Three common sense rules to avoid people management problems
Those of you who read the September edition of HRM, the AHRI magazine, may have seen the article How do you do? by Lucinda Schmidt about a program being trialled in a Victorian Hospital to make the workplace more employee friendly by getting staff to change their behaviour towards each other and greet fellow workers. The aim is to improve well-being, create a more civil workplace, and contribute to a sense of being part of the hospital community.
The program is based on the recognition that human beings are highly social animals who are strongly impacted by interactions with others, especially those in their social group. Social cues that indicate respect, positive feelings and greeting, or conversely, being ignored, excluded or treated rudely, have a strong impact on how people feel at work and this affects their performance. Remember that one of the worst punishments for a human being is solitary confinement, which tells us how powerful a need for social connection is for people.
But can we really change engagement and performance at work by simply saying hello and showing some good manners?
The obvious is often ignored and common sense isn’t so common
I am reminded of an experience a few years ago when I was conducting interviews to fill a position in my team. Candidates were asked to wait in an area near the lifts where there was no receptionist. I was surprised by the number of unsolicited comments from candidates on their positive experience whilst waiting for their interview. They said people who passed them while they were waiting would greet them, some might ask if they would like a drink, others would ask if they needed any help. This was clearly unusual in their experience and this made them feel very welcome and gave them the impression that this would be a good team to work with.
We often forget how sensitive people are to social cues that shape their feelings of belonging and well-being in a group. Apparently-small cues can create significant outcomes. Much of our conventional wisdom about people management and performance in organisations overlooks the obvious reasons that people feel and behave the way they do at work, and overcomplicates what we can do to encourage different behaviour, engagement and performance.
Three common sense rules to improve people management
The people management challenges organisations or leaders experience can often be overcome or avoided by applying three common sense rules:
Rule 1: Actions and inactions have consequences that most adult human beings can predict
So you are going to sack 10% of your staff to reduce your business costs and improve company performance? What is going to happen with people’s performance and what will this mean for other costs or revenue generation in your business? Actions that appear very rational decisions to improve business performance often have unintended consequences that most people can predict, but which many businesses fail to think through before they act. What appears financially rational often produces unintended consequences that have far more negative outcomes for business results than the original problem.
You don’t need to have an MBA or have gone to a leadership training course to work this out. Most human beings when presented with this scenario are able to predict the outcomes. And yet organisations appear repeatedly surprised when the predictable unintended consequences happen and actions like downsizing don’t improve performance.
Rule 2: Implicit assumptions about human beings underpin your management practices and often explain why they aren’t working
A simple way of testing this rule is to describe a management practice to a few people and ask them to spell out the underlying assumptions about people that are behind the practice. Then ask the question - what else would need to be true about the world and people if those assumptions were correct?
For example, one assumption that organisational bonus systems often appear to rest on is that people (and CEOs apparently more than any other person in the organisation) require extrinsic incentives and rewards (money, benefits etc) to perform to their best. A logical assumption from this is that individuals put their greatest effort and their heart and soul into what attracts the most monetary reward in their lives. The greater the money, the greater the effort. When we look around the world we see that clearly this assumption is flawed.
Many of our most entrenched people management practices are based on assumptions that do not stand up to the assumption test, let alone the evidence of research, – and yet we cling on to them and wonder why people are disengaged at work or why the practices have produced unintended consequences. Just think of all that time and money we could have saved on the Financial Service Royal Commission by just applying this test to a few of those people management practices in banks. And have those practices now been fundamentally changed, or are elaborate and complicated processes for “risk management” being applied instead to mask the fact that the people management and reward practices still encourage the bad behaviour we saw?
We persist with looking for complex solutions, when the solution is lying in plain sight and we all know it. But changing our practices would mean we need to stand up and challenge conventional wisdom and we don’t want to be seen to challenge the status quo. So we stay quiet and the problems persist.
Rule 3: Don’t overcomplicated things – straightforward insights and common sense are often the best explanation
We overcomplicate just how simple it is to change behaviour and outcomes. You don’t need to bother finding fancy ways to increase engagement. Maybe all you need to do is to start with a little human kindness, spend time listening and talking with people, or just genuinely smiling and saying hello to fellow workers so they feel recognised.
People feel better and more part of a group when they are greeted and made to feel welcome. It’s therefore highly likely this helps their feelings of engagement, will improve how they relate to others, including patients or customers, and will lift their performance. Simple.
So if you are looking for some ways to overcome some of your people challenges – apply these three rules to what you are doing now and see what you come up with.
