I recently heard a story from friend of mine who is the MD of a small company employing around 50 staff. He told me how he had to intervene when two of his team deemed it acceptable to have a stand up row in front of other colleagues and within earshot of customers. Each had ‘reasons’ as to why they had reacted to the other in the way they had and why things had got out of control- none of them, in my view, acceptable reasons for ‘grown ups’ to behave in this way in the workplace.

In many organisations, people are aware of the technical and professional standards that apply to their roles- teachers know the standards for teaching, lawyers know the law inside out and backwards; even estate agents and financial advisers (sorry) have a code of conduct and standards of operation that they need to adhere to – but these same ‘professionals’ don’t always demonstrate the same rigorous standards when it comes to attitude and behaviour – simply because we tolerate poor behaviour. And tolerating it in one person gives permission to everyone else to do the same.

The statement ‘you get what you tolerate’ is incredibly powerful. In her book entitled ’Fierce Conversations’, Susan Scott (Piatkus, 2002)* says, ‘As a leader, you get what you tolerate. People do not repeat behaviour unless it is rewarded… Have you communicated clearly not only the results but also the behaviour you want? What about the attitude?’ And, to what extent are you prepared to hold people accountable and take action if they do not exhibit the behaviours and attitude you expect? Herb Kelleher, Chairman of the Board of Southwest Airlines said ‘ we are prepared, including legally, to fire you for a bad attitude’. This view is captured by Jim Collins in ‘Good to Great’ (Random House 2001) where he talks about the need for rigorous cultures in organisations. This, for him, is one of the things that differentiates great organisations from good ones. Being rigorous ‘means consistently applying exacting standards at all times and at all levels, especially in upper management.’ He quotes a Wells Fargo executive as saying, ‘the only way to deliver to the people who are achieving is to not burden them with the people who are not achieving.’

Yet organisations are frequently less than rigorous when it comes to standards of attitude and behaviour in their people and are terrified of ‘encouraging’ people to look hard at their job and career choice for fear of being accused of constructive dismissal and bullying – so they get what they tolerate and get the results they get. However, if having and applying rigorous and exacting standards is one of the defining characteristics of great vs good (let alone average) organisations, what reason could there be for continuing to get what you tolerate instead of applying a rigorous approach to all standards and seeing the impact on your business results when you do?

In the world of leadership development, the ideas on how he leads and manages his business are not new. What is unusual and refreshing is the commitment to and tangible evidence of success in a manufacturing business based in South America.

Semler has done much to involve his employees in how the business is structured and run. And the fundamental belief behind this being a successful strategy revolves around how we treat people when they walk through the gates or doors of a business. As Semler says, “Workers are adults, but once they walk through the plant gate companies transform them into children, forcing them to wear identification badges, stand in line for lunch, ask the foreman for permission to go to the bathroom, bring in a doctor’s note when they have been ill, and blindly follow instructions without asking any questions. At Semco, Semler says, “We simply do not believe our employees have an interest in coming in late, leaving early and doing as little as possible for as much money as their union can wheedle out of us. After all, these same people raise children, join the PTA, elect mayors, governors, senators and presidents, they are adults. (Maverick. Ricardo Semler, Random House Business Books, 2001)

This got me to thinking about some of the things I hear as I travel around the country about how people are spoken to by their managers and/or the beliefs they hold about employees in their organisation.

McGregor’s Theory X Theory Y has been around for a long time, yet it seems as though there is still a substantial number of managers who believe that people need to be kept under control and cannot be trusted to behave if not tightly managed and given a proverbial boot up the backside every now and then. And when it comes to understanding processes and procedures in an organisation, no matter how unwieldy or ineffective they may be, responses are all too often “I’ve always done it this way.” These beliefs and behaviours demonstrate an inherent lack of respect for and trust in the individual. It’s simple – treat people like children and they will behave like children. If you have used any or all of these kinds of statements and questions – or if you have been on the receiving end, you may have experienced frustration, anger, disrespect, sulkiness, lack of motivation, tension, stress – to name but a few. I suspect that long-term positive results have been hard to find – and a lot of energy and time will have been spent in chasing people up and checking they you have done what you told them to do. Time that could have been spent more profitably.

The buzzword of the noughties has been “engagement.” There is a recognition that employees require a bit more than an inflation-linked pay-rise each year and a pat on the back (or a slapped wrist when they done not so well) to keep them motivated and committed and many organisations are looking at engagement programmes or are slipping the word “engagement” and derivations thereof, into corporate communications. However, an engaged workforce this does not make. Engagement needs to be at the heart of every conversation and every relationship – whether with customers, stakeholders or managers and their teams. There needs to be genuine commitment throughout the organisation to communicate with people in a way that recognises and values their contribution – and that points people respectfully in the right direction when they make mistakes. Evidence from both Gallup and the Corporate Leadership Council shows frightening statistics for those who are genuinely engaged and committed to the success of the organisation (between 15 and 30%). That means alot of energy spent trying to gee up between 70 and 85% of your workforce.

Worryingly perhaps, as we approach the end of the decade and find ourselves in recession, we are trying to regain control over our lives. At home we cut down on our food bills, we switch lights off and turn down the heating to save on fuel bills. We bring in new, more stringent policies – switching electrical equipment off at the mains – only drinking wine at the weekend! In business, there is a tendency to play it safe, stick with what you know, stop spending money, minimise risks, manage people more closely. The rules and procedures become even tighter, the conversations tougher. The “grown-ups” take over, not trusting the & “children” to behave responsibly or make sensible decisions, creating further disengagement.

