Incentive - January 2009 - (Page 22)

INTERVIEW Lencioni also intends his stories for an audience at all levels of organizations, from the CEO to the middle manager to the frustrated employee on the bottom rung of the ladder. “When it comes to managing people for fulfillment and engagement, the principles are universal,” says Lencioni. “People who have ‘non-sexy’ jobs deserve to be as fulfilled and feel as motivated as people who have jobs that are much more high-profile. And the other thing is that many people who are in high-profile jobs that are highly paid are actually miserable for the same reasons as the guy working at the front counter.” Motivating Away Misery In The Three Signs of a Miserable Job, Patrick Lencioni discusses the major demotivators that hurt morale and corrode a company’s productivity. Here he discusses each sign and what kind of motivators can turn it around. Anonymity THE PROBLEM: “Human beings have a need to be known. If you don’t feel like the person you work for knows what’s going on in your life…If you don’t feel that person you’re toiling for every day cares about you as a person, you really don’t find fulfillment in going to work.” THE INCENTIVE SOLUTION: “Incentive programs can be so powerful if they are combined with genuine appreciation and a real knowledge of who you are appreciating When a manager says, ‘I was thinking about you and I thought you would like this,’ it’s huge.” Ideas for Life as Well as Work Just as these principles are meant to apply to organizations ranging from a major telecom company to a small church, Lencioni believes that management principles are as valid outside the workplace as they are in the office. The father of four boys, he recalls coming home one night and joking with his wife that if his clients ran their organizations the way he and his wife ran the family, the clients would go out of business. “I help CEOs run their businesses more proactively, and I run my consulting firm proactively, and I had meetings and planning sessions and a strategy and values in place, but then I’d come home and I’d just wing it,” says Lencioni. After speaking with other professionals, he found many others who put family at the top of their priorities, but failed to manage it with the same kind of planning and conscious strategizing that they put into their work. The result of these lessons is Lencioni’s most recent book, The 3 Big Questions for a Frantic Family. He says that while the book is about a different area of people’s lives, he has found that the same audience that reads his business books have been interested in this story. Send comments to alex.palmer@incentivemag.com Irrelevance THE PROBLEM: “Everybody needs to know that their work matters and that other people’s lives would be [affected] if they weren’t doing their job.” THE INCENTIVE SOLUTION: “Show the person how his or her work directly improves the lives of the customers. Appeal to people in a very human way…[Don’t] be afraid that it will come across as disingenuous.” the U.S. Military Academy at West Point. Lencioni’s expansive experience has allowed him to write to a broad audience, offering “universal truths” with wide application. His book, The Three Signs of a Miserable Job, demonstrates this universality through the story of a retired CEO of a major exercise equipment company who is inspired to take over the management of a local, miserably run pizza place. What he finds is that employees at all levels in companies of any size become disengaged as a result of the same three factors (see sidebar). As the CEO applies these ideas and begins turning the restaurant around, Lencioni hopes the reader will see his or her own organization in the story, however unlike a pizzeria it may be. Immeasurement THE PROBLEM: Lack of clear goals or ways for employees to measure their performance. “If your only measure of success is whether your boss likes you, you feel very out of control. You almost feel like a slave to that person and the mood they are in that day. Employees should have a sense of their ability to influence their own career.” THE INCENTIVE SOLUTION: “The reason salespeople often like their jobs is not because they’re ‘coinoperated,’ but because they get immediate feedback about how they are doing…When you can give a person something very real and specific for something they’ve done, that’s a powerful thing.” 22 | Incentive | January 2009 | incentivemag.com http://www.incentivemag.com

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Incentive - January 2009

Incentive - January 2009 Contents Editor's Note: Rewards Must Be Sustainable Headlines Cover Story: Responsibility's New Role Incentive Interview: Patrick Lencioni Family Rewards: Who They're Working For Primer: Working Design Leap of Faith: Religion in the Workplace Cook Up Engagement: Kitchen Teambuilding My Turn: Procurement Possibilities Motivation@Work: Hard Times Recognition Legal Ease: The Tax Facts on Corporate Gifts Travel News: Where to Go and What to Do The Bahamas: Islands in the Sun Field Reports: Four European Destinations Golf: Around the World in 18 Holes Potentials Here and Now Watches and Clocks: Strike the Pose Golf Merchandise: Awards with a Solid Swing Computers: Digital Delights Retailers Band Together for Gift Card Market Gift Cards: The Prepaid Reward Spectrum Advertiser Index On the Web www.Incentivemag.com

Incentive - January 2009

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