Meaningful Monday

Q:  What makes a great company culture where every employee is doing Meaningful Work, the second strand of my 3strands LEADERSHIP principles?

A:  Hope.

Don't move on yet.  If a leader does not inspire hope in others, then their ability to achieve results is low. Assess your leadership abilities to engage people in meaningful work, and those skills in the leaders throughout your company.

Consider these two quick stories.  The first, of one person NOT engaged in their work, and the second about a person in a similar role who is doing meaningful work.  Then you judge the increased profits when everyone in your organization is doing what they love, and loving what they do.

EXAMPLE #1:  Unhappy Tech

The engineer enjoys working with information technology.  Let's say her name is Dorothy.  Her company is a reasonably good one.  Dorothy’s boss is a nice guy, but busy.  She has reasonable learning opportunities, but there is a gap.  Actually a few gaps...

Dorothy has a written career path from her boss, but her company does not allow her to take time to study for exams and certifications during work hours.  She is expected to work extra hours if she is to advance.  There is no bonus for Dorothy spend this additional time.

The learning assignments would be illegal if the Company required her to do them, but the learning is an option.  It is just that she does not get a raise in pay unless she completes the learning.

Dorothy's boss does little or no follow-up to confirm she is completing her career path, encourage her to do so, or help her to achieve any of the objectives.  Dorothy’s learning goals are only looked at about once a year during her performance review.

Another issue is Dorothy needs advice and/or the expertise of her boss from time to time, and often he is too busy to help her.  The work needs to be done, so she does the best that she can after seeking the advice of her peers and researching information online.  She only has a limited amount of time to seek the advice, do the research, and complete each service ticket.

When her boss later follows up with her, too often he is not happy with her work.  Rather than be open to the fact the work was done in an acceptable manner, he always (seems) to find something wrong.  Yet the Company put her in a position where she had no choice:  The client needed the work done and her boss was unwilling to make her requests for advice a priority.  As you can guess, this is no fun.

EXAMPLE #2 – Happy Tech

Suzie has a written career path that she developed with her boss, Rachel.  Her company allows her 2-4 hours weekly to study for exams and certifications during work hours, depending on how busy they are.  Suzie still has to invest time outside of work for additional study.  She gets bonuses for passing certifications, in varying amounts based on how much third party training cost to prepare her for the certification test.  Her salary is based on the amount of training and certifications she completes on her career path.

Suzie's boss discusses her learning objectives with her each week.  During the conversation they consider the best time of day for study, her most efficient learning methods, and Rachel answers questions related to the training that she knows from experience.

Suzie often asks Rachel how to do something.  Rachel answers her question and confirms Suzie understood, schedules time to help, or finds someone else to help her.  Rachel also works with Suzie to improve Company processes that could be better based on issues that Suzie comes across.

Suzie is supported by great employment and tech resolution systems (Systematic Power), while she does meaningful work, and Rachel’s attention to her reinforces Suzie is a priority both to her boss, and her Company.

Suzie loves what she does, and is doing what she loves.

Guess who is more productive and profitable, Suzie or Dorothy?  Suzie by a long shot.

Why?  Dorothy has a good guy for a manager, who is a Bad Boss.  Suzie has a nice woman for a manager, who stopped her Bad Boss habits a long time ago.

Which boss do you want to be?  It is a choice.