Susan Kehoe
Consultant | Advisor | Change Leader
Work with Susan
Susan specialises in people-focused strategy development and implementation, people and culture, human resource management, and transformation and change. She brings practical experience and thought leadership gained from many years of leading successful performance improvement and change in some of Australia’s leading businesses and government.
The program is based on the recognition that human beings are highly social animals who are strongly impacted by interactions with others, especially those in their social group. Social cues that indicate respect, positive feelings and greeting, or conversely, being ignored, excluded or treated rudely, have a strong impact on how people feel at work and this affects their performance. Remember that one of the worst punishments for a human being is solitary confinement, which tells us how powerful a need for social connection is for people.
But can we really change engagement and performance at work by simply saying hello and showing some good manners?
The obvious is often ignored and common sense isn’t so common
I am reminded of an experience a few years ago when I was conducting interviews to fill a position in my team. Candidates were asked to wait in an area near the lifts where there was no receptionist. I was surprised by the number of unsolicited comments from candidates on their positive experience whilst waiting for their interview. They said people who passed them while they were waiting would greet them, some might ask if they would like a drink, others would ask if they needed any help. This was clearly unusual in their experience and this made them feel very welcome and gave them the impression that this would be a good team to work with.
We often forget how sensitive people are to social cues that shape their feelings of belonging and well-being in a group. Apparently-small cues can create significant outcomes. Much of our conventional wisdom about people management and performance in organisations overlooks the obvious reasons that people feel and behave the way they do at work, and overcomplicates what we can do to encourage different behaviour, engagement and performance.
Three common sense rules to improve people management
The people management challenges organisations or leaders experience can often be overcome or avoided by applying three common sense rules:
Rule 1: Actions and inactions have consequences that most adult human beings can predict
So you are going to sack 10% of your staff to reduce your business costs and improve company performance? What is going to happen with people’s performance and what will this mean for other costs or revenue generation in your business? Actions that appear very rational decisions to improve business performance often have unintended consequences that most people can predict, but which many businesses fail to think through before they act. What appears financially rational often produces unintended consequences that have far more negative outcomes for business results than the original problem.
You don’t need to have an MBA or have gone to a leadership training course to work this out. Most human beings when presented with this scenario are able to predict the outcomes. And yet organisations appear repeatedly surprised when the predictable unintended consequences happen and actions like downsizing don’t improve performance.
Rule 2: Implicit assumptions about human beings underpin your management practices and often explain why they aren’t working
A simple way of testing this rule is to describe a management practice to a few people and ask them to spell out the underlying assumptions about people that are behind the practice. Then ask the question - what else would need to be true about the world and people if those assumptions were correct?
For example, one assumption that organisational bonus systems often appear to rest on is that people (and CEOs apparently more than any other person in the organisation) require extrinsic incentives and rewards (money, benefits etc) to perform to their best. A logical assumption from this is that individuals put their greatest effort and their heart and soul into what attracts the most monetary reward in their lives. The greater the money, the greater the effort. When we look around the world we see that clearly this assumption is flawed.
Many of our most entrenched people management practices are based on assumptions that do not stand up to the assumption test, let alone the evidence of research, – and yet we cling on to them and wonder why people are disengaged at work or why the practices have produced unintended consequences. Just think of all that time and money we could have saved on the Financial Service Royal Commission by just applying this test to a few of those people management practices in banks. And have those practices now been fundamentally changed, or are elaborate and complicated processes for “risk management” being applied instead to mask the fact that the people management and reward practices still encourage the bad behaviour we saw?
We persist with looking for complex solutions, when the solution is lying in plain sight and we all know it. But changing our practices would mean we need to stand up and challenge conventional wisdom and we don’t want to be seen to challenge the status quo. So we stay quiet and the problems persist.
Rule 3: Don’t overcomplicated things – straightforward insights and common sense are often the best explanation
We overcomplicate just how simple it is to change behaviour and outcomes. You don’t need to bother finding fancy ways to increase engagement. Maybe all you need to do is to start with a little human kindness, spend time listening and talking with people, or just genuinely smiling and saying hello to fellow workers so they feel recognised.
People feel better and more part of a group when they are greeted and made to feel welcome. It’s therefore highly likely this helps their feelings of engagement, will improve how they relate to others, including patients or customers, and will lift their performance. Simple.
So if you are looking for some ways to overcome some of your people challenges – apply these three rules to what you are doing now and see what you come up with.
Susan Kehoe
Consultant | Advisor | Change Leader
Work with Susan
Susan specialises in people-focused strategy development and implementation, people and culture, human resource management, and transformation and change. She brings practical experience and thought leadership gained from many years of leading successful performance improvement and change in some of Australia’s leading businesses and government.