Fixing the ‘I Hate Work’ Blues
Many employees report they are
overworked and not engaged—a recent New York Times article on the phenomenon
was titled, "Why You Hate Work." The problem, says Bill George, is
that the way we design work stifles engagement. Here's the fix.
The New York Times ran a troubling story, "Why You Hate Work," in last week's "Sunday Review." The article
indicated that employees work too hard and find little meaning from their work.
The anecdotes we all hear about this topic are reinforced by the Gallup Poll,
which shows that only 30 percent of employees are engaged in their work.
The issues raised are ones I have
worked on for many years. With the drive for higher productivity in the
workplace, there is little doubt that people are putting in longer hours than
they did two or three decades ago. In part, this drive comes from never-ending,
short-term pressures of the stock market. An even greater factor is the global
nature of competition today, which pits American organizations directly against
counterparts in Asia, where work days are long and onerous.
The much greater issue raised,
however, is that many workers do not find meaning in their work. A shockingly
low 25 percent of employees feel connection to their company's mission.
(Contrast that to the 84 percent of Medtronic employees who feel aligned with
the company's mission.) In my experience, if employees don't feel a genuine
passion for their work and believe that it makes a difference, engagement drops
off dramatically. When engagement falls, so does productivity.
Message
not being heard
Many senior executives have been
focused on building mission-driven organizations for the last decade. The CEOs
I know are fully committed to getting everyone focused on mission through
regular engagement with employees—much more so than CEOs in my generation. So
if CEOs are focused on the mission, why aren't these messages getting through
to employees?
“Instead of managers who control, we need leaders who
inspire”
I believe the answer lies in the
highly bureaucratic, multilayered organizations that companies are using to
execute their plans. There is so much pressure to realize short-term results
that middle managers are consumed by making this month's numbers rather than
building teams that focus on achieving their company's mission. Innovating
under intense operational pressure is nearly impossible.
In addition, the heavy burden of
compliance with government regulations and internal corporate requirements is
taking a toll on people, limiting their creativity, and causing them to be
risk-averse. In this environment, desired qualities like empowerment, engagement,
and innovation are subordinated to control aspects. No wonder people aren't
engaged and having fun!
Finally, we have lost sight of the
importance of first-line employees—the people actually doing the work—and have
given all the power to middle management. We have driven down compensation for
first-line employees, increased their hours, and taken away their freedom to
act with myriad control mechanisms. When it comes to layoffs, it is the
first-line people who get laid off, not the middle managers, as senior leaders
protect the people closest to themselves.
What's the solution to this dilemma?
I believe we need to restructure large organizations by giving much more
responsibility and authority to first-line workers and paying them
accordingly—with appropriate performance incentives. We need to trust
employees, not control them, by empowering them to carry out the company's
mission on behalf of customers. They should be given full responsibility for
performance, quality, achievement of goals, and compliance with company
standards.
To realize this change,
organizational structures need to change. Dramatically. For starters, companies
have far too many layers of managers. The best way to address this is to widen
the span of control for everyone between the CEO and first-line employees.
Instead of six to 12 direct reports, all managers should have 15 to 20 people
reporting to them. For many managers, this violates traditional management
principles, but it also dramatically reduces the number of layers between the
CEO and first-line staff. I know many extremely effective executives, including
Mayo Clinic CEO John Noseworthy and Medtronic CEO Omar Ishrak, who have more
than 18 direct reports and handle the load extremely well. It just requires
ensuring that all your direct reports are competent to do their roles and that
you use a superb system of delegation, so that you're not over-managing
subordinates.
Required:
leaders who inspire
Next, the role of middle management
requires fundamental changes. Instead of managers who control, we need leaders
who inspire in these roles. They should work alongside their employees, doing
more than their fair share of the most challenging aspects of the work. Their
leadership role is to champion the company's mission and values, and to
challenge others to meet higher standards on behalf of their customers. It is
the job of these leaders to facilitate the work of the people they lead by
making their jobs easier, and removing bureaucratic impediments and other
obstacles. Middle managers who cannot make this shift may have to move on to
new roles elsewhere. All of these actions make these leaders more like partners
and coaches than bosses and controllers in the traditional sense.
Finally, the most senior executives
in the organization should be engaged every day with the first-line: working
with them in the marketplace and in customer meetings; roaming around the labs,
quizzing innovators, scientists and engineers about their latest ideas;
visiting production facilities and service centers to check on quality and
customer support. That means far less time holding lengthy business reviews in
their conference rooms or having 1:1 meetings in their offices. Executives who
are fully engaged with first-line employees every day will have a much better
sense of how their businesses are running, and their presence will be highly
motivating and even inspiring.
As a result of these changes, the
employees will be more engaged and more productive, overhead costs will drop
dramatically, and customers will report a much higher level of responsiveness.
The executives will make better informed, more thoughtful decisions about the
business because they are so much closer to their markets and the people doing
the work.
Bill George is professor of management practice at Harvard Business
School
http://hbswk.hbs.edu/item/7547.html
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