Reasons to be cheerful ... Part I

It’s Friday! 

Granted, it may not be Friday where you are but Fridays for me are my favourite day of the week.

Not because it signals the end of my working week but because generally, people usually appear to be happy that it’s the beginning of the end of their working week. 

Moods seem brighter; people seem to have a renewed energy to focus-in on the work that needs to be completed before the weekend arrives.  There are conversations about plans for the next two days, a fairly genuine interest in each other’s short-term objectives develops and these discussions invite colleagues to share information about life outside of the working environment.  Some choose not to disclose too much, others will share all of the details – either way, the benefit is that people become more ‘humanized’ and often allow people to get a glimpse of their interests, hobbies and family life.  Subjects that wouldn’t usually surface during discussions over a complex spreadsheet on a Tuesday afternoon!

It’s important to get to know each other at work.  If you know what someone likes then you can sometime make reasonably safe assumptions about what they don’t like.  And so you can begin to build up a picture of their values, beliefs, motivating factors and internal drivers.  Hugely important snippets of information can be shared during these casual encounters. 

You see Jane at the water cooler and ask her what her plans are for the weekend.  Jane is having her elderly mother over to stay until Sunday.  You ask where her mother lives and find out that it’s at least 100 miles away.  Jane’s mother can’t make her own way over because she’s ill, too frail and lives on her own.  So you’ve now learned it’s possible that Jane must at times feel the pressures of having a sick and elderly parent living alone miles away from her.  You realise that  Jane will probably be worried about the journey she needs to take in order to collect her mother and drive her back to her own house.  How does Jane’s young family cope with having an elderly and sick relative staying over?  How will Jane get her mother back to where she lives before the new working week commences? 

Is there anything you can do to help Jane?  Could you let Jane leave early today?  Could you allow Jane to come in a little later on Monday?  Is Jane really okay? 

You get the drift, right?

Of course, I’m not suggesting that you hold weekly interrogative interviews with every member of your workforce!  Nor am I suggesting that you will always be in a position to help.  In many cases, you’re offers of assistance will most likely be declined anyway.  You must tread carefully but the fact that you are listening to what’s being said will provide you with the opportunity to show that you care.  That you are reinforcing the psychological contract between you and the person that you’re working with and importantly, that you understand that life goes on outside of the workplace.  You realise the overall impact of continual outside pressure will inevitably start to manifest itself at work.  And let’s face it; employees usually leave their place of employment because of the attitudes of their managers.  If you’re in any relationship where it’s made clear that the opposite number doesn’t give a hoot about you then the writings on the wall so to speak.  It’s only a matter of time before the relationship ends.

Care for your people.  It’s your job!

Wishing you a very happy and safe weekend and all the best in all that you do.

Keith

Discuss...Do you do BAU???

BAU – or ‘business as usual’ is an expression that I hate.

I see it used as a cop-out.  It’s nothing more than a lazy statement that tells everyone that your intention is just to do ‘the same old, same old’.

Unless your BAU is to strive forward each day with the enthusiasm of a starving dog scoffing 

stolen food, then all you’re really saying is “I’m not going to be doing anything different.” 

So tell me this Mr or Ms Complacent...Why should I continue to bother to employ you? Why should I continue to pay you good money to sit on your rump doing ‘BAU’?

I want people working hard in my team; working hard in the belief that they really are making a difference.  I want people who are seizing the moment and every possible opportunity to make things better.  To sell, produce and market our products so that we’ll all reap and share the dividends in the style of medieval kings and queens at a sumptuous banquet.  I don’t want passengers.  I want participants. I want people that have bought-in to my vision and agree with my strategy for growth and ambition.  I want to be the market leader.  I want my people to want me to be the market leader.  I want to rob opportunities from others and watch them wither and die as I leave them in my wake of profit, profit and more profit.  I want to be known throughout the world.  In fact, I want to DOMINATE the world!  You must be always thinking up ways of increasing my profile.  When you wake up, shower, drive to work, drive home, eat your dinner, when reading your kids their bedtime stories and in your dreams.

So you see, your weak and pathetic BAU just doesn’t cut it.  Not with me.  Not on my watch. You have no excuses.  Not one! NEVER!

Unless of course, I missed something?   

Maybe I didn’t tell you that this is what I wanted.  That it’s what I expected from you.  That this is the contract between us.  It’s your job.  You won’t find it written down so don’t bother looking, but I was sure that I had made myself clear? 

Clear?

Clearly not!

All employers want this from their workforce.  Most don’t get it.  Possibly because they may have hired the wrong people.  Possibly because the conditions aren’t right and the resources aren’t there.  Possibly because the workforce is de-motivated and isn’t being engaged.  Possibly a mixture of all of these things? 

How do you get people to buy-in to your vision? 

Simple! 

You have to sell it to them the same way that you want them to sell it to your prospects.  They must be enticed.  They must get a seat at the banquet table so that they can see, touch and eat the rewards.  Failure to reward leads to complacency at best and total de-motivation to the point of inertia at worst.  Nobody works for free.  Not for very long anyway.  In the same way that a dog will eventually refuse to chase after a stick if it’s not praised for doing so; people will lose ambition if they think that they’re just being slogged for your benefit.

Not many people get anywhere in business without the help of others.  

So why don’t we look after those who work for us if we really want to dominate the world?

I’d be grateful for your opinion.

Wishing you the best in all that you do,

Keith