Employee Empowerment

Human Resources has often had to straddle the recognition of employee personal brands vs their organizational engagement. In this day-and-age many individuals have larger follower bases than those of the organization they represent. Still to this day, individuals have lost employment opportunities due to their social media behaviors. While we see many companies using employee advocacy to boost their brand and celebrate individuality. Take into account employees participating in large gatherings for social justice while navigating a pandemic and enforcing policy outside of work becomes ever-complicated.

The elusive permanence of work from home policy paired with the wave of social justice will no doubt have a lasting impact on workforce culture. As employee engagement gave way to employee experience, its now time to give awareness to Employee Empowerment!

The End of Micro-Management

Without proximity to look over employee shoulders, managers who rule by control have lost a major component of their entitlement. Simply put, trust is the only path forward. Managers who cannot lead through positive direction will soon render themselves irrelevant. Employees have had a taste of working at their own pace and will seek to continue self-motivation (and we'll have data to prove efficiency). As the world evolves to empower individual brands, expect to see HR playing a key role in helping managers develop as true people leaders.

With transparency in the ether the transformation of employee empowerment will put an end to workplace bullying.  

Attention to Mental Health

It's difficult to work from home for three months straight without having good days and bad. The personal isolation resulting from the virtual office has brought hyper-focus on employee mental health. It is a shame that it took a global pandemic to bring peoples mental conditioning to the forefront but this revelation will ultimately serve a higher purpose. Much in the way intolerance of workplace bullying will improve manager/employee relationships, we will also see a vast improvement in recognizing employee burnout.

With freedom to express one's mental fatigue comes a workplace collective that is based in support of all people toward social evolution.

Encouraged Activism

There was a time when seeing an employee fighting for social justice on the front page might have been frowned upon. That time is gone. Politics overlapping with professional purpose can create workplace unrest but freedom of expression can no longer be regulated. Allowing employees time off to vote, the license to serve social causes and levity in personal expression is an unwritten right.

Employees who have the ability to do work that matters in service of a cause that is making a difference will stay forever. Even if your company serves a more mundane purpose, recognizing individual's personal passion will help invigorate their professional purpose.

2020 may very well be noted as the most confusing year in human history. With uncertainty comes a lack of control but we are starting to discover that this can be an avenue to progress.

Don't Forget to Remember,

Dave

MAPS

As we endure our 14th week in quarantine we are finding order without perfection. One thing is for sure:

Personal Strategy is as important as Collective Harmony.

Finding little wins helps and in every day we try to learn and evolve. We've gained hours once lost to commuting, we've learned to make silo-ed communication meaningful and it seems interpersonal disputes are no longer all-consuming.

Without in-person calamity, we are continually engaging with other human beings; some lift us up while others seek to project frustration. There are people who have always been better at working at their own pace where struggle has become commonplace in those who require more attention. Managers are losing the ability to look over employee shoulders so those who cannot trust will fail. Some things will never be fixed but we can focus on what we can control.

It is time to dive deep into yourself to confront chaos with composure.

"there is a map in my room (on the wall of my room)... and I've got big, big plans" - Brian Sella 

Mental Discipline

If you sit in your house for three months you are going to have good days and bad. The evolved attention to employee mental health will be amplified tenfold post-COVID. A lasting shift in how people are treated is coming like a tidal wave and employee empowerment will hit an all time high.

Is your company ready?

Are you ready?

Finding personal discipline will be the defining characteristic that separates highly successful people from those who struggle over the next 18 months. This will require an ability to take total personal accountability for your success while allowing others empathy. Individuals will be required to do twice as much with half the resources. Navigating fear of reduction will override any abundance of back patting. Those who are able to put the work in without expectation of reward will emerge with an enlightened approach to success.  

Activist Mindset

As we struggle through a time of unimaginable disappointment, compassion is the only vehicle for progress. Most humans possess an inherent desire to help others but support may be a passive exercise. Assembly and volume can put the boat into the water but part of acknowledging the strife of others means allowing them to drive.

