I’m linking to this blog as it has a great post that highlights some of the “old school” thinking that is still out there. It amazes me that in this day and age there are still managers that believe that showing appreciation is a bad thing….
Let me know what you think…
We had three very cute baby Raccoons in our yard last Thursday night. They were fearless, lost, adorable and wondering around lost without a mother. Kind of like employees without a good leader…but more on that later.
We went out and watched them as the toddled around the yard and gardens. They were obviously hungry. The smallest one could not keep up with its siblings and kept cooing out to them (that’s the only way I could describe it, like a mix between a cat’s “meow” and and owl’s “who”). The siblings would circle back and rub noses with the smallest one. They would try to get it to climb the rock wall to the garden or move under the table. The smallest Raccoon would waddle slowly after them and try to keep up.
But the siblings were hungry and cold themselves and soon enough – they left the smallest one by itself.
The next morning, the smallest one was almost dead by the side of the garage.
I read “Sales Comp Demands a Deep Sales Dive, Not a Best Practices Quest” by Ann Bares on Compensation Force yesterday – the article really resonated with me. The basic premise of the article is that companies should focus on understanding their sales force and not depend on best practices. Ann states it best when she says, “the problem with the notion of best practices in HR is that it too often leads to a blind search-copy-cut-paste effort whereby we simply lift popular program elements (out of professional journals, books, studies, etc.) and implement them, without sufficient thought as to their fit and strategic applicability.”
It resonated because it is right-on but also because I just completed an assignment for a company where they were looking for “best practices.”
I didn’t give them any (we’ll not really – more on that later…).
I was in South Dakota last week on a family vacation. First off, I forget how beautiful South Dakota is and all that it has to offer. Secondly, there are some really, really humongous carvings there…
The original idea for Mount Rushmore is credited to South Dakota historian Doane Robinson who thought that it would increase tourism (he was a pretty insightful man). His idea was to carve local famous people into some of the granite mountains of the Black Hills. In 1924, after working on Stone Mountain, GA, sculptor Gutzon Borglum was brought in to carve the mountain.
Mt. Rushmore
Borglum expanded on the original idea and wanted it to be a National monument that focused on our presidents. He insisted that his life’s work would not be spent immortalizing regional heroes but insisted that the work demanded a subject national in nature and timeless in its relevance to history.
Borglum started work on Mt. Rushmore in 1927 at the age of 60. He worked the rest of his life on the mountain.
I just spent the last week in South Dakota with my family. It was a needed break from the day-to-day stuff that has been going on for the last six months.
A time to unwind and relax. A time to reconnect and think. A time to focus on things other than work and obligations…
Buffalo at Wind Cave National Park
I’ve talked taking time off before in order to recharge ourselves (see here: refreshabbatical). I’ve realized that it is very important that we do this – and yet it is so hard. I wanted to take the time off completely – without checking in or doing any work.
Oh well…
I ended up needing to be on some conference calls, figuring out a problem with one of our rental units, and checking back into see how an issue was being resolved at work. As a result I was up way earlier than I wanted to be while on vacation. Putting it mildly, that sucked. Setting an alarm for 5:00 AM while on vacation to take a conference call is not my idea of fun.
But by doing it early, I was able to spend all day with the family – every day.
And I didn’t check twitter, or my blog, or the internet or even the news. It was almost blissful!
What is it that drives meaning in work? True, real meaning that goes beyond the obvious “completed this project” or “achieved that goal”? I have some ideas, but would love to hear what other people have to say first. I’ll keep a track of the responses we get and put up another post on this with some ideas at a later time.
So please, leave a thought in the comment section!
Over the past 18 years I have conducted a team building event called the Electronic Maze® with hundreds of companies and thousands of participants. Sometimes called the “Magic Carpet” the Electronic Maze is extraordinary, not because it is magic, but because of the team behaviors and emotional responses it elicits.
Those behaviors and emotional responses are surprising similar across a wide variety of groups: senior managers, line workers, middle management, cohesive teams, strangers, international audiences, men, women, and every group that we’ve ever done this with.
Those behaviors are also very insightful as to how we perceive the world, work with each other, and get things done.
I was reading an the transcribed copy from a conversation between Ira Flatow and Dr. Paul Bloom on the NPR show Science Friday. This show was titled, “Why we like the things we like” and I think it highlights some very interesting insights that we could all learn from.
The following excerpt is a great example of the Drive to Challenge and Comprehend.
FLATOW: Well, you led into a topic I wanted to ask you about, and that is the pleasure of just learning about things. It’s – you know, just knowing more. I mean, I find that extremely pleasurable, and I’m sure a lot of our listeners do, or else they wouldn’t be tuned to this program.
Salespeople who are engaged in their roles, who are motivated to succeed, and who’s goals are aligned with the organizational goals have been shown to have a significant impact on helping an organization succeed (Badovick, Hadaway, & Kaminski, 1992). Successful organizations understand this and try to keep their sales employees motivated and engaged through a variety of motivational methods – mostly involving extrinsic rewards.
While much has been much written about how extrinsic rewards may have a detrimental effect of on a sales person’s intrinsic motivation (Deci & Ryan, Kohn, or Pink – note: there is also a lot of research on how this extrinsic/intrinsic effect can be mitigated) there is little disagreement on the short-term impact that extrinsic rewards can have on a company’s performance . The short-term benefit of extrinsic rewards assures us that these rewards will be used in businesses no matter what Dan Pink has to say on the topic. However, this does not mean that these types of programs can’t be improved.
Successful organizations and leaders of the future not only need to focus on the optimization of extrinsic reward programs but also on moving other levers within the organization that can drive sales motivation. Using the Four-Drive Model of Employee Motivation (Lawrence and Nohria, 2002) provides a clear framework for how to do this.
This was our most viewed slideshare presentation with over 14,000 views – I’ve now turned it into a 4-minute youtube video….with music and everything. Hope you enjoy and please forward on to anyone you think would benefit from watching.
Navigating Uncertainty: The Relevance of Adaptive Leadership Post-COVID-19
Confidence is Key, Until It’s Not: The Overconfidence Bias at Work
Knowing When to Abandon Ship: The Sunk Cost Fallacy at Work
The Power of Possession: Understanding the Endowment Effect in the Workplace
Navigating the Complexities of Co-Workers: One Common Cognitive Error We All Make
Powered by WordPress & Theme by Anders Norén