Improving employee morale: motivating your employees..

You can walk into some corporate offices or business environments and get the sensation that the life is getting sucked out of you. These are offices that lack in any energy, camaraderie, motivation and overall morale. Take a look around your own office. Have you noticed that many employees are calling in sick more often or that several of your workers have started drifting in late or have started taking frequent three day weekends. If you are starting to get the impression that your employees are working just hard enough to get fired, take at look at the motivation you have been giving them lately. Offices with high employee morale are far more productive and efficient, so maybe it’s time that you start learning how to motivate your employees more effectively.

 

When do you ask your employees to come into your office for a private meeting? Do you call your employees in only when you want to let them know what they have done wrong with a project or an account? Do your employees cringe when you ask them to come into your office? More than likely, you are offering only negative reinforcement. In other words, your employees are working hard enough just so that you DON’T call them into your office to scold them. Instead, let your employees know when they have done a good job, even if they worked on a project that might have been simple. Of course, you don’t want to go overboard and start commending your employees just for making a fresh pot of coffee or for coming in on time. However, if one of your employees quickly gets your computer ready for a presentation you have the next day, even if it only takes a few hours of their time, let them know you appreciate their hard work and the fact that they put your computer issues in front of their own projects for a few hours. As humans, we wish only to be recognized and appreciated, so start letting your employees know you respect them and their hard work.

 

Not all of us work in a Fortune 500 company where we can offer our employees huge bonus checks at the end of the year or large Christmas gifts for jobs well done. If your own group of employees is small, take them all out to lunch one day after a large project has been completed on time. Or, maybe you don’t make quite enough to pay for all of your employees? You can buy them bagels one morning or set up a time for your group to have their own celebratory potluck. They will definitely appreciate the recognition.

There is an old saying that an employee will quit on a boss, but they will not quit on a friend. By this, I am not suggesting you become your employees’ best friends or become buddy-buddy with everybody in your office (although there is nothing saying you CAN’T become friends with your employees); rather, I am suggesting you take an interest in the lives of your employees. Many managers seem to have read the decades old manager’s handbook that suggest you are “above” your employees so you should be a little distant from them. This is definitely NOT the kind of airs you will want to be putting on for your employees in today’s world. For example, if you hear that your employee’s wife recently became pregnant, congratulate him. If an employee’s father is in the hospital, send flowers or start up an office collection to have flowers sent to him at the hospital. Little things like this will make your employee feel that you truly care for them.

 

The biggest de-motivator for any employee is a manager who micro-manages. An example of a micro-manager is somebody who, say, watches the door for you to arrive at 8:00 but then makes a big production if you continually stroll in at 8:05. He or she will assign specific break times, specific lunch times and maybe even specific restroom times. A micro-manager, essentially, works on an attitude of distrust. They do not trust that their employees can manage their own time and productivity. If you are a manager like this, you really need to reconsider your approach. Just like you, your employees went through an application and interview process and received the job based on their merits. Trust your employees to do the jobs that are assigned to them and only interfere when they start taking their job for granted. For example, if they come in two hours late everyday and leave an hour early, by all means, talk to them. But do not scold them for coming in 5 minutes late or for taking a lunch break that went over 3 minutes long. Employees want to feel that their managers trust them to do their work.

Who's a Boss? - An Experience Sharing.

“People do not leave companies, but they leave because of their bosses” goes a popular adage. How many of you nod your head for this statement in agreement?? If so, I expect you to rethink your stand on this after you read through my experiences.

I decided to share my experiences of working with a boss, who is my inspiration for my life – both on my personal and professional front. Some people argue with me saying there is no one as an ideal boss in this world. But I feel there are always exceptions and my boss is one. I just felt my sharing would be insightful not only to the current bosses of today’s corporate world but also the future bosses as well.  

Here are some of the cues that I picked up:

Creating a vision for the department – Each and every organization has its own mission and vision. Understanding the culture of the company, aligning the goals of the department and strategizing the functional workflow are one of the key skills for the success of any department. As a head of the department, I think this is one of essential mantras to be adopted and followed.  Setting clear goals and objectives - In my observation, the head of the department or the leader should be a matured enough to weigh the pros & cons of a situation before, taking a final call in any of the critical issues. If need be, the views of the team can also be taken.

The objectives set for a period should be realistic and achievable, and should be defined understanding the challenges and the practical problems to be faced. Not only that the resources constraints be it man power or other resources should be thoroughly studied, before setting the goals of the department.

Role clarity for the team members – It is not sufficient, if the department goals are clearly set and defined. Each of the team members’ strengths and weaknesses have to be studied carefully and the roles and responsibilities should be clearly defined. This practice can minimize unnecessary work place conflicts and can contribute a lot to team’s synergy. 