You don't have to march to learn about other people. Make time every day to learn something about someone different from you.

Physical Commitment

As if evolving your personal ideology in isolation is not challenging enough, you'll also have to commit to your own physical health.

You will need to...

1. Exercise 7 days a week

2. Eat Right

3. Sleep (at least) 8 hours an evening

4. Lay off the booze

5. Manage your susceptibility to disease contraction

When you commit to physical health, EVERYTHING gets easier!

 

Spiritual Enhancement

Pray

Read

Listen to great music

Watch wonderful movies

Interact with people who uplift you

Find sources of inspiration

Things will continue to be less than ideal for a great while. The discipline of navigating this segment of history will be something that stays with you forever.

"most of us probably not getting better, but not getting better... together" - John K. Samson

Don't Forget to Remember,

Dave     

A Shift in Behavioral Modeling

Dr. Michael Ahearne of the University of Houston shared research this week that pointed to a dynamic shift from transactional to trusting customer relationships through the emergence of the COVID19 pandemic. We've seen insight into how to work from home more efficiently. With theory becoming a sustained reality, it is now time for human beings to adapt and persevere.

Additionally, there has been a noticeable transition from quantitative to qualitative measurements of organizational success. This means keeping an acute focus on revenue while changing the measures by which to get there.

I've authored several articles on the importance of Behavioral Modeling in the past. Whether you create performance pillars based in intrinsic motivators or you subscribe to the SCARF methodology to guide manager/employee relationships, the time is now to shift focus.

To evolve workforce strategy, Total Rewards teams are presented an opportunity to marry compensation and benefit strategy. This new normal will be rooted in technology. With an already intense strain on HRIS teams, the deployment of Human Capital Management technology may be an additional unmet need. Here, the opportunity for field management to utilize existing platforms will bring historically fragmented parties together in partnership.

Work with What You've Got
With goals shifting from individual to team based, competition will give way to collaboration. This synergy will produce an avenue for engagement at higher levels than in the past. Collective achievement can have a more profound impact than individual employees taking all the credit. Those of greatest contribution can still be recognized while complemented by a grander strategy based in collaborative advancement.

We've seen this before. The retail banking scandal of last decade moved tellers from transaction-based selling goals to a more responsible customer support model. It may come as a surprise but customers added more products to their portfolio and the term of customer relationships were lengthened. 

Continued Leverage
So we are calling upon individuals to be a bigger part of the collective. How do we measure that?

1. Put qualitative performance pillars in place
a.     Teamwork
b.     System Population
c.     Training Completion

2. Measure the above systematically
a.     Manager Coaching
b.     Badging for Milestone Completion
c.     Leaderboards

You'll see how these formally assumed "fluff" programs become measurable and actionable.

With the carrot now affixed at the end of a longer stick, will employees continue to be motivated?

As budgets shift you'll have plenty of opportunity to reward employees for short term goal attainment through non-cash rewards and save compensation bonuses for overall measured production.  

The Jerry Maguire Rule      

"We are losing our battle with all that is personal and real about our business" - Jerry Maguire

The above excerpt is from Jerry Maguire's mission statement entitled "The Things We Think and Do Not Say". With the extraordinary financial strain of COVID19 related work adjustments, this mission statement is more relevant that ever. As Dr. Ahearne further exemplified in his research, bringing value to clients will be the only way to retain them. Similar to the unwritten agreement employers have with their employees, now more than ever, trust will drive client relationships.

What does this mean?

Robotic approaches to customer service will not sustain. Sales professionals will need to invest deeply in knowledge attainment of customer needs and how to solve business challenges. Organizational leaders will have to be realistic while creating inspiration at a level they may have shied away from in the past.

The road ahead will be rocky and no one can see the bridge to stability quite yet. It would be great to have simple answers but there are none.

Now is the time to invest in employee development and put customers first. Advocacy will win the day... One day at a time!

Don't Forget to Remember,

Dave