people Archives - Wim GE De Vos

person first

September 26, 2020 by Wim GE De Vos Leave a Comment

One night a father was relaxing with his newspaper after a long day at the office. His son, who wanted to play, kept on pestering him.

Finally, fed up, the father ripped out a picture of the globe that was in the newspaper and tore it into a hundred tiny pieces. “Here son, go ahead and try to put this back together,” he said, hoping that this would keep his little boy busy long enough for him to finish his newspaper.

To his amazement, his son returned after only one minute with the globe perfectly back together.

When the startled father asked how he achieved this feat, the son smiled gently and replied

“Dad, on the other side of the globe there was a picture of a person, and once I got the person together, the world was okay.”*

Next time we are faced with a challenge or opportunity. Let´s think about this. Focus on putting the person together first. Because once we do – the rest will be OK.

Personal Kaizen works wonders.

*From “The Monk Who Sold His Ferrari”.

Employee engagement: no rental cars at the car wash…

January 2, 2020 by Wim GE De Vos 1 Comment

def.: Employee engagement is the emotional commitment people have to their organisations, colleagues, partners, goals.
(And it is not the same as employee satisfaction.)

Employee engagement it is the corner stone of a successful company. And the good news is it is relatively easy to push to the forefront.

Question: Why don´t we see rental cars at a car wash?

Because drivers do not own the car. They only care about the short term benefit = temporary transportation. Not about the long term effects.

The same is true for a company and its employees.

People who are engaged have a sense of ownership and will make decisions in the best interest of the organization whenever they can. Both short and long term. And this is how everyone wins.

Otherwise they will simply drop off the keys every day as if it were a rental car…and leave a mess behind for others to clean up.

4 pillars of employee engagement:

1. Transparency

Transparency should be the default setting inside a company. People want to make a difference but need information to be able to do so.

So what information should you share?

share the wins: individual or team achievements, acquisition of new business and contracts, a great quarter,…
share opportunities: potential new customers about sign up, new markets about to open or exciting new products being launched that could grow the business exponentially,…
share the vision: where are we going? are we there yet? what are we trying to achieve? who and what are we trying to change?

Note: Transparency should be built into Software tools and platforms by offering company wide access to key information. But it only works if the company makes this information available = it is a mindset, a reflex to share, a company culture. People make better decisions when they have more information at their disposal. We use PartnerZone, Slack and Xero to share information.

2. Goal setting

Working towards goals helps people to be engaged because it offers a guide to follow. Setting goals goes hand in hand with maximising autonomy for each individual. Goals should be set together and fit the company vision.

This will set people free to be their best self under various circumstances and deal with challenges.

Make goals ambitious but achievable.

Note: As a Software tool we use Trello which reflects and shares the yearly, quarterly and even monthly goals we set together to achieve the company vision. In partnerzone we have leaderboards and badges for our own team and partners.

3. Employee development

People want to get better at stuff. Grow. Learn. Flourish.

Employee development can be achieved in several ways and ideally a combination of the following:

training: define a training plan together with each person.
job variation and even rotation: have people be challenged by new situations on the job. Often colleagues and customers are happy to be part of the learning experience.
mentoring, coaching, personal investment in people. A bit more about mentoring as it is often overlooked or pushed aside as we all get very very busy with stuff…

Note on Mentoring

Luke Skywalker had Yoda, Frodo had Gandalf, and Harry Potter had Dumbledore.

Mentorship is a critical aspect of employee engagement and growth. Mentors makes an investment in the personal growth of those around them and share the experiences that helped them get to where they are. (more mentors in a previous post: “mentor or hero?“)

Some fundamental concepts regarding mentoring:

Mentoring starts with believing in the potential of others and a desire to develop it further.
Mentors are a resource. Employees are required to be proactive if they want to make use of it.
Mentors are not sponsors, magicians or free protection. They give insight with unknown situations, sound board for hard problems or big opportunities , offer feedback to grow personally, share experiences. In the end it is the employee who will have to deal with the situation or opportunity.
Mentors should make time and an extra effort to be available. The key activity will often be to listen and respond with directed questions. Above all avoid to intervene directly.

