do you like your job?

There was a common theme amongst my friends this past holiday season: assessing their lives, work situations, relationships, etc.  It wasn’t just a new year it was a new decade! - and time for some big shifts.  A lot of them wanted to hear about new ventures I was working with in hopes of being inspired by my passion because, really, I love what I do.  Which begged the question to them:

do you like your job?

I recently stumbled upon a book The Three Signs of a Miserable Job by Patrick Lencioni.  You may recall I reviewed one of his books before and I must admit I like the story telling aspect of how he presents his management thesis.

The fable in this book is around Brian Bailey a successful CEO that decides to test some of his management theories on a tired local pizzeria, with a motley crew of staff, he has invested in.  The basic premise of his theory is that dissatisfied employees have a direct impact on productivity, staff turnover and morale all of which hit the bottom line hard.  So, why not identify what makes the job miserable for the employee and fix that and in turn increase profits!

so what is a miserable job?

According to Lencioni, a miserable job is: “the one you dread going to and can’t wait to leave.  It’s the one that saps your energy even when you’re not busy.  It’s the one that makes you go home at the end of the day with less enthusiasm and more cynicism than you had when you left in the morning.“  To be clear, a miserable job has nothing do to with the actual work a job involves … it’s about not feeling rewarded or fulfilled while doing the work.

ok, what are the three signs of a miserable job?

1. anonymity - people cannot be fulfilled in their work if they are not known (we want to be understood and appreciated for who we are!);
2. irrelevance - everyone needs to know their job matters … to someone. anyone. or why bother?
3. immeasurement - staff need to be able to gauge their progress and level of contribution themselves - how else can they measure their own success or failure? people have a need to control their fate and feel good about it.

Yes, it really is that obvious and it makes one wonder why these things aren’t addressed naturally.  Lencioni suggests that too often managers are slow to recognize they have an employee satisfaction issue and when they finally do their attempts to address the issue focus on the wrong things.  Most often they only find out when an employee is exiting and typically they say they are leaving because of pay - but what made them think of leaving in the first place?

right then.  how to make a job rewarding?

Well, that can only come from the employee/manager relationship.  I am a firm believer in the adage: treat staff the way you want to be treated.  As well, managing people effectively requires some degree of empathy and curiosity about why that person gets out of bed in the morning, what is on their mind and how you can make them succeed.  Lencioni gives some basic guidance on how to turn a miserable job around for your staff:

• get to know your staff!  seriously, this is just basic human decency.  You spend so much of your day with your staff shouldn’t you know them better?
• make sure they understand who they are helping and how?  of course for some roles it’s obvious (e.g. sales is helping the customer) but think of other roles.  For instance, the Controller helps me immensely as the CFO!
• find effective measures that an employee can directly influence and that are connected to the person or people they are meant to help.  So, ya, don’t pick that corporate revenue goal as a target.

Great!  Seems straightforward but …

what if I am the employee with a horrid manager?

Well, perhaps you should both read this book as a starting point for discussion so that together you can turn things around.  Or, as the book suggests, you will probably start looking for another job soon.  One that is rewarding.  But, my only request is, please be honest in the exit interview: if you didn’t feel fulfilled or rewarded then let them know.  Oh ya and tell them how much more you’re going to get paid.

Here’s to rewarding work in 2010 and beyond!