Boredom is something I wish fewer employees had to live with at work. Managers sometimes think that boredom is just the way a job is, and that employees should “suck it up.” I think there are better options. For example, boredom can be related to the way we structure organizations. Unhealthy hierarchy keeps challenging tasks unnecessarily divided by level in the organization. Managers can easily (though falsely) perceive that it’s in their own interest to…
What Can Employees Do? One of the things that has sometimes challenged me about bringing this project forward, has been getting overwhelmed by the question: “But what can employees really do about their situations at work?!” I know firsthand the feeling of powerlessness we can have when it seems like we’re trapped in an unpleasant job, where the powers that be aren’t interested, willing or able to do things to create a healthy work environment.…
I know there are lots of others out there who feel like I do – that there’s something wrong when people don’t feel their potential is engaged at work. When I was setting up Employee Point, one of the other names I considered using was Employee Life. I found someone else had that twitter name. And wouldn’t you know it, here’s what they tweeted: “doing same thing five days a week….. what a life” “…all…
During the Industrial Revolution This topic is kind of obscure. In a course I took on organizational behavior (OB), we were required to read a short story by Herman Melville, called “Bartleby the Scrivener.” It’s a strange story, written in 1853 – shortly after the industrial revolution made such drastic changes to working conditions and other aspects of society and which we were told the authors of the time were railing against. A Strange…
These definitions from urban dictionary are evidence of how employees feel when they’re not engaged in their jobs: Employee: A slave with a paycheck. Groups of people at the workplace who engage in the means of production by providing labor to the employer. In return for their hard work, the employees receive pay and benefits while the employer makes a profit which allows the employees to continue to earn income which they spend in other places allowing other people to remain…
Being Promoted Doesn’t Mean Always Being Right I think people who get promoted often make the mistake of taking that as proof that their decisions are the right ones. Not necessarily so. Suppose for example, one of two people get promoted. Now that person gets to decide how everything gets done. But it might have been a really close call. With a different toss of the coin, maybe the other person would have been promoted,…
How We Communicate Is More Fundamental than Any Amount of Planning …improvement in organizations essentially comes down to the interactions between one individual and another. The woman who taught me non-violent communication a number of years back, believes that improvement in organizations essentially comes down to the interactions between one individual and another. She is an experienced OD consultant, who’s done things like strategic planning with groups for years. Eventually, she shifted to teaching people…
What!? A human right? How can I suggest that autonomy within one’s defined function at work is important enough to be considered a human right? You Can’t Be Responsible Without Authority Many leadership theorists agree that one shouldn’t delegate responsibility without delegating authority (e.g., Responsibility Without Authority on Victoronbusiness). Lack of Independence is Deadening We all know it’s annoying when someone micro-manages – or when they tell us ‘how’ to do our job instead of…
I’ve been an employee – and an observer of employee experiences – for three decades. Over the years, I’ve always been keenly attuned to the ways employees’ lives at work can be uniquely challenging. The Struggle to Contribute in a Demotivating Environment Through many conversations with many unhappy employees, I know lots of us have persisted ongoingly, feeling frustrated and often trying to come up with ideas for how to make things better at work…
I have wanted to set up support for employees in workplaces for a long time. I’ve had the idea and have been working on developing and testing it – and on my confidence to bring it forward – for quite a while. I’m hoping it’s an idea whose time has come. First: Workshops for Employees A while back, I designed a workshop series called Making Work Better aimed at helping employees in challenging workplace situations…