4. the fun factor…

When people get to know each other as individuals a bond develops that goes beyond the daily tasks and roles. This is how a-teams grow. A-teams never ever consist of superstars. A-teams are always, always, always a bunch of people who have developed a chemistry that makes them nearly invincible.

Think Oceans 11…pretty oddball and maybe even useless as individuals but together they can pull of the heist of the century against all odds…

So throw company parties, go on trips together, create fun events with partners, have a few beers and lots of laughs, celebrate achievements,…look for and ignite the chemistry between people.

You may even want to give this task to a linchpin in the company… And always be on the lookout to create a fun event. There is no such thing as too crazy in this department. Create unforgettable memories whenever possible.

Note: Our mix so far consists of skiing, Peaky Blinders, escape rooms, karting, wine clubs, dancing and other fun events…

To conclude: Put your best foot forward, be transparent, set goals together, guide with compassion (don´t micromanage), and go nuts every once in a while.

The choice is (y)ours…like always.

Small decisions that make a BIG impact. 💥

Motivation & rewards

January 1, 2020 by Wim GE De Vos 1 Comment

Motivation is the fuel ⛽️ that drives talent 🎨.

So how can a business truly motivate people?

Old thinking tells you to create a system based almost exclusively on carrots & sticks. Extrinsic motivators like money (salary, bonuses, commission, car,…) & punishment (being fired, ridiculed,…). Yet it does not work (any more)… and it often even does harm.

New thinking tells us we can motivate people beyond basic tasks (eg: decision making, creativity, higher order thinking,…) by focussing on intrinsic motivators. These can be divided in 3 building blocks: autonomy , mastery and purpose.

Todays Business Operating System focusses on intrinsic motivators (check out sources below):

🚁 Autonomy (intrinsic): we desire to direct our own lives and work.

To do: Have people set their own goals and make their own decisions within the strategic vision of the company. Increase autonomy radically when choosing priorities, techniques, resources. Make sure everyone feels to be capable and agrees with the strategic vision of the company… eg: ROWE = Results Only Work Environment.
(top-down management works if you want compliance; if you want engagement self-direction works better)

🧙🏽‍♂️ Mastery (intrinsic): we like to get better at stuff.

To do: Create continuous and constructive feedback loops so learning becomes a second nature. Cultivate a growth mindset. Invest in training. Cumulative 1% improvements.
(hiring people to simply “get the job done” based on the skills they already have today misses the point of growth and opportunity that lies in each individual)

🎯 Purpose (intrinsic): to be part of something meaningful and important beyond our own selves.

To do: State the companies purpose above all else and make sure it is understood and shared by everyone. Show how every individual can and is contributing to the overall purpose. eg: (audacious) fundamentally change and improve an industry; (In B2b) making partners more successful; (social profit) create opportunities for others;…
(when pure financial incentives are dominant or even disconnected from the companies purpose bad shit happens. Unethical behaviour, bad quality products, lousy service,…)

So what about money and punishment? The old and intuitive way of doing things…

🤑 Money (extrinsic): pay people enough to “take this issue of money off the table”.

To do: offer higher fixed salaries, minimum (or no) individual commission or bonus schemes, in other words an “enough” approach.
(goes against the mainstream approach that largely focusses on money rewarding schemes as the way to motivate people. Specifically “high performers”.).

⛏ Punishment (extrinsic): counter-productive approach that has to be eliminated from current days business practices.

To do: create a context where taking ownership is by definition a positive, where failure is an opportunity to learn collectively, where mistakes are never a taboo.
(goes against the mainstream approach that relies heavily on a logic of blame, punishment, endless rules that lay out individual quid pro quo to scare people into shape).

Once we have the right people on the team, let´s make sure we get the motivation piece right. And this will mean going in against old school thinking…

Small decisions with a big impact 💥.

Sources (aside from own experience): Dan Pinks 📕 Drive and his 🎤 TED talk “the puzzle of motivation”. Interesting summary in this 📹 animated RSA clip.