ignored their interests when making decisions that affect them.
Managers need to empower their employees and give them more control over their jobs. By increasing the level of responsibility, workers will take more pride in their jobs. Expanded responsibilities mean less time spent on menial tasks. Empowered workers need less supervision and fewer supervisors.
Develop Skills and Potential
Well-trained employees are more capable and willing to assume greater control over their jobs. They need less supervision, which frees management for other tasks. Employees are more capable of taking care of customers, which builds stronger customer loyalty. All this leads to better management-employee relationships.
When former Intel executive David House became CEO of Bay Networks, he realized the troubled computer manufacturer’s problems involved fundamental business decision-making. To solve the problem, he attempted to create a new culture. “Culture is what people fall back on when there are no instructions,” House explained. “It gives you rules for when there are no rules, and it provides a common language for moving forward.” House created four courses to teach the practices that he’d set in place at Intel: Decision-Making, Straight Talk, Managing for Results, and Effective Meetings. He taught the courses to Bay’s 120 highest-ranking executives who, in turn, taught the same courses to the other 6,000 employees.
Despite chaos for a couple of weeks, House’s teachings instantly hit home and produced results. Bay reversed a $285 million loss in fiscal 1987 with $89 million in profits the first six months of fiscal 1998. Final proof was Bay’s sale for $9 billion last year to Canadian telecommunications giant Nortel.
Dell Computer Corporation also has innovative work practices. Every Dell employee’s job responsibility includes finding and developing their successor—not just when they are ready to move into a new role, but as an ongoing part of their performance plan.
Additionally, when Dell promotes employees, they are given fewer responsibilities, not more. “When a business is growing quickly, many jobs grow laterally in responsibility, becoming too big and complex for even the most ambitious, hardest working person to handle without sacrificing personal career development or becoming burned out,” Chairman and CEO Michael Dell wrote in his book, Direct from Dell: Strategies That Revolutionized an Industry.
Bay and Dell each developed successful workplace programs. Some tips for setting up your own processes to help develop the potential of your employees follow:
• Explain the “big picture” for the company and how this influences their employment and growth.
• Provide feedback on the employee’s performance. Be specific; mention a particular situation or activity.
• Make sure they understand the company’s expectations.
• Involve the employee in the decision-making process whenever possible.
• Listen to their ideas and suggestions.
• Give them room to do the job without unnecessary restrictions.
• Pay for employees to attend workshops and seminars.
• Offer on-site classes where employees can learn new skills or improve upon old ones.
• Challenge them with lots of responsibility.
• Assign them a coach or mentor to help them with development.
Evaluate for Continuous Improvement
Evaluation and continuous improvement is the final step of the PRIDE model. Evaluation is a nonstop activity that includes specific steps. The primary purpose of evaluation is to measure progress toward goals and to determine what needs improving. Continuous evaluation includes, but is not limited to, the measurement of attitudes, morale, and motivation of the workforce.
A key component in creating a high performance organization is selecting the right people in the first place. The American Management Association recently completed a survey showing that 29 percent of American companies are conducting personality assessments on all job applicants—up from 19 percent from the previous year. These assessments indicate if the person is reliable, has a good work ethic, and is a good team player.
Not only do managers need to be more careful about whom they select, but they also need to evaluate why good employees leave for another job. Tom Daraude, the regional senior vice president of USAA in Tampa, Florida, conducts an exit interview with each and every employee who leaves his 1,700-person company. His conversations follow a strict path:
1. He sincerely thanks them for working at USAA.
2. He tells them they are welcome to come back, no questions asked.
3. He asks them why they are leaving.
Daraude says his second statement brings tears of thankfulness to some employee’s eyes. Many employees actually do return when they realize that the grass is not greener on the other side of the fence.
Change or Be Changed
Winston Churchill said, “America always does the right thing, after they try everything else first.” Transforming workers to winners isn’t about magic, nor is it only about money. It’s about creating a work environment where people enjoy what they do, feel like they have a purpose, and feel they are reaching their potential. It requires more time, more skills, and managers who care about people. It requires true leadership.
Businesses have searched widely for the competitive advantage, the best equipment, the most powerful computer, or the latest business technique. These devices provide only temporary solutions. The true competitive advantage is motivated people proudly working together, contributing vitality and energy toward the goals of the enterprise.
A motivated worker will contribute vitality and energy to the organization, infusing the organization with tremendous productivity and a competitive edge—all the while providing a valuable service or product for the business and its customers. Organizations that decide to become proactive in transforming their work environments into employee-friendly places will likely sail toward a rewarding future. For those who refuse to change, thinking their organizations are too sound to run aground, disaster may not be far off.
©Copyright–CYC International
About the Author
Greg Smith is a management consultant and speaker who focuses on the leadership skills and trends shaping the business world today. His background and experience includes assignments as a human resource manager, hospital administrator, government executive, and now president of the management consulting company, Chart Your Course International.
From 2nd Lieutenant to Lieutenant Colonel, Greg built his career on the front-line as a U.S. Army Officer. When the Berlin Wall fell, he was the Director of Innovation, Quality, and Strategic Planning for the U.S. Army Medical Department. He was a management consultant to military generals and played a key role in the largest organizational transformation in U.S. history.
He has conducted retreats and developed and taught leadership and team building programs for organizations including Yamaha, Rollins Inc., State Farm, Hallmark Cards, UNISYS, AFLAC, Alltell Corporation, and National Data Corporation.
Greg is listed in Harvard University’s Profiles in Business and Management: An International Directory of Scholars and Their Research. Human Resource Executive Magazine selected him as one of the Top Ten “Rising Stars” in Human Resource Management, and he is listed in Who’s Who of Professional Speaking. Greg’s other awards include the Legion of Merit from the U.S. Army, the Order of Military Medical Merit and an Eagle Scout ranking from Boy Scouts of America. He has a B.A. from North Georgia College and an M.S. in Human Resources Management from Troy State University.
Greg has written numerous publications including two books and more than 300 articles on business management. The titles of his books include, The New Leader: Bringing Creativity and Innovation to the Workplace and How to Attract, Keep and Motivate Your Workforce. He also is a syndicated newspaper columnist and a regular contributor to many journals and trade magazines.
Greg Smith can be reached by calling 770-860-9464. If you would like a free subscription to Greg Smith’s Navigator newsletter, please fax your letterhead to 770-760-0581 or e-mail him at greg@chartcourse.com. More articles and tips are available at www.chartcourse.com. |