Communication Model – If you are a practicing manager or you have subordinates reporting to you, assess your pattern of communication with them. Do you allow your subordinates to ask questions? Do you allow them to paraphrase once the discussion is over? Do you have clarity on your thoughts before you communicate? Do you provide them with an ambience where they can express their opinions and suggestions freely?? Always remember communication is a two way process and an effective communicator is one who obtains feedback from the receiving end to ensure the desired action could be achieved. In addition to it, listening is a key skill. As a superior, it is your duty to listen to the problems or the issues of the team members. Do not close a problem or do not assume things, how ever trivial it could be. 

Conflict Manager – Conflict is an unavoidable syndrome in workplace. It is the duty of the manager or the head of the department to redirect the conflict into a constructive one, creating a win-win situation instead of spoiling the team morale. Based on my experience from my boss, he creates ample opportunities for the involved parties to have open communication and he is very neutral not taking sides. This practice helps the affected ones to learn from their mistakes and build trust and relationship among the team members. When the situation goes to the extreme, he comes into the picture, helping in working out a compromise formula. 

Career Development of subordinates – When any manager takes interest in the well being of the team members, he wins their trust and builds the bonding. One of the key success skills of my boss that I feel is that he has been a personal and professional guide, mentor, and counselor or call it by any name to my entire team. He always had concern for people and used to keep giving inputs from time to time for the professional and personal development. The care that the boss shows for your well being develops the loyalty factor towards the company. 

Teams success / failure – It has been an inspiration for me to see my boss giving appreciation and credits instantly and giving recognition for the work and not taking it on him, before the other stakeholders. Even though he has been instrumental for the deliverables, he passes on the credit to the performer. Not only that, if it is failure, he sees it as a team’s failure and not as individuals. It underlies the essence of separating the people from the problem. Though it is said easily, you need a broad shoulder to practice it. This has been a truly motivational factor.

Giving and receiving feedback – We have this regular practice of giving feedback to our boss and as well receiving feedback from him. This periodical activity helps in better understanding of the team and understanding of the boss and this definitely contributes to the team’s productivity. But a key reminder is to have an open mind when you sit on a feedback session, be it boss or a subordinate without any expectations.

Encouraging new initiatives – My boss is a true professional who believes that the team growth or the team members growth, is contributing to his growth. So he is one, who always encourages new ideas, initiatives and supports in all endeavors. As a team member, this approach of my boss facilitates to think out of the box and always look out for the value addition done by us in each of the deliverables. 

Management by Example – I would like to term the practices of my boss as ’Management by Example’. He is an example in each and every action of our department and it quickly enables the team to fall in line with him. This includes, even coming to office on time, maintaining punctuality for all the meetings, approachable to all the members, down to earth person despite the title he has, lending a helping hand when we need to meet up time pressures, very humane in nature, consistency in deliverables, etc etc, the list being too very long. 

To put it in a nutshell, though I have tried to keep myself as short as possible, my boss has truly been my inspiration for me for all my endeavors. My teams’ success rate on all our deliverables under his leadership and guidance is truly a validation for his management principles. Having been associated with him for over two years, I think this is the best tribute that I can pay him for what I am today, by sharing his best management practices to the management fraternity. 

All said and done, I would urge all bosses to take good care of your team and that is the best motivating factor to enhance the team’s productivity. Create an enthusiastic and positive ambience, to tap the best talent of your team. The bosses can make or break the career of an individual, provided the individual also cooperates in the successful accomplishments of the department’s goals. 

 

Jai Hind...

 

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!!!!!!

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

 

• Love, Peace and Joy came down on earth on Christmas day to make you happy and cheerful. May Christmas spread cheer in your lives!
• Sending the warmest Christmas wishes to you and your family. May God shower his choicest blessings on you and your family this Christmas!
• May all your days be merry and bright and may your Christmas be white! Merry Christmas!

 

 

Values and the Executive .

I have come across so much skepticism whenever I discuss executive life and basic values, that I am reminded of the story of the preacher who ended his sermon with ‘Remember my brothers and sisters, there is no buying and selling in heaven’.  A bored executive on one of the last pews, got so fed up that he yelled back - ‘That’s not where business has gone anyway’.

Yes, “business has gone to hell” - is the refrain heard from executives everywhere.  But we cannot sit back and passively accept this state of affairs.  We need to do something about it.  And the best summary that I have come across is one put forward by Cyrus Vance in his excellent book ‘Manager Today, Executive Tomorrow’.  Vance gives eight

basic attitudes.  These are:

1. >From birth to death we are alone

There is no one in the entire world who can help us or be with us all the time.  Surely one’s parents are there through infancy, childhood and perhaps a part of adulthood.  One may have brothers and sisters and friends.  They will all be with you some of the time through the course of your life.

And again, in reverse, this will happen with your own wife and children who will be with you part of the time. But the own permanent company you will keep is yourself.   Because from birth to death, you are alone - only interspersed with periods of togetherness. That is why you have to learn to enjoy your own company - to convert the concept of ‘loneliness’ to a concept of ‘aloneness’.  Loneliness is negative, depressing, sorrowful, stark.  Aloneness is positive, enjoyable, rejuvenating. There would seem to be a lot of sense in this guideline.  It makes you less dependent on other people, on the movies, TV programmes or the video films.  It is important to face up to the reality that from birth to death you are alone, and adopt a positive attitude towards this inescapable truth.

