Creating a culture of value
The Story
This journey into creating a culture of value in companies and organizations actually started years before I had any familiarity with the words “organizational development” It started with a core passion to see things done in the most optimized way possible. To see things done with wisdom and excellence. It started with the desire to see individuals, myself included, empowered to discover there key giftings or signature strengths then move forward with them in roles that gave them opportunity to use those gifts consistently so that they could be developed to a level of mastery. Really you can only reach a level of mastery in these areas of signature strengths. You can get pretty good at other things but you have to have this synaptic inborn talent in an area to really excel at a high level. In order to do this you first have to discover what those things are if you don’t already know. To move forward you have to deal with the obstacles that stand in your way. Believe me those obstacles will make themselves clear as you try to move forward. As you navigate these troubled waters character is developed that is a foundation for you to operate in the higher level of your calling with sustainability. In other words without ending in a big shipwreck. Nothing is more powerful than walking fully in the gifts and calling that you were created for…. but nothing is more destructive than stepping into that too soon before character issues are worked out and developed to a level of maturity that can carry the power in a healthy way.
The next step for me came as I was developing a value proposition for business owners to offer Aflac to their employees. The value proposition is this. “I help companies to increase employee loyalty and productivity by helping them to create or enhance a culture where the employees feel valued”
I started thinking about other ways that I could help my clients create this culture of value. It turned into a research project. I started having coffee with everyone met who had experience and expertise related to this. HR people, organizational psychologists, CFOs, CEOs etc. As I started having these conversations I was excited about how engaging this topic was for people. I started to become more familiar with Organizational Development and as I realized what it is I realized that it is the same passion I had to see transformation in individuals but it could bring transformation to whole groups of people! And transformation in a company means productivity, profitability and innovation both for new products and for how to do existing business better.
Some core elements are trust, authenticity and encouragement.
Trust relates to first trusting yourself, knowing that you are going to do what you say you are going to do on a personal level. Then it relates to being trust worthy, being trusted by other individuals whole groups trusting each other both trusting their motives and trusting their competency to accomplish what they are trying to accomplish.
Authenticity is where people discover their true voice. They find who they really were created to be and operate out of that center, no small thing. As this begins to happen within an individual then alignment begins. As it happens in group of working together out of their individual and collective authenticity then you get a synergy that really starts to gain momentum. When you get this with an whole company you have exponential growth and profit, not to mention job satisfaction, engagement, creativity and innovation. When you create an environment where people can tap into their
true gifts then you are tapping into so much more resource and brilliance than the average company does.
Encouragement has to do with how you communicate with one another in a way that continually calls forth that true voice in one another. It is a recognition an affirmation and proclamation of who you are and who “we” are and where we are going. When you walk more fully in authenticity, find and use your true voice its not just a good thing for you it is a good thing for us! I am sure we’ve all had times where there was someone on your team that was really not operating in their giftings, to say the least, and seen how it can make things difficult for everyone and put a huge drag on efficiency. I liken it to a jet boat. I used to work on a 49 passenger jet boat on the Yukon river. It had three jets that when working together brought the boat “on plane” and had a speed and efficiency that got us to our destination in about 3.5 hours. If one of those jets sucked a rock into the impeller either slowed or incapacitated a jet then the speed and efficiency went down not by one third but by much more. It could take us 6 to 8 hours. So you can see the importance of having all three jets working. When Turst, Authenticity and Encouragement are working properly then look out, there is power to really go somewhere!
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Here is an interesting article about increasing employee retention by increasing their employees “employability”.
“…executives intend to stay longest with those companies that offer the greatest opportunities to enhance their employability.”
Here is the article:
* OCTOBER 26, 2009
How to Keep Your Best Executives
The key: Make it easier for them to leave
By ELIZABETH CRAIG, JOHN R. KIMBERLY AND PETER CHEESE
Determined to retain your most talented executives? Well, here’s some counterintuitive advice: The best way to keep them from leaving is to prepare them to do just that.
The Journal Report
See the complete Business Insight report.
In tough economic times like these, retention becomes less of a priority for many companies as they focus on more-immediate business concerns. But companies that neglect this issue during a downturn may be in for a nasty surprise just as things start looking up: Historically, there is a significant increase in the number of executives leaving their companies as market conditions improve and more job opportunities open up.
