Focus on making your employees happy

Recently, I recalled a kind thing that a boss once said, and I was stuck by the intense joy and smile it brought to my face today, eight years later.

For 14 years, I worked two part-time jobs: one as a Life & Career Coach and one as a software technical writer. During that time, I'd gradually reduced my tech-writing hours as I transitioned to my new career.

When my Life & Career Coaching clients consider working two jobs, I share my experiences. One of the Pros of my computer job involved holding onto benefits, which included pension savings. One of the Cons is that my managers frequently had to justify my presence to newly hired administrators (Why are we paying that high salary to the guy who isn't here every day?). My bosses often said, Just trust us, leave him alone, until the new hires could feel reassured by the quality of my work.

During the first half of 2007, I took a leave of absence because of a herniated disk in my back and the resulting surgery. At the same time, my start-up company had significantly increased its staffing and HR policies in anticipation of a corporate buy-out. As a result, after my surgery, I returned to many new faces, some new rules, and a more formal work environment.

Sometime during first few weeks back, one of the newly hired Bean Counters sent an email and asked me to verify my weekly hours. Given my hectic re-entry and the intensity of trying to get back up to speed with my work, I didn't give the question as much thought as I should have. I thought it would be easier to come in just two days a week instead of trying to squeeze in another half day, so I answered "16" (two eight-hour days). 

Well, in the day or two after answering, I began to see form letters informing me that my benefits were being cut. Without bothering to wander 20 yards down the Cube Farm to talk to me, the Bean Counter simply began hacking away. After exchanging a few emails with him, it became clear that this was all happening because I'd dipped below 20 hours a week.  

Ooops!  

Factoring in my 401K and insurances, I was instantly on board with coming into work for that extra half day. So, I sent an email to my manager, he sent a note to the Bean Counter and to me about reinstating my 20-hour work week, and he prefaced everything by saying, Let's make Gerry happy.

To this day, that line makes me smile. Let's make Gerry happy! At that time, it also made me want to work very, very hard for him. It would be a few more weeks before I was recovered enough from surgery to be able to work significant overtime, but I was ready to "show him some love" by doing some excellent work.

*          *          *

Notice that my manager didn't explicitly focus on compensation, problem solving, resolving an "issue," facilitating better communication, motivating me, reciting policy, or performance coaching. Instead, he briefly-yet-powerfully invoked corporate culture, reminding us that—as we worked really hard—we should also "have each other's back" emotionally, caring about whether we were happy. It's about taking a little bit of time to generate that feeling in your exchanges with a coworker.

When I first became a supervisor, I received a week of management training, and I still remember several points made during that week. When discussing how to reward employees' performance, the instructor emphasized that different approaches make different people happy. Some like the latest new hardware gadget, yet that would be meaningless to other people. Some like the office with the window. Some love a small accommodation for child care. Still others are about the raises or the formal title. Or maybe it's about being placed on a particular project team and being able to do a certain kind of work.

Part of excellent management is understanding that motivation and making someone happy intersect, but they aren't the same thing. Motivation is about a manager generating employee performance; creating joy is about rewarding performance in a way that fosters SELF motivation.

When I was a manager, one of the biggest "bang for the buck" rewards programs involved me doing some detective work about an employee's tastes, writing a Thank You card for a very specific bit of good performance, and popping a $25 gift certificate for a product or service that that person would enjoy into the card: music for a music fan, a movie gift certificate if she liked films, a bookstore gift card for others. 

That really made people smile! But you have to take some time to get to know them to know how to create that moment.

My tech-writing manager knew how to do that, and I smile about it to this day. Thank you, Dave!

A Life Coaching model applied to Ferguson

A common Life Coaching model first involves helping people to create a clear, detailed vision for a much better future. When assisting with a vision, one of my favorite tactics is to ask The Magic Wand Question: If you could wave a magic wand and make it so, what would a perfect, wonderful situation look like? In this way, the coach helps the client to stay focused on the desired end game without self censoring based on current limitations and without balking out of fear.

If you aim high and come up short, you'll achieve more than if you aim low and hit the mark.
 
Once the vision is clear, then the coach helps people to create long-term goals and strategies (in general, what needs to happen to create the future you envision?). Finally, given the vision and long-term goals, the coach helps the client to identify a few manageable tasks you could accomplish right now that would move that process along (what would you be willing to do this week? this month?).

If you can do a few small goals every week, all month long, for a few years, then magic happens. You can build the future you imagined.

