This story of transitions, will document several transformations at once. It is blurry and confusing in the midst of such upheaval, but I am hoping more clarity unfolds as the story develops. In the meantime, I will simply write what comes to mind.
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I made a rather bold accusation in an earlier post that one of the terrible by-products of a massive downsizing was the loss of passion in employees. Indeed, many lifelong loyal employees at my own Company were walked out the door (or asked to leave) in a massive restructuring that extended throughout the entire automotive industry. The survivors of this restructuring are struggling with how to re-engage.
Even those that remain in positions of leadership feel the lack of cohesion and synergy around them. Remnants of our old culture mixed with the birth of a new culture not yet embedded make for a confusing environment to encourage true passion in your work.
Many simply won’t re-engage. They are aggressively pursuing other interests and it is only a matter of time before they find something that will draw their attention.
Others, however, want to stay and make Ford the best automotive company in the world. They just don’t know what or how to mentally and EMOTIONALLY reconnect at the same level they were previously. We shouldn’t underestimate this huge leap of faith and courage that will be required to do so.
Our HR departments are now tasked with the monumental assignment of kick starting “employee engagement”. How much will it cost to recapture your heart?
It is not a criticism of leadership or negative commentary on the decisions that were made during a painful restructuring. It is a simple statement of a natural human phenomena of recovery. In a traumatic event many people enter a period of shock. It is a self defensive reaction that takes some time and attention to resolve.
Unfortunately, the easy answer of money won’t fix the issue of lack of passion or true engagement. Sure, we would all like to have more money…it helps compensate for a lot of other things. But even if you gave everyone a 20% pay raise (which would be a ridiculous move for a corporation), it would be a short lived improvement in satisfaction and ultimately no impact on real engagement or passion in employees.
We have to get back to the fundamentals of what makes people tick. It’s about each individual and their own desire to feel wanted and connected. Restoring their sense of value can be helped with pay raises…but their sense of feeling wanted and connected takes something else.
The obvious mandate is to provide a sense of purpose for everyone. Restoring the health of the Company, hitting profit targets, sales targets, product & service targets are all worthy goals that every member of the team can aspire to improve and know how their contributions impact those results. I believe this is hard work but most managers are skilled in helping employees know how their department or job impacts the goals of the organization.
The more difficult task, however is encouraging true engagement (or “passion” as I call it). Employees can easily resign themselves to simply having a job. They may be satisfied with their job (even rate it “completely satisfied” on internal surveys), happy with their surroundings, work-life balance and generally enjoy the relationships they have in the office. They may even acknowledge a sense of purpose in what they do and perform their jobs competitively and typically in an acceptable manner (sometimes even much better).
To some inexperienced managers (or worse, those that don’t know the difference), they could feel their department was fully engaged. Their employee satisfaction scores look really good….they don’t have visibly unhappy people walking around…they see people having fun at the water cooler. They may have no reason to suspect their Company is being “shorted”.
A passionate employee is more likely to be less satisfied in this environment regardless of how they answer corporate surveys. They see more potential for themselves, their Company, their teammates, etc.. They are often frustrated with limitations, bureaucracy or micro-management. They are incredible assets to any Company that can harness their energy and unleash them in the right environment.
Fostering passion in employees is not a skill set that is universally developed in most corporations. In fact, a manager that has the ability to spot passion and channel it effectively is rare. To fully succeed in a globally competitive arena however, it is a requirement.
What would make you passionate about your job? What would it take to make you the biggest ambassador in the history of your Company? If they made a list of the most influential employees (in the eyes of consumers) would you be on the list or do you aspire to even be considered? It’s a question that EVERY company needs to ask if they want sustainability.
You can’t Buy passion….you can only foster it.
The point of this posting is to state that a New Years Resolution should be communicated. It should be a statement worth sharing. It can be personal, which means you would only share it with close family members or a privileged few…but it is nevertheless a statement and requires the courage to communicate. For it to “count” you must do more than just think about it. You must have the courage to place it in view of someone.
