Consider what others think...

Most people will tell you they like change, but the reality is that many of them are afraid of it.  They like the certainty of the status quo and get anxious about the unknown. But if yesterday’s message was correct, companies that ascribe to continuous improvement need to address this anxiety and the resistance it creates. Before you get too far into the kinds of improvement you want, complete a scan of employee perspectives and perceptions, understand their interests and concerns, prepare a communications plan that educates them fully, and seek their feedback and input. What might seem appropriate or obvious to you is best tested. And don’t overlook the natural “what’s in it for me” reactions that you might find. Consider holding focus groups, creating feedback loops, and engaging employees in the planning process. Cities have representative government, universities have student senates, homeowner’s associations have participative bylaws, and companies have collective bargaining agreements – these are the models against which employees view management expectations of engagement. If you want your employees to be engaged, give them appropriate forums in which to do so. Consider the examples above as examples of thinking that help people to see change as an opportunity, not a threat. If you want employees to get behind innovations that are good for your business, make them part of the process today.

 

Steven Paul Jobs (1955 – 2011): American businessman, inventor, and investor best known for co-founding the technology company Apple Inc.

Ask people what they think...

I don’t know about not believing in excellence but stressing that without all the practices needed to identify, design, and implement it may be counterproductive. Employees intuitively want to find better and smarter ways to do their jobs and leaders should support and facilitate their efforts. Start with including them in discussions that affect them, their workspace, and their responsibilities. Ask them what they think and listen to their ideas – implement the good ones and help them to work on those that need improvement. It’s a great way to get them engaged in things that matter, in the overall process of continuous improvement, and to see that their ideas and efforts matter.  We can’t complain that they’re not engaged if we don’t give them meaningful ways to participate. Stop thinking that you’re the only one who can see or design change – that top-down thinking often makes employees feel left out. And don’t scoff at what they suggest – they’re there on the front line and you’re not. The highly paid designers who planned the front desk at Mirage got it all wrong – the employees had to turn around or go to another room to get the forms and materials they needed. When one of them brought the problem and a simple solution to management it led to a redesign that worked, and a changed management mindset about should participate in workplace design. Do yourself a favor – ask employee what they think will help promote excellence today. 

 

Tom Peters (born 1942): American writer on business management practices, best known for In Search of Excellence.

Do your homework...

When I used to attend SHRM conferences, friends and colleagues would congratulate me on all the cool HR programs we developed at Mirage and Wynn Resorts. While we rarely talked about it, most of those took long periods of time because they usually started out as bad ideas. That’s partly true because I was dreaming stuff up before there were computers to do them. And at that early stage there weren’t a lot of people skilled and knowledgeable enough to take the risk of working on them. But as computerization started to take off and people got more experienced with them, I was able to get people together to brainstorm my ideas. Notably, Bob Pemberton at Infinium believed in my vision and gave me the support and courage to continue while computing caught up. And David Kolins from the UK was disciplined and persistent in creating the specs needed to communicate with other developers and manage the projects. I’ve said before here that from thought to finish, my applicant tracking and paperless ideas took nearly 14 years – it would have been so easy to give up but the projected savings in time and money were too hard to ignore or abandon. My colleague John Strzemp used to say that ‘nothing comes easy’ and that was so true for my crazy projects. But bad ideas have a way of turning into good ones if you stick with them and continue to learn along the way. Do your homework and keep your eye on the ball if you want a good idea to live long enough to come true today.

 

Steven Spielberg (born 1946): American filmmaker. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest film directors of all time and is the most commercially successful director in film history.