It is no secret that there are optimal environments for plant growth and botanists have had success increasing the growth speed of plants by creating that perfect environment in the safe and controlled climate of a greenhouse. The cost of operating a greenhouse is certainly higher than just planting a seed in your back yard and hoping for growth but the odds of a harvest are much higher! The easy part about seed growth is that they have a very specific and consistent set of needs but humans on the other hand have a lot of variables when it comes to creating a maximum growth environment. That may be why so many organizations don’t focus on creating maximum growth environments. However, even with all the variables there are many known and reliable needs humans have that can be provided in a greenhouse like environment in order to accelerate growth and productivity. Unfortunately, those that have the authority to control the greenhouse environment for workers are usually only focused on results and not the climate that produces results. If the results are not what is needed it must be the workers fault not the process. (See writings from Edward Deming and TQM). Most of us know that different plants have different sets of requirements, a cactus needs a totally different climate than a palm tree but most people in authority still treat everyone the same. Whether the worker is part of production or design or sales or distribution, they are all treated the same. This myopic management method is costing organizations enormous amounts of lost productivity and profits. The solution is to begin focusing on the climate (process) that produces the results you want. For instance if the results you want are creative designs from your team then it will be a different climate than if you want maximum production and so forth. Also, the effectiveness of coercion and criticism has been proven to be counterproductive in that it has more bad than good long term affects. In Shawn Achors book “Before Happiness” he refers to studies that prove it takes five times more positive responses to overcome the effect of a negative criticism. Too many organizations still hammer the worker when they don't get the results they want even though they are totally clueless about what kind of work process would actually consistently produce the results they want. Managers try make up for their lack of understanding of how to design the correct processes that produce consistent results by micro managing and/or requiring workers to put in the hours and just be on the job ready to do what their told. This is so demoralizing to workers and contributes more than anything to the lack of disengagement of workers and confusion about how their performance is being measured. Great environments for growth are consistent and dependable and not up to the whim of those in authority. You can’t imagine the assembly line process of an auto manufacturer being changed every day at the whim of a manager without disastrous results. Unfortunately, that is what is happening every day with so many managers across America and the world.
By: Kevin Minne
InnovationGrowthSystems.com
720-354-0291
By: Kevin Minne
InnovationGrowthSystems.com
720-354-0291
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