Tag: trust

A culture that matters

Fabrizio5 Comments

People do not seek transactions.

Or better, if what they seek is a transaction – for example, I give you my time and energy and you give me money in return -, they can find it pretty much everywhere.

Of the three sources motivating people, the only one that is independent from the context is the work they do. And yet employers focus most of their engagement and retention strategy on that very same source, therefore failing to differentiate from any other employer in the world.

If you work in HR or if you are an entrepreneur, there is a clear opportunity for your company to stand out. Make space for employees to build meaningful relationships, give them opportunities to get to know each other when not talking about work, build a culture from the ground up – the only type of culture that employees can perceive and buy into every single day. Have your managers and leaders show them that they care.

It is not what used to matter a few years back.

It is the only way forward now.

Along the way, many senior executives will be challenged to reimagine how they lead. The skills that made leaders effective before the COVID-19 pandemic—strong coaching, mentoring, creating strong teams—are just table stakes for the challenge of the months and years ahead.

McKinsey, “Great attrition” or “Great attraction”? The choice is yours.

Pumpkins

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Which do you prefer?

Having two perfectly carved Halloween pumpkins on your doorstep – you have commissioned a master carver to create the pumpkins, you have paid dearly for them, and that allowed your dear ones to keep busy doing their own stuff.

Or having two so-and-so carved Halloween pumpkins on your doorstep – you and your dear ones have carved them together, you had a good time, you made fun of each others carving skills, and you all cherish the memory when you pass by them now.

It’s the camel dilemma all over again, isn’t it?

And the way you choose one way or the other will tell much of the type of leader you might be.

Follow or not

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You can read that your product makes one out of three girls feel bad about themselves, and still comment that it is more likely for it to have positive effects (it’s one out of three, after all), or that the number is only a reflection of what happens in the world.

At the end of the day, the way you choose to interpret the world is up to you.

What is up to us all, though, is choosing if we are going to follow or not.

Remote listening

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One cannot overstate the importance of listening.

And now that most are relegated to their own home offices, conversations happening through a screen, listening is more challenging than ever.

We are all very busy trying to control our appearance, our background, our environment, the kids screaming in the other room, the cat jumping on the desk to broadcast their behind, the email that just came in, the little red circle signaling that somebody just sent us a message – it might be important. And the most we can do is listening while waiting for our turn to speak.

Just being mindful of this very challenge can help you find ways to overcome it.

  • Use the camera only if you can handle it, it is OK to keep it off.
  • If you are on a two-screen setup, turn off the second screen. Maximize the app you use for the call, and shut down all other distractions (email and browser, in particular).
  • Keep your hands off the mouse or trackpad.
  • Take notes on a piece of paper.
  • Use headphones.
  • Apply coaching tactics such as asking open questions and mirroring, to keep yourself engaged and the other listened (you can find some very useful ideas in this past post).

We’ve got this!

Out of the nest

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Shit happens, right?

We are all familiar with this way of saying. We have used it or heard it or written it o read it many times, in many different circumstances.

What we seem to not be very familiar with, though, is the actual situation of shit happening. We go about our lives as if we are seeking perfection, we convince ourselves that we can control every tiny detail, and eventually we are completely unprepared for the thousands of times when things don’t go according to plans.

We ought to learn to let go.

Not because we don’t care. Not because we have given up. Not because we turn our attention to something else.

But because we do care, we are committed, and we want to succeed.

To be fully alive, fully human, and completely awake is to be continually thrown out of the nest.

Pema Chödrön