photo by antkriz
Dueling philosophies on hiring and employee retention at the latest Web2.0 conference (via WSJ Blog).
Mark Zuckerberg touted the Facebook culture of hiring entrepreneurially inclined people who burn brilliantly and then fade away (presumably of their own volition). Tony Hsieh of Zappos provided the counter philosophy of finding the folks who fit the culture and aspire to stick with the company for 10 years or more.
Who is right?
Both. The key that makes both of them right is that everyone is aware of the culture. Each CEO knows exactly what they’re looking for and how to identify it. Success is achieved by aligning the culture/working philosophy and getting everyone pulling in the same direction.
Corporate success comes from recognizing what you want to achieve and defining the culture accordingly.
Facebook is about changing our relationship with each other and the Internet. Thus, they need people who can conceptualize a radically different world and execute to get everyone there.
Meanwhile, Zappos is about customer service. So it makes sense that Zappos creates a very cultivative company. How employees are treated is how they’ll in turn treat customers.
There aren’t necessarily good or bad cultures. But there are good or bad cultures for you.
The ability to explicitly describe what each company is looking for enables people to opt-in or out of the application process. And that same explicitness enables everyone hiring at the company to hold all applicants up to the same light and identify the ones who will be successful by honoring the company’s philosophy.
Unfortunately, most companies can’t state their cultural philosophy as passionately or clearly as Zuckerberg and Hsieh. And, it’s not much of a surprise there aren’t many companies doing as well as these two either.
From the Amazing Mind of Jessica Hagy
Your job description is the bare minimum required to do your job. It’s a suggested starting point not a prescriptive action plan.
Seeing that Venn diagram reminded me that I’ve never been more frustrated than when I felt constrained in my ability to make a difference. When I failed it was because I succumbed to the thinking that ‘this is how things are done’ and allowed myself to be defined by my title, job description or the perception of others.
A couple off-the-cuff thoughts on what I was doing differently during the times I was successful:
These aren’t universal, of course. And there will be work environments in which this is easier to do than others.
But, the bottom line is that to make yourself invaluable you have to do more than check the boxes. Be proactive in defining your role. It certainly makes the game easier to win.
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For more intelligently funny truisms in diagram, graph and equation form, check out ThisIsIndexed.
photo by annadriel
A recent Towers Perrin post reveals a conversation the author had with former NFL coach Tony Dungy. Football is known for its gruff, abrupt, in-your-face style of ‘leadership,’ but Tony Dungy was far from that. He succinctly states his philosophy to leading and getting the best from his players three points (from the post):
- His parents were both teachers and they believed that it was their responsibility to make every student an “A” student. But not every student learns the same way, so you have to tailor your style to each individual to bring out the best in them.
- You have to make each player on the team understand that the good of the team is greater than that of any individual, and that you can only be successful as a team.
- You have to earn your players’ trust — this is foundational to the first two. They have to trust that your coaching and advice is what is best for them and for the collective team.
I like this for several reasons:
First, if your leadership style is inflexible and you see people as cogs in the wheel then you dramatically limit the field of potential individuals who could excel in the job. Finding good people is hard, why should we further constrain ourselves?
Secondly, you are limited by the boundaries of your own imagination and thought process. If you only know one way to go about things then you won’t be open-minded to new, potentially better approaches.
Further, by acknowledging that people are unique you are connecting with them on a very personal level. In order to motivate you have to know them. That connection is usually a two-way street. By taking the time to understand someone you’re proving you care about them. Reciprocation is then difficult not to grant. You wind up getting a lot more effort in return.
Finally, you don’t want your people to compete with each other too much. That devolves into a race to the bottom. It is far easier to push another down than it is to lift oneself up. Putting the team first means that you won’t reward pushing others down in order to shine.
I don’t like the term ‘happy’ when it comes to work. It’s too New Age Cumbaya. Though, if pressed, I would fall back on my sample of one and recall the times I’ve been most creative, effective and productive at work and it’s always been when I’m most confident in myself, when I’m most comfortable fitting into my surroundings and when I’m generally happy. Yes, it matters.
I just finished reading Johan Lehrner’s latest called How We Decide and he off-handedly plucks out a study by Mark Jung-Beeman showing that people with a positive mood (read: happy) are able to solve 20% more puzzles than unhappy people. And conversely, people with higher anxiety solved fewer problems and were slower doing so.
photo by tricky
A majority of us now work in knowledge industries. Everything we do is about solving problems, creatively improving products and processes and finding new ways to out-flank our competition. Everything requires creativity. And insofar as speed to execution and problem-solving matter to your business then it behooves you to pay attention to what your employees are feeling.
It’s not making sure they have M&Ms, on-site dry cleaning or yoga classes. But making sure that,
Just as Happy Cows make better cheese so do happy employees make better products.
[To read Jung-Beeman's full study download the PDF for the 'Positive Mood and Anxiety Modulate Anterior Cingulate Activity and Cognitive Preparation for Insight.' It's the first title.]
photo by auntie p
I just read a phenomenal post on burnout - well researched, explained and experienced. And while I’m a big believer in work-life balance I was left with a question for which I don’t have an answer.
Can burnout be prevented through the right set of challenges and rewards?
In my sample of one, the times in which I’ve experienced burnout are when I don’t see the value of my work.
In other words, the work I was doing wasn’t challenging enough, the reason I was doing it didn’t align with my motivations and the rewards were captured by someone else.
Is it possible to solve burnout not by giving your team a few extra days off and returning to the same situation that created it in the first place but by getting to know what drives everyone on your team and assigning work accordingly?
If you knew why each individual on the team wanted to work, how they preferred to be rewarded and what their long-term goals were, do you think they’d burn out?
I don’t mean to suggest people can be worked indefinitely. Creative people (of which we are all a part in some manner) need to recharge at some point. But if we create work environments that provide the road map by which people can reach their goals and get the rewards they seek along the way then I think we’d see far less talk about burnout and being over-stressed.
Please jot your thoughts in the comments below. Thanks.
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