Management's Role in Employee Motivation (Part Two of a Two Part Series on Employee Motivation)

 

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Two weeks ago we talked about the top ten things to do in order to inspire employees. Now it’s time to examine the role management plays in inspiring employees.

First, imagine you are, like many in America, working in a cubicle. The movie Office Space taught us that annoying neighbors are one thing you may face – from the secretary answering all the phone calls in her high pitched voice, to the guy playing his radio across the way, to frequent pop-ins from upper management (“Did you get that memo?”), to the claustrophobic feeling that the walls of a “cube” — as many half-affectionately call it — can have. But what happens if instead of Milton Waddams and his stapler, the guy sitting next in the next cube over was your boss?

Now imagine it’s the CEO of the company.

Joe Mansueto, the chief executive of Morningstar, the fund-rating company, is one of those “chiefs” who prefers to sit among the “troops.”  "I like the idea of being out in the open and down in the trenches with everyone else and not sequestered in some rarified space for corporate executives," Mansueto says in an interview in the Wall Street Journal.

Cabinet Maker magazine puts it this way: “Good bosses earn respect and admiration for their management and leadership skills, while bad bosses fail to motivate and inspire confidence.”

Well, yes, but what does the boss need to do to become a “good boss”?

Motivate, communicate, praise and reward, acknowledge initiative, encourage staff development, be honest and truthful, treat staff as individuals, and muck in.

And “mucking in” may be the most important. According to the Wall Street Journal, “executives have sat among the masses for more than a century in businesses ranging from banking — J.P. Morgan himself had a desk on the trading floor, though he also had a private office — to small companies.”

But even though this may have been a common practice for a while, it’s certainly been refined in recent years. Anne Fawcett, managing partner of the executive search firm Caldwell Partners International Inc. in Toronto, told Canadian Business magazine that she's never seen more profound changes in the role of CEOs than in the past five years.

“Life at the top ain't what it used to be. Historically, the job of CEO was all about top-down authority and retiring at 65 with dignity and a gold watch. These days, CEOs are caught in unprecedented cross fire from shareholders focused on quarterly results, liability-shy directors, competitive capital markets, technological change and a volatile global economy. And, oh yeah, they have to inspire their employees.”

But what do they need to do in order to accomplish this goal of inspiring employees? According to Prosales magazine, “whether they rely on charisma, an astute sense of business management, or entrepreneurial vision, the great leaders of business all share a day-in, day-out commitment to the success of their teams.”

bizjournals listed some ways in which CEOs have succeeded in sharing in this commitment:

·         Scott Mitchell, president of Mackay Envelope in Minneapolis, MN, holds a one-on-one, 20-minute discussion with every employee every year to discuss ideas, improvements, or whatever is on the employee's mind. Mitchell devotes more than 170 hours to this task every year, an investment that he sees as time well spent.

·         Palmer Reynolds, CEO of Phoenix Textile Corporation, an institutional linens distributor located in St. Louis, hosts monthly breakfasts. Every month, Reynolds invites one employee from each of the company's five departments to join her for breakfast at a local restaurant. Because employees get to know her, and each other, they are often better able to work out problems.

·         Hal Rosenbluth, CEO of Rosenbluth International, a chain of travel agencies headquartered in Philadelphia, is accessible to all his employees through an 800-number "voice-mail box." Employees are encouraged to call in with suggestions, problems, or praise, and about seven employees do so every day.

·         Mary Kay Ash, founder of Mary Kay, Inc. made a commitment to meet with every new employee within 30 days of hire. She once even turned down an invitation to the White House because it conflicted with a new employee orientation session she had committed to months before. Mary Kay's philosophy: "Make people who work for you feel important. If you honor and serve them, they'll honor and serve you."

·         Ron Kiripolsky, former president of a 500-person division of PSA Airlines, now part of USAirways, personally opened the organization's suggestion box at the beginning of each work day, read the suggestion, and met with the suggestors and their supervisors that day to discuss the suggestions and work out implementation.

·         To ensure that employees know he has read their reports, Harry Seifert, CEO of New Oxford, Pennsylvania-based Winter Gardens Salad Company, stamps "Read by Harry" on reports and then routes them back to employees, often adding personal comments. According to Seifert, the quality of reports he receives has improved since he started using the rubber stamp.

And while pay-for-performance systems have become popular, the Merit Systems Protection Board (MSPB) — citing a study by the Corporate Leadership Council — said in Federal Human Resource Week that “new research suggests that while pay is important — especially to recruitment and retention — only management interaction can truly motivate employees to improve their performance, thereby raising the performance level of the entire organization.”

According to the study, one factor that significantly affects organizational performance is employee engagement. Employee engagement refers to the extent of positive interaction between an employee and manager. Therefore, the more positive interaction managers have with their employees, the better the organization as a whole performs.

“Trite as it might sound, employees are an organization’s greatest asset,” says Michael Maciekowich, National Director of Astron Solutions.  “Without employees, organizations stop functioning.  CEOs and top management must show respect for and interest in their team.  When management leads the way, employees will show their respect for leadership.”

As we learned in Kindergarten, it’s important to “work and play well with others.”  Make sure this adage works in both directions in your organization, not just up the chain of command.