If you can clearly define and communicate your culture of behaviors and attitudes then it is much easier for your team and your new hires to determine whether they want to be a part of developing and growing in the direction you are going. When companies emphasize the importance of their culture with training and measuring and rewarding, it will draw the right people and scare away those that just want a paycheck. Zappos, the online retailer, has a policy that pays a new hire to leave the company after a period of employment if they don’t feel like it’s the right fit for them. This helps promote the importance of culture through out the organization. People who have strong convictions about what they want from their work beyond pay are looking for that same kind of clarity from their employers. So, if you want to design a work place culture that attracts the best and most productive workers you have to design work in ways that will require the growth of the individual as well as the company.
What does it mean to design work?? Most workers now know that the days of lifetime employment are gone. What workers are really looking for, is employment opportunities that will enable them to stay competitive and valuable to society for a lifetime. Not, work in a job that will become stagnant and eventually obsolete over time.
In years past companies like the auto makers could insist on very specific work requirements that fit into their assembly lines without any thought of what the worker needed. Unfortunately, many companies are still run the same way, letting the collective brain power of the majority of the workforce lay dormant. By not addressing the mental, emotional and social needs of their workers to grow and develop, these companies are missing out on the numerous productivity and innovation advantages they would gain if their work scopes were not so restricted. When you look at the behaviors and attitudes a company needs to continuously learn and improve they are very much in alignment with what an individual worker needs in order to remain competitive and valuable to society. The difference, is that a company can have just a few workers contributing to the continuous improvement effort and still get credit for keeping true to the growth culture. However, the challenge of creating a growth environment of continuous improvement for both the worker and the company is that it requires a redesign of the work scope of the individual worker to include contributions in ways that are not only physical but mental, emotional and social. This is a far cry from the old arrogant belief that the brain trust belonged only to supervisors and managers. Again, we can look to some of the great places to work, such as Atlassian software, and we see that creating opportunities for workers to contribute outside of their normal work scope on what they call “ship it” days has ignited some of their biggest breakthroughs. And, the enormous side benefit is that the worker grows and develops new skills and competencies that will make them even more competitive.
What does it mean to design work?? Most workers now know that the days of lifetime employment are gone. What workers are really looking for, is employment opportunities that will enable them to stay competitive and valuable to society for a lifetime. Not, work in a job that will become stagnant and eventually obsolete over time.
In years past companies like the auto makers could insist on very specific work requirements that fit into their assembly lines without any thought of what the worker needed. Unfortunately, many companies are still run the same way, letting the collective brain power of the majority of the workforce lay dormant. By not addressing the mental, emotional and social needs of their workers to grow and develop, these companies are missing out on the numerous productivity and innovation advantages they would gain if their work scopes were not so restricted. When you look at the behaviors and attitudes a company needs to continuously learn and improve they are very much in alignment with what an individual worker needs in order to remain competitive and valuable to society. The difference, is that a company can have just a few workers contributing to the continuous improvement effort and still get credit for keeping true to the growth culture. However, the challenge of creating a growth environment of continuous improvement for both the worker and the company is that it requires a redesign of the work scope of the individual worker to include contributions in ways that are not only physical but mental, emotional and social. This is a far cry from the old arrogant belief that the brain trust belonged only to supervisors and managers. Again, we can look to some of the great places to work, such as Atlassian software, and we see that creating opportunities for workers to contribute outside of their normal work scope on what they call “ship it” days has ignited some of their biggest breakthroughs. And, the enormous side benefit is that the worker grows and develops new skills and competencies that will make them even more competitive.
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