2.  No one in this entire world owes you anything

This is a very difficult attitude to adopt because we are all brought up to believe that everyone should do things for us.  We all have expectations, sometimes very high, and some totally divorced from reality.  This is because we do not understand and accept the positive success generating attitude that  ‘no one you meet in your entire life owes you anything’.

If anything is given to you, it can be graciously accepted.  If it is denied to you, it is pointless being annoyed.  There are no rights or favours that are done for you or to you. Much of the unhappiness in the world today is not because people have less than in the earlier generation.  It is because expectations have changed and increased, and when

these expectations are not met, people get annoyed and revolt.

3. The word progress means different things to different people

Most people measure their own progress based on where they stand in relation to those friends who have perhaps gone places and are apparently very successful.  So, because my friend who graduated at the same time twenty-five years ago, is now an Assistant Director with World Bank in Washington, I am unhappy.  Because another friend of mine is now a Cardiologist in London and practices at Harley Street and stays in a large five bedroom mansion near London, I feel unhappy.

This is because I am measuring my own progress by the achievements of other people.  Vance suggests that we measure progress by the objectives we have set ourselves in life, and how far we have achieved these objectives.  It’s like the basic rule followed in athletics and racing:  ‘Always look forward.  Keep your eye on the finishing line.  If you look back to see where the others are, you may slip up in that brief moment and lose the race’. Never mind about what other people are doing or have done.  Let them do their own thing, as you are doing yours.  Let them follow their own star, while you follow yours.  Because progress means different things to different people.

4.  In life realise that you are going to win some, lose some

Some people get so spoilt as children, where their parents give them everything they ask for from ice cream to clothes and expensive toys, that they cannot face a situation where they can’t get something they want.  They do not realise that like in a one-day cricket match, only one side can win. The really complete person faces up to this with some disappointment, but without the depression bordering on wanting to commit suicide.  Because he  knows that in life, “you win some, and you lose some.  You don’t win all the time”.

5.  A life without problems is impossible

Most of us are looking for the ideal life, where we will encounter total happiness and contentment without any clouds of sorrow. But this is a dream.  It never happens.  Perhaps it happens in novels, in unrealistic movies, and in short stories.  But not in real life. Life is always a graph of high and low points, of peaks, and valleys.  Some may have longer periods of peaks and smaller intervals of valleys.  For others it may be the other way round. But we all have a due share of both, whether we are born rich or poor, intelligent or dull, handsome or ugly, brown or white.

6. No matter what others say, you never stop learning

There will be the pessimists and cynics who keep telling you that the world is a cruel place, that merit really gets you nowhere, that every where it is now a question of how you can buy your way through with either money or influence, or both.  That the boss goes by how many favours you have done for him rather than by how well you have done your work. There are others who will tell you that there is nothing new in the world, that you can’t teach an old dog new tricks, that all supposedly new knowledge is ‘old wine in new bottles’.  But the world is changing so fast, with technology being updated every day, not just every year, and new concepts being put forward and old theories disproved.  It is a fast changing world.  At last 70% of the products you buy today, were not available 50 years ago.  Unless you keep learning and keep abreast of what is going on, both in your own field as well as in the general environment, you will be outdated and soon obsolete.

7. Change is taking place all the time and you must welcome it

Most people don’t.  They prefer the familiar, the standard routine with everything in its place.  People don’t like to change their homes to bigger houses and better surroundings because of the fear of the unfamiliar.  It is only the positively oriented who welcome change and enjoy it. They do not wait for everyone else to change, and then join them.  They are amongst the first, ‘the change agents’.  They realise that ‘the only permanent feature of life is change’. Change also involves learning or relearning, which is resented by most people.  But the change agent does not resent it inspite of the trouble.  It may involve, because he understands and accepts that he must welcome change.

8.  You must choose optimism instead of pessimism

It is so easy these days to be pessimistic.  The examination papers are leaked out and sold, there is cheating at the exams, you can’t get admission into professional colleges even with 90 per cent marks, jobs are only obtained by influence, fast progress in one’s career needs a god-father, the country is going to pieces, there is corruption everywhere, the old sense of ethical values has totally vanished, the price of necessities is spiralling.

All this is enough to depress any normal human being. But it can’t be allowed to happen.  As Henry Thoreau said, “Men were born to succeed, not to fail”.  The person with positive attitudes looks at the bright side of things and moves forward.  He looks for ways and means to bring about changes and improve the environment.  Instead of being totally influenced by others, he makes an effort to influence others.  All the time he asks himself ‘what can I do about it?’

 

 

Courtesy By: Jagdish Badal, Asst.Manager, ICFAI Flexi Education Network (IFEN), Corporate – Sales (Team -1), E-mail: Jagdishbadal@ifenindia.org

 

Wish you Happy Diwali and Prosperous New Year.