“Change before you have to.” Jack Welch
My brother was telling me about how much he loves his work the other day. His 90 minute commute across London does nothing to temper his enthusiasm to get to work, where the first thing that he is greeted with is a green smoothie made by his boss.
Knowing that his boss has taken the time to do this for everyone, and that he cares that much about his team starting the day on a healthy note, (let’s face it, anyone who is willing to wash out a smoothie maker on multiple occasions is truly committed!) tends to persuade even the coffee addicts to sacrifice their expresso for kale.
This has become the norm at their work and demonstrates that there is without doubt care and connection within their culture.
The great news is that it doesn’t take much. You don’t have to wait for a new policy to come out of HR or for your manager or head office to create a place where people genuinely want to be. You can make a few changes yourself. Some ideas:
- Just like they do at high school, organise weekly mentoring catch ups with mixed groups of people to check in, care and connect.
- Run regular (ideally daily) sessions to revitalise and refocus – include mindfulness (you can download a plethora of apps for this,) breathing exercises and stretching routines.
- Hold comedy lunches – screen some stand up comedy in the lunch breaks for one of the most powerful tonics of all, laugher.
This model outlines where people may sit (figuratively!) at your workplace:
PEOPLE STAGNATE – No walk to talk
Here there is no action or awareness in the need for creating a place where people want to be. Consequently the place can be quite miserable, cold and impersonal, where people tolerate being there at best, and dread being there at worst. This can result in under par or mediocre performance.
PEOPLE HOPE – Talking the walk
Here good intentions may well exist, and the awareness that the workplace needs to be somewhere that people want to be is there. The problem is nothing changes despite the talk due to no action, so although there is hope amongst the team, there can also be skepticism. This can result in reserved performance.
PEOPLE HESITATE – Sporadic walking the talk
Some positive ideas are implemented to create the place that people want to be, but because it lacks a real awareness around the true value of doing so, actions can be inconsistent and lack congruency behind why they’re being done. This can result in inconsistent performance.
PEOPLE SHINE – Genuine walking the talk
Here there is a deep belief that having a happy and fulfilled team is the only way to go. The team spirit is at olympic level strength and people shine when they are here. This can result in effortless performance.
You workplace needs to be somewhere that people want to be. To get the best performance and to ignite potential, your team need to shine. It just takes some thought about what will make your team happy and fulfilled at work. And if you’re struggling to come up with ideas, you could always go directly to the source and ask them!