Meridian Coaching & Consulting Blog

Today’s faster and flatter organizations must have the strategic involvement of its’ people if they hope to sustain a competitive advantage. The key is their ability to attract and retain the very best people by creating a sense of shared ownership.

People want to be engaged in and need to have the opportunity to participate in the pursuit of meaningful goals, use and grow their talents and share in the rewards of a job well done. Most efforts and articles that address the engagement of employees focuses on what leadership and the company should be doing to create a climate of engagement. And with good reason, the track record of most managers and companies is abysmal in this regard. However, regardless of whether you are at work or at home, with family or colleagues – your attitude is your responsibility not someone else’s.

Modern organizations were designed to facilitate command and control. Your job description is fixed, your performance monitored. It is easy to develop a sense of powerlessness. So at some level it makes sense for you to wait for someone else to make things right.

What we tend to lose track of is the fact that business is a uniquely human endeavor, it is conducted by people and between people.  Businesses are like small communities that exist within our society as a whole; the organizational community you inhabit has an infrastructure, culture, rules and reputations.  The values and the reputation of your organization are a reflection of the values and attitudes of everyone who works there and is a member of that particular business community.

More than ever before, your organization’s success reflects the collaborative effort, and its true success relies on your individual level of commitment.

Regardless of your title or pay grade, the results achieved by your organization are a reflection of you and all who work there.  In a very real sense, each person is an owner of the organization, and its reputation is a reflection on you as a member of that community.  This means that the responsibility for good corporate citizenship belongs to everyone.

However, we have all encountered (or been) people who are not fully engaged at work.  You hear them in the lunchroom and in the halls.  They are the people who are quick to point out what is wrong, who has wronged them, and how things will never change.

While you cannot change the mindset of others, you can be a powerful influence by modeling the behavior you would like to see in others.  The road to being involved as a good corporate citizen begins with your attitude, because your attitude is the control center of your actions.

In making every action count and being accountable for your every action, you carry forward the best part of the past–what’s right and good about you and your organization.  This is an attitude based on hope, not deficit; people will not be committed to what is wrong, but what is right.  The author, Barbara Kingsolver, articulated the attitude beautifully:“The very least you can do in your life is to figure out what you hope for; and the most you can do is live inside that hope, not admire it from a distance, but live right in it, under its roof.”

You can have a tremendous impact on your work environment when you use your influence and natural strengths to contribute to your success and that of your organizational community.  Create your own plan for Corporate Citizenship and you will expand your ability to influence others in a positive and exponential manner.

Corporate citizenship is a reflection of your:

• Commitment – Not only do you need to demonstrate a commitment to your organization and its goals, but to the other people in the organization as well.  Put aside your concerns about what others should be doing for you, become self-directed.  Commitment is inwardly focused, looking at what you need to do, not outwardly focused, calling attention to what others are doing wrong. Can you honestly say that you fully support the goals of your organization? Do you give your best effort everyday?

• Accountability – Neither the failure of others nor the shortcomings of the organization can or should excuse you from maintaining high personal standards and holding yourself accountable for the results you attain.  Accountability becomes reality when it is self-imposed. Do you personally take the initiative to improve your own performance? Do you hold yourself  to the same standards of accountability that you would hold others to?

• Interdependence – All things that thrive in the natural world recognize the need to coexist interdependently. Success in the business world is defined not on your ability to compete but upon your ability to collaborate and cooperate because those are the root of flexibility and innovation.  Your ability to work interdependently is a reflection of your perceptions and beliefs. Do you assume that others act in good faith? Do you value your relationships enough to take the initiative in resolving your disputes with others? Are you open to influence and prepared to change?

Being a good corporate citizen doesn’t mean that you ignore what’s wrong.  Instead, create a positive change by working from a position of hope.  Use positive energy and leverage your strengths to build, nurture and sustain what is right and good about yourself and your organization.

