|
|
by Rick Baker
On Mar 27, 2014
When it comes to work, does sense of accomplishment mean anything to you?
Do you think work is a necessary evil, devoid of anything satisfying or fulfilling?
Or, do you experience gratification when you complete a work-task?
Are you proud when your work-tasks are well done?
When you struggle with or fail at work-tasks, do you experience negative feelings like frustration, annoyance, or even anger?
Or, when your work-tasks go poorly do you feel little one way or the other?
Does your work trigger a sense of accomplishment?
If your work does not trigger a sense of accomplishment, why do you subject yourself to doing it?
Do you think your work is the place where you exchange your time and effort doing things that provide you no internal rewards for money...that is, you get paid?
If so, do you think that's sustainable?
Do you think you can carry on working without positive feelings...working on and on like that until the day comes when you don't work any more?
Will your job survive if you approach your job that way?
Will your employer want to keep you?
Whether or not you are still there, will your place of work survive with workers who approach their jobs that way?
by Rick Baker
On Mar 13, 2014
When problems arise in business, as they have a habit of doing more or less all the time, some of us have a need to apply labels of blame. I mean, some of us cannot begin to work on fixing a problem until we firmly fix the blame for the problem onto a person or persons. For some of us, affixing blame is the first step in problem solving and the second step in problem solving (if there is a second step) is entirely dependent upon what happened during the affixing-the-blame step.
If the affixing-the-blame step goes smoothly and the blame tightly clings to the other person then the second step often involves a quick washing hands clean of the problem: as in - not my problem, your problem...look & see...the problem is affixed to you...so you fix it.
This Affixing Labels of Blame strategy has the advantages of being quick and effective for the hand-washer. In other words: I've affixed the problem on you so you're stuck with it and my hands are clean so I will get on with other work.
This Affixing Labels of Blame strategy has the disadvantages of really annoying other people [as you kick them when they are down] and depriving problems of access to their best solutions.
Tied to this Affixing Labels of Blame strategy, are the mindsets:
- I'm not going to invest time or effort on this problem unless you balk at being stuck with it, in which case I will repeat my opinion that it is your problem not mine and
- Sooner or later, if you do not fix the problem and that failure annoys me then I will conclude you are incompetent and I will reserve the right to express that opinion to other people.
***
Some people take a different approach to business problems.
Rather than feeling the need to first affix the blame, some people feel a need to understand the problem.
Recognizing business contains only 3 things - people, process, & situations - they feel the need to understand the situation and the processes surrounding the problem. This need drives them to understand the problem then resolve it. As they go about understanding the situations and processes that have caused the problem they do not affix blame on people. They go beyond not affixing blame. They take extra care to communicate in ways that diffuse the fear of criticism experienced by others. They understand many people are so accustomed to being the brunt of blame-labels they have developed self-protection habits, which they perform as soon as 'their problems' become the topic under discussion.
Some problem-solvers understand self-protection is a normal part of the human condition. They know their skin is thicker so they have less need than others to be self-protective. They don't feel the need to criticize others about self-protection or ferret out that fact of life in ways that humble or humiliate others. Some problem-solvers view affixing blame as damaging, counter-productive, and a waste of quality time and effort.
How do you approach problems?
How do you react/respond when problems are brought to you:
- By co-workers/peers?
- By your boss?
- By people who report to you?
Do you alter your approach to 'fit' the person?
When people arrive with their problems, do you push away, kiss up, and beat down?
Do you practice the good habit of working first to understand the processes & situations around problems?
Or, are you stuck on that bad habit known as Affixing Labels of Blame?
by Rick Baker
On Mar 11, 2014
There's an old saying, "Do as I say, not as I do."
That saying captures the fact people provide advice to others that is totally inconsistent with the actions they display to others.
Why do we instruct one way and act the opposite way?
We do we give advice to others that is inconsistent with our self-advice?
Do we treat others harshly and cut ourselves slack?
Yes and yes...frequently.
Do we provide better advice to others than we provide to ourselves?
Yes...frequently.
Why do we do these things?
In a word - Emotions.
Each of us has long-lasting and deep relationships with our emotions. Each of us has formed habits that are laced up in the emotion-legacies we experience as feelings. And, while our own emotions hold strong influence over us, we have far less ability to empathize with the emotions and feelings experienced by others. Consequently, the advice we give to ourselves is wrapped up in our emotional baggage while the advice we give to others is not (or, at least, the emotional baggage around it is much thinner).
Does that imply the advice we provide to others is better than the advice we give to ourselves?
Yes...at least the cold, hard logic of the advice is better.
On the other hand...No. The other person will quickly wrap up our logical advice in his or her own emotional baggage and so our advice will be distorted and, in the vast majority of situations, it will not be followed. Put another way, the other person will tend to cut himself or herself the same emotion-wrapped slack we would apply to ourselves.
All of this seems to point to the value of building something like 'reverse psychology' into the advice we provide to others. We can do this by refraining from giving advice to others and instead let others know the advice we would provide to ourselves if we were in the same situation. Then, we could be candid about the quality of our self-advice. We could let the other person know our self-advice has the habit of being laced with logic-defying emotional baggage. We could let the other person know our self-advice is quite often flawed to dysfunctional. All that said, the person may give thought to his or her own self-advice, inject some emotion-defying logic into it, and actually follow it. That would be a constructive outcome.
Later, seeing the positive results of the advice self-selected by the other person, we could choose to follow the advice we did not give.
Then that old saying could be altered to - "Do as you say and I'll do as you do."
