The Happy Burro

(fifth in a series titled Issues Managers Face in the Workplace)

The 2008 economic picture is purported to be bad. Maybe your company is facing revenue, market, and cost pressures. Stock price is down. New leadership. A freeze on hiring and on raises. Just today the Dow Jones Industrial Index lost over 240 points. How do you get your team to continue providing world class service and productivity? As always, you have options:

Make a Case For the End of the World

What if things are as bad as they seem? Do you want your bonus at risk? You need to get your team moving, and f-a-s-t! Throw some of these rhetorical questions and demands at your team:

• What happens if we don’t make our budget this year?
• You need to try harder, work harder, put in more hours!
• Should we wait for new leadership to tell us what to do?
• We could bankrupt this place if we don’t get more customers!
• Do you want to lose your job?
• Are the monthly birthday club cakes worth losing a raise?

Forgettaboutit

You could ignore the issues at hand. They could possibly be temporary. After all, the stock market crashed in 1929, recovered, crashed again in 1987, recovered. This too shall pass…

• Bring in doughnuts every morning and say “who wants sprinkles?”
• Hang around and tell more jokes to lighten the mood in the office
• Put a positive spin on any reports (e.g. if your organization was supposed to make $10M, and actually lost $3M, say “we missed our near term profitability target by just a few mil…”)
• Completely ignore any negative news and act as if you didn’t hear/read/experience it

Create Light, Not Heat

Here is where you get to talk about the future. What is possible, not what is constrained. Not ‘pie in the sky’ dreaming, but real opportunity to succeed. Try this:

• Focus on what is working. Are overall customer satisfaction scores down, but are up in the east region? Celebrate that fact, then figure out what is different about east region and try to work on the scores in other regions.
• Reward people that are reaching their goals
• Give extra attention and support to the employees that are struggling to meet their commitments
• Be a realist with company news – if the budget needs to be cut 15% do not play down the impact
• Routinely discuss what might be, not just the doom and gloom
• Thank people for extra effort and let them know you value each and every contribution

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“Better to light a candle than curse the darkness”

 

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Threats and ‘whipping the horses’ may have some sort of short term effect. Long term you’ll have mutiny on your hands. Or worse: people will just leave.

False bravado or hope isn’t going to work either. Like an ostrich, putting your proverbial head in the sand and ignoring problems will not make them go away. Your team will see through your fake smile and vain attempts at humor.  Doesn’t that make more sense? Sure, there are times when a tougher message may be necessary. Those situations are the exception, not the norm. Few of us face such dire circumstances that require yelling, threats, or paranoid behavior to ‘motivate’ our employees.

Be the light, not the heat.

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Want more on the power of meaning in the workplace? Check out Dr. Alex Pattakos at The Meaning Difference. Worth a weekly visit!

Stumble it!

Joe Raasch :: Jan.11.2008 :: Employee Engagement, Leadership, Performance Management :: 3 Comments »

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