The single biggest threat to our own wellbeing tends to be ourselves. Without even giving it much thought, we allow our short-term decisions to override what’s best for our long-term wellbeing. Like democracy, in a world of freedom and choice, good organizations are created from the active and willing participation of its citizens.  Don’t wait for the organization to give you permission or to provide the right environment.  If you want a better workplace, go make it happen.

It is well documented that people who like their job, are motivated to do a good job; and when people are motivated to do a good job they perform better and you, the employer, get better results. In spite of the overwhelming evidence that supports this fundamental concept a large number of organizations continue to spend millions on teambuilding and improving communication skills. In other words, they focus on the symptoms not the cause.

Now I’m not saying that those programs are a waste but they are generally symptomatic of a deeper problem. When people care about their organization and their job, they invest more effort into getting good results. They take the time to nurture their relationships with others. They are invested in the outcomes. They do the work required to build and sustain effective relationships,

Gallup’s well known survey of employee engagement found that only 29% of the employees they surveyed were able to describe themselves as being “engaged” at work. On the other hand, approximately 54% described themselves as being “not engaged” and there were a percentage that were best described as being “actively disengaged”. This is disturbing because the Hay Group found a 52% gap in the operating incomes of companies that could be described as having high levels of employee engagement and those with low levels of employee engagement. Gallup has found significant increases in retention, customer base, safety, productivity and profitability for those companies with a high employee engagement profile.

With this kind of data in hand, why wouldn’t the leadership in any organization be focused on implementing strategies to improve the level of engagement?

Unfortunately a large number of companies still want to bring in consultants and trainers to provide things like ‘teambuilding’ and ‘communications’ workshops and a growing number of these organizations want to do this in a compressed time frame as well.

The problems that these workshops address are real but they are symptomatic of a deeper problem – people just don’t care enough about the organization, its’ goals or their roles and responsibilities to this community. Employee engagement is much more than a skill, it is a cultural value.

A large part of building engagement is to just treat people with basic respect. Give them your trust, respect their opinions and recognize that you chose them because you believed they could do the job – so let them.

Many of the programs that consultants, coaches and trainers are brought in to deliver are aimed at the symptoms that are glaringly evident. And I would not suggest for a moment that continuing to build and refresh basic interpersonal skills isn’t value added, it is just that managers and business owners have a tendency to treat workshops like western medicine treats the cold – just take the right pill and it will go away. Until it comes back again!

Poor teamwork, communication or problem solving skills aren’t always due to a lack of skill sometimes they are a symptom of a failure to care enough to make it work. If people don’t like their job, they lose the capacity to care or invest enough of themselves to make it work.

There is a very basic formula that can help managers and business owners build a high level of engagement. First, you need to establish “agreement”; and, there are three basic agreements that need to be established by answering the following questions: Where are we going? How are we going to get there? What is important along the way?

People need to have a common or shared purpose. This is the single most important ingredient because it is the reason people show up and it helps people make basic choices during the day because they are clear about what we are, collectively, trying to accomplish. Second, people need to understand how they fit in. What are the roles, responsibilities and procedures for accomplishing these shared goals? Finally, because this is about people coming together for a shared purpose, the values that guide them need to be clear as well.

After basic agreements are clarified, people need an environment of trust. A place that is safe from exploitation and manipulation, a place where they can explore, learn and contribute in a meaningful way. Trust is not something you mandate or place in your ‘Guiding Principles’, trust is a behavioral issue and is subject to what Malcolm Gladwell described as “thin slicing”. We know it when we see it.

You have to give trust in order to get trust. Trust is not a one-time transaction. Trust is earned over time and when the trust is broken, you need to work hard at repairing it and treat it with a sense of urgency.

It really is pretty simple, if you want to create a rewarding and profitable work experience for yourself and others, work in the business not on the business. Establish clear unambiguous agreements and build and nurture trust. These will lay the foundation for a high level of individual engagement and performance and profit with follow naturally.