Wouldn't that be a win-win!
by Rick Baker
On Mar 3, 2014
Wouldn’t it be interesting if perfectionists would allow us to walk step-by-step with them as they perform their perfectionist role.
When they are being the perfectionist - do they think much, or are they simply compelled to do...and do...and do?
When perfectionists think, is their thinking confined to ruts where thoughts keep repeating while actions are stalled?
When perfectionists think, what are they thinking? Are their thoughts like those of non-perfectionists except more textured or broader in scope? Or are perfectionists' thoughts nonsensical or scattered or bizarre?
To what extent are perfectionists’ thoughts being dragged along by feelings of need or worry or criticism? Are perfectionists' thoughts always dragged along by negative feelings? Or, are perfectionists' thoughts sometimes laced with positive feelings...or mania?
To what degree are perfectionists driven to create? Is perfectionist-behaviour aligned with building value or is it simply driven by an extra-strong interest in doing things right?
Perhaps an in-depth understanding of perfectionists’ mindsets and thought processes would put us in a much better position to help them…assuming they need, want, and are ready to accept our help.
Or...
Is perfectionism in business a dysfunction by its very name?
Is perfectionism a dysfunction that a leader simply cannot ignore...a signal that corrective action is a must?
In business, doing things right is a good thing. Like everything in business, there are costs associated with doing things right...at the least, there are the costs of time spent. And, perfectionists overspend their time. Others know this. That's likely how the label 'perfectionist' came about in the first place. So, perfectionists are inclined to spend too much time on things as they work to do those things the right way. That sounds conflicted.
Where does perfectionism end and indecision start?
Or - do these 2 things overlap?
Or - is perfectionism an exaggerated form of indecision...one destined to to thwart both good decisions and delegation?
Questioned another way...
Is perfectionism the antidote for decisiveness?
If so, as we work at doing things right in business, can indecision help us achieve better results?
by Rick Baker
On Feb 11, 2014
In business, should we reward the efforts people make or the results people achieve?
I've seen the following conflicted pieces of advice from the 'experts', the psychologists and the behavioural scientists:
- reward efforts and don't reward results,
- praise efforts and reward results,
- set small, short-term goals and reward results as they are achieved, and
- be careful when you reward result...you may not like the behaviour behind the results.
And, over the last 10 years, there has been much said about how to apply rewards.
For example:
- Is money a reward that motivates people? Some argue "No", intrinsic rewards are the drivers behind motivation,
- Should we use negative rewards? [I wrote a bit about that in no carrots, no sticks...no donkeys, inspired by seeing Dan Pink in action in 2011], and
- celebrate failures.
In the 2007 book ' INFLUENCER', Patterson, Grenny et al recommend:
- Intrinsic rewards come first.
- Social support, encouragement, and rewards are the essential second step.
- Then apply extrinsic rewards.
Consider the above 3 steps for Influencing.
Step #1: Consider your work-situation and the people you work with. When work-tasks are being doled out, do you think any of your people ask themselves questions like: " Can I do this thing?", " Do I enjoy doing this thing?", and " What's in it for me if I do this thing?" Likely, you will agree - most people do ask themselves those intrinsic-motivation questions. And, if their answers to those questions are negative then their intrinsic motivation to do the work-tasks will be low. And the next domino...your ability to spark their flames of motivation will be small, perhaps non-existent. You may be able to force the people to do the work, using a 'stick'. However, the behaviour that follows will be lacklustre and the positive results [if they happen at all] will be short-lived. And, of course, think about yourself. How do you behave and perform when you think the tasks are beyond your capability or offer little of interest to you in return for your effort?
Step #2: Again, consider the real people in your work-situation. Does your work environment contain social support to enable change? As one example: when changes are in the works do your people rally around the change, helping one another perform the new behaviours? Or, is change more like a bunch of singular events where every man is expected to change for himself and every woman is expected to change for herself? Is the former succeeding? Is the latter failing? In summary - What do your real-life experiences tell you about Step #2: Social support, encouragement, and rewards are the essential second step?
Step #3: How much time do you spend considering the effect extrinsic rewards have on your people? For example, does money help motivate your people? Does an annual cost-of-living raise motivate another year of top-notch behaviour? Do you see direct evidence of that? Does a year-end bonus help motivate another year of top-notch behaviour? Do you see direct evidence of that? Can you identify a direct connection between any of those sorts of routine money additions and your people's positive work-behaviour? Or, are money increases more like a 'necessary evil'...a necessary evil because they are required to keep your people from leaving to work elsewhere?
When I think through these sorts of questions - how they apply to people I have worked with and how they apply to me - I know:
- There are times when money motivates behaviour...this motivation is highest when money is short; this motivation is lowest when financial independence has been achieved.
- I know intrinsic rewards work...when work-tasks are enjoyable, regardless of why they are enjoyable, it is easy to spend the time doing them; when tasks are not enjoyable and the other benefits linked to the tasks are not clear or large enough it is easy to say "I'm too busy" or procrastinate
- Social support does influence behaviour...most people go the extra mile when they feel they are part of a unified team; most people struggle when they are forced to perform in isolation
by Rick Baker
On Jan 24, 2014
When you were a baby were you curious, wanting to understand the world around you?
Yes - of course you were a naturally curious baby.
Yes - of course you used your natural senses, you observed, you copied, you tested, you explored, and using those natural processes you learned.
When you were a baby you, naturally, knew enough to learn.
How is that natural gift serving you now?
|
|