The evolution of employee preference has spotlighted Emotional Intelligence where the Total Rewards Model once held court. This wave of change will seek to replace transaction with transformation. While the concept is exciting, scaling and corralling EI will be much more difficult.
We will wait for systems and their according benefits to catch up, until then, let's simplify what it means to be a person with a job (and all of the intricacies that fit in-between):
What do you love?
Where do you find it?
It's the Sunday afternoon on a bar stool when a song that reminds you of a time comes on the Jukebox. It's the walks with your dog. It's the total peace you feel when watching your kids sleep (and your desire to wake them up in that moment). It's the anguish of losing and the thrill of victory. It's laughing from the bottom of your stomach and how that warms your heart.... and seeing that girl that will change your life.... and the feeling you get when you lose a job or a relationship passes and you realize you'll be better for it.
In every day we find a passage to a thought that leads us to to something new. With every one of these experiences, we cling to something that makes better sense... and life gets better because we care enough to change.
People die...
... and people are born....
And leaves fall and then the sun starts shining again.
In-between it all, you meet new people, take on new responsibility and discard what you are helpless to control.
and you hear a song you love... and your team wins.... and life, in these fleeting moments, is freaking great!
So, we take in the complexity of what it means to be human and we attempt to qualify, quantify and create a transaction. We will never be able to capture all the complexity of being human and put it into a box. What we can do is allow people to open the next door in their path to development.
Freedom
There is an old Management ethos that involves posing open ended-question for the sake of putting the employee on the spot. Apparently embarrassment is a motivator? You could also just tell people what to do and trust them to do it.
Motivation for the sake of appeasing a task master will entice people to do just enough to stay out of trouble.
People want to be left to their own devices: to make their own schedules, develop their path to success, to celebrate results and recon with their failures. Success feels great when it is shared. We know when we've messed up and we don't need to be reminded.
Doing God's Work
"I don't care what people expect of me. Doesn't concern me. I'm doing God's work. That's all I know." - Bob Dylan
At a certain point you stop waiting for direction or asking for approval. Your experience will guide the way... you'll come to understand what not to do in spite of your failures. Collaboration is critical, Dependence is a death sentence.
You back a man into the corner long enough and sooner-or-later, he's going to come out swinging.
When you know what you are fighting for all you have to do is develop an uncompromising work ethic. Purpose... Skill.... and Hard Work meet at a mighty cross roads known as success.
Compromise will only get you so far. Short cuts will always catch up with you. If you are not rooted in principles that you would die for, you have not yet lived. If you think you can fake it until you make it, you will never make it. There are a million unemployed Rhodes Scholars sitting on bar stools across the land sucking on silver spoons.
No one owes you anything and people will seldom give away that which can be purchased.
You have to earn it.... over and over again!
You can wait for the door to open or you can Kick It In!
Don't Forget to Remember,
Dave