I thought it would be an interesting exercise to apply this process to the situation in Ferguson, Missouri. Of course, this is just an intellectual exercise. I'll leave it up to others to determine of this is something they would actually want to DO, mind you. ;-)

Vision: Imagine a city five years from now in which authority respects community members, and citizens respect authority. Citizens feel as if they belong, there's a place for them in the city, and they have equal opportunity to thrive and succeed in Ferguson. Leadership is skilled and reflects the make-up of its citizenry. Cooperation, collaboration, and communication with citizens has been woven into the process of how the city runs. Specifically, imagine a black mayor, and four of six city council members being black. Imagine a black police chief, and 40% black police officers on the force. (If not black, then an incredibly strong and clear ally of the black community.) Imagine racial profiling statistics involving arrests and ticketing having plummeted.

Long-term goals could be: 

• Work with organizations focused on social justice (for example, the ACLU or the NAACP) to hire a community organizer to lead this effort. Give this person the space and authority to coordinate.

• Hold monthly community meetings to listen to citizens and provide status about ongoing efforts. Spin off specific task forces as issues crop up during these meetings.

• Meet with influential community leaders to review plans and gain their support. Sometimes leaders will be obvious, such as the pastor of a church. Sometimes they will not be obvious but will be equally powerful, such as the wise grandmother who lives on the corner of the block, sees everything, talks to everyone, and who indicates approval with a nod, a smile, or frown.

• Find a few influential white leaders who will publicly back and support this effort. Begin to build a coalition of support.

• Begin to explore funding sources that you'll need for campaigns and for paying your community organizer. Be sure to get some grant writing expertise, and people who have experience soliciting major funding for political efforts. Blend a mix of long-time Ferguson residents, short-term Ferguson residents, and help from outside the community.

• Identify the most win-able city council seats, identify candidates, train them, and build campaigns to elect them. Build a strong Get Out The Vote machine, and put it to work for primaries and elections.

• Provide ongoing education in the community about the vision and the plan. Emphasize the importance of the midterm elections as being the vital election cycle for Ferguson. Enlist people with marketing, graphics, and political advocacy experience to provide this community education.

• Encourage the "house party" model throughout the city, so that every-day-people can meet and stay connected with neighbors, and so that focus and enthusiasm can be nurtured and maintained over a long period of time. Encourage small, neighborhood based projects, and don't micromanage them.

• Investigate setting up a small-business mentoring program, which could provide a bridge between disenfranchised citizens and the city; the goal should be to increase the feeling of citizens that there is a place in Ferguson for them. Look into boosting job-training programs.

Short-term goals could be:

• Form a leadership board that can provide coordination of events until the hiring of a community organizer. 

• Put together a vision statement of your 5-year plan. Enlist members of the community skilled in marketing for ways to communicate this vision as succinctly, strikingly, and powerfully as possible. Run ideas through field tests and focus groups (attend house parties of interested and active citizens, run the vision ideas past them, observe the effect of the message, solicit feedback, and rework the vision accordingly).

• Brainstorm ways to take most of the energy off the streets and away from protesting, and put it instead into sustained, organized, political effort toward enacting your vision. Figure out how to get citizens to keep their eyes on the prize.

• Leverage the energy of recent youth protests by identifying a few youth leaders. Involve them in the planning process.

• Approach your black city council member to ask about shadowing or internship possibilities. Investigate how you will train your future leaders.

• Begin conversations with respected community leaders about their willingness to run for office.

• Attend city council meetings, listen, observe, and soak it all in. Learn the ropes of local city government, and begin to get an understanding of where you are most likely to make inroads with your efforts.

Interesting ideas, eh? Thanks for letting me share them.

Team up with people who have skills you lack

I was a huge second-generation Beatles fan when I was young. The band had broken up years ago, but their music—in particular, their studio artistry—inspired me. Hungry for more and eager to learn their secrets, I absorbed as much information about the band as I could.

I still recall how the band members met each other and joined forces. Paul McCartney attended a performance by John Lennon and his band. As I recall, John wasn’t particularly impressed with Paul as a person, but Paul was able to play guitar a bit better than John. Putting his ego aside, John brought Paul into the band.

Later, Paul introduced John to a younger boy named George Harrison who knew how to play more guitar chords than either of them. George demonstrated his guitar licks for them on a bus, and, after observing his skills, he was welcomed into the band.

The inclusion of Ringo Starr was messier, in that they had to fire their current drummer in order to include him. Ringo had been a very popular member of a competing band, and the boys knew that Ringo could only expand their fan base. He was more popular than the three current members of the band.

I think of this story often regarding how to form a team or an organization. When faced with the decision to stay “top dog” by excluding someone more talented, the members of the Beatles consistently chose to bring in someone stronger, someone with more talent. Each of the members was able to put their ego aside (for a while) in order to strengthen the group. And the rest is musical and pop-culture history.

In what ways are we rejecting and ignoring people because they threaten us? How much more powerful would our teams and organizations be if we not only permitted more talented people to join us but sought out such talent?