Employee to Employee Accountability
When you have a strong company culture that is driven by 3strands LEADERSHIP then employees hold each other accountable. One of my favorite stories from an IT solution provider about how this worked in his company went this way...
His company pays a quarterly bonus to employees on their technical services team of just under $2,000. The bonus is only paid when the entire team performs at a certain level. One member of a technical team within this organization really needed the bonus to make his mortgage payment. The problem was another member of the team was failing to achieve the performance standards so the team could receive the bonus.
The guy with the financial challenge invited the poor performer out into the parking lot for conversation. He said something like, "Listen, we have to make our quarterly bonus so that I can pay my mortgage. I am not going to miss my mortgage payment because you are not doing your work. So you have two choices, you can pick it up and perform as well as the rest of us, or we are going to come back out here after the end of the quarter and it's not going to be this pretty. Got it?"
I do NOT encourage this type of behavior between employees. However to be candid, I love the story!
How well you engaging your employees in the key areas of 3strands LEADERSHIP?
Systematic Leadership: Are you as consistent and process driven in the way you hire, manage, develop, and retain employees as you are in the areas of your business that relate to your natural strengths, such as sales, tech work, accounting...?
Meaningful Work: How well are you engaging each employee so that the work they do for your company is personally meaningful to them?
Sincere Gratitude: Do you know how each employee wants to be recognized. Hint: It is different for each employee.
The only scalable way to grow your business is to have employees take full ownership for results and to hold each other accountable when you are not present.
If you need help, our LEADERSHIP Essentials and All-In LEADERSHIP programs are an ideal way for you to improve your Systematic Leadership in less time and with processes we have proven to work over the past 11 years.
Have a meeting with your leadership team, or you can do this alone as part of your weekly Sanctuary time, to evaluate how systematic you are in the way you hire, manage, develop, and retain employees.
- List the systems you have in place in each of the four key areas of employee engagement: Hiring, Management, Development, and Retention.
- Rate each system by simple four-point scale:
- Does Not Exist (Nothing is in-writing, no accountability, inconsistent...)
- Needs Improvement (Something is in place that people should follow, but it clearly could be much better.)
- Doing a Good Job (Figure out how to make it better)
- Outstanding (Figure out how to more broadly take advantage of the strength.)
- Develop and pilot improvements. Drive your business based on employee engagement and everything else will improve.
Let me know if you need help. And have fun!