That’s why it’s crucial that companies get serious about retention now. And that means giving executives opportunities to take on greater responsibility, broaden their skills and cultivate a network of relationships with their peers. These are the things that executives we have surveyed consistently say they want most from their jobs.
Of course, executives want these opportunities largely because the skills, experience and relationships they acquire make them more valuable on the job market. So there is always the risk that a company may invest in building its executives’ talents only to see some of them take those talents elsewhere.
But our research shows that executives intend to stay longest with those companies that offer the greatest opportunities to enhance their employability. On balance, a company will keep more talent by helping its executives grow than it would by denying them these opportunities. And as a bonus, its executives will be more valuable to the company itself.
Too few companies understand this. We found wide discrepancies between what executives want in the way of professional development and what their companies are giving them. With that in mind, here’s a look at how companies can address that gap by providing the three types of opportunities executives want most.
New Responsibilities
The executives we surveyed ranked opportunities to work on challenging tasks and to take on more responsibility higher than any other factor in career satisfaction. Providing these opportunities not only helps a company retain executives, but also helps the company identify and cultivate its next generation of leaders. That is especially true in times of adversity, like an economic downturn or a business turnaround, when executives have more opportunity to make their mark than they would when the business is thriving.
United Parcel Service Inc. continually creates opportunities for employees to take on more challenging tasks and greater responsibilities. John Saunders, the company’s vice president for human resources, says: “We don’t view it as, ‘We hired you to do this particular job.’ We view it as, ‘This is going to be a 30-year process.’ ”
UPS holds formal reviews with employees to discuss training opportunities, special assignments to work on solving particular problems, and other growth options. They discuss “things like what kind of assignments they need to round them out in preparation for the next promotion,” says Peggy Gardner, director of customer communications. “We talk about their skills, their career objectives and what they want to do next,” she says. “We figure out what we can do to help them achieve their goals.”
Broader Skills
In addition to developing their leadership talents, executives want to increase their value by acquiring knowledge of operations outside their areas of expertise, and by polishing general business skills.
[RETENTION]
Consider the example of hotel giant Marriott International Inc. In an industry notorious for its high turnover rate, Marriott is exceptionally skilled at retaining managerial talent. One reason is a program that exposes talented managers to business issues and situations that prepare them to pursue promotions to general management roles.
For example, a marketing executive with little experience in hotel operations completed a training assignment in the operations division. To help her get up to speed quickly, she was assigned both senior and peer mentors. Moreover, she wasn’t the only one who benefited from the experience. During her assignment, she shared some of her marketing knowledge with her colleagues in operations, by suggesting ways to attract more customers, for example.
Companies can also profit from offering their executives training in broad business skills like working well with others, understanding and upholding ethical standards and communicating effectively.
Cultivating Relationships
Networking is important to executives for several reasons. It establishes connections that might be helpful down the road in finding a new position, increases their visibility and lets them learn from their peers.
Networking can also help a company, not just by improving retention but also by increasing understanding and collaboration among various business units.
Good to Stay
* The Goal: Retain your most talented executives.
* The Paradox: To keep them, you need to give them what they want most—the skills and experience that make them attractive on the job market.
* The Details: Executives crave opportunities to take on new responsibilities, learn new business skills and build more-extensive networks.
Consider the investment bank profiled in the book “Driving Results Through Social Networks,” written by Rob Cross and Robert J. Thomas and published this year. The authors found that the social networks of the bank’s senior vice presidents were different from those of its junior vice presidents. The senior vice presidents had more-diverse connections—to people “in different business units, with different areas of expertise, and in different tenure groupings.” The junior vice presidents aspired to create this type of network, and it was in the bank’s best interest to help them.
The bank identified its high performers and held several events throughout the year so that these individuals could connect and forge more-productive personal networks. After a year, the retention rate of this group was much higher than that for the investment bank as a whole.
Companies that apply these lessons will be in a better position not only to retain their most prized executives but also to attract new talent as the economy recovers.
— Dr. Craig is research fellow at the Accenture Institute for High Performance in Boston. Dr. Kimberly is a professor of management at the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School. Mr. Cheese was until recently the managing director of Accenture’s Talent and Organization Performance consulting practice world-wide. They can be reached at reports@wsj.com .
Here is a link to the article: Link:http://www.linkedin.com/news?actionBar=&aIdx=0&articleID=80299436&aogid=80299436&gid=791847&gid=791847&srchType=nws&srchCat=WOTC&trk=news_brkout&goback=.ana_7918