Now may not be the time for your organisation to embrace the huge changes Ricardo Semler has instigated in his organisation (although if it is, fantastic – and we are up for the chance to help you!). However, taking small steps to think about the way you manage conversations with the people who deliver your business is a small first step towards genuine engagement – and a potentially enormous step to increasing employee commitment, improving individual performance and increasing business results. Gallup estimates around a 27% increase in profitability when employees are committed and engaged in the work they do.

In the ideal world, this all happens seamlessly. As a manager, you have a clear line of sight to the organsation’s vision and goals; your manager discusses their objectives with you – along with the targets and measures in place; you have a pleasant, inspiring and meaningful conversation that crystallises for you exactly what you need to do, how you need to do it and exactly what you will have done at the end of the year to contribute to the success of the business. You can’t wait to go and have a similar conversation with your team to set them all on the way to success, leaving you to concentrate on your bit.

Sound familiar? If not, you are not alone. Here is a selection of some of the things I hear from people at all levels of organisations:

My manager hands me his objectives and tells me to go and write my own; I haven’t seen the business plan – I’m not sure if there is one for my department. My department uses a scorecard/dashboard to report results – I have not. I’m still waiting for my manager to send me his objectives before I set mine and my team’s (this was heard half way through the performance year). There is no point in setting objectives, things change so fast they never bear any relation to reality by the end of the year. Sometimes it is easier to set the objectives retrospectively-at least that way they show the reality of how the year turned out.

Why do people need objectives if they know what their job is?

Recent research by the Corporate Leadership Council demonstrated that employees perform better (their research shows 20% improvement) if you can answer the following questions for them.

What do you want me to do?
How do I fit into and contribute to the success of the organisation?
How am I performing?
How can I progress my career in the organisation?
What other factors surround my job?

Their research also found that the employee’s manager is the key to engaging and gaining commitment from the employee. Yet all too frequently, performance management – all elements of it- is seen as irksome and something that needs to be done on top of the day job if and when there is time. NEWSFLASH – if you are a manager, this IS the day job. The good news is that, the better you are at this bit of your role, the more time you have to be working more strategically at the stuff you should be doing and less time is spent having to micro-manage or react to problems that occur as a result of people not having or taking responsibility for their work.

So, how do you do it?

Communicate the business plans and targets

As a senior manager, you should know what these are – how can you and your team perform without them? What can happen is that objective-setting season can start before final versions of the plan and budgets are signed off. However, in most organisations, the plan is an updated iteration of the year before with key projects and deliverables amended to reflect the previous year’s successes. If you haven not seen the plan, ask for it. If it is not ready for onward communication, discuss with your manager what reasonable assumptions can be made – they can always be updated later.

Set objectives

Effective objectives are set during a two way conversation that both aligns and engages your team member – ask questions to establish what will be meaningful for them whilst getting you the commitment you need.

Make sure the objectives are SMART (Specific, Measurable (linked with your scorecard), Achievable, Relevant and Timebound). And ensure that your employees know HOW to achieve them – what company values and behaviours do they need to demonstrate to achieve them?

Set short-term objectives that allow for some quick wins and that act as milestones for longer term objectives. That way they stay fresh and current and prevent & end-of-year-itus; where you see frantic activity in the week before the annual review as people try and get stuff done that may no longer be relevant.

Review progress

Most organisations plan for half yearly reviews. This should be the bare minimum and ideally objectives need to be reviewed on an ongoing basis to ensure employees have not been taken down any blind alleys or are working on projects that do not align to company success; and to re-engage and re-focus them on the role they play in creating success.

Re-visit objectives

No plan survives its collision with reality (Susan Scott, Fierce Conversations). There is no point getting to the end of the year and trying to review someone’s performance if the objectives you are reviewing bear no resemblance to reality. Priorities change – external and internal events have an impact on the business being able to deliver what it set out to do at the beginning of the year. Objectives can be changed and amended in line with these changes- but not because the individual concerned has not delivered.

Ongoing communication, engagement and performance management

Too often, team members turn up to reviews with a set of objectives nobody remembers setting. The copies they bring are dog-eared, creased, crumpled and coffee-stained from where they have been dragged out of the bottom of a drawer from under a year’s worth of paperwork. Too often, managers turn up with versions that are out of date and have never even been signed off.

If you want to get the best out of your people, you need to speak to them on a regular basis. What does regular mean? Well, not once every six months! We are talking at least once a month for a quality conversation. What does quality mean? Well, not walk with me on the way to my next meeting;. And not a 10 minute chat in an open team space over the top of a desk divider, but in a quiet area with phones and Blackberrys switched off (no-one is that indispensable) so that you can update your employee on any changes that might have happened or might be looming that will impact on their progress and any blockers that might be getting in the way ; so that you can discuss together ways in which those blockers might be removed; so that you can recognise progress and successes and identify next steps; so that you can nip in the bud any performance issues and agree on measures to address them.

Still not convinced? Let’s go back to that 20% performance improvement. This is a pretty conservative figure and it can seem as though there is a lot of effort that needs to go in to get 20% more. However, think again. If each person in your team was really performing 20% better than they do now, what would it look like?

20% of projects coming in 20% quicker and at 20% less cost?
20% less of your time spent answering questions and resolving day to day problems?
20% better attendance from each person?
20% fewer customer complaints?
20% more potential clients turned into sales?

And what about you?

Authentic is a great word, one of the core values of 21st Century Leadership, and one that appears alongside organisational values such as open, honest and genuine. Values, when properly defined and used, should help define how people in organisations engage with each other within the organisation and with customers and stakeholders outside. Not because it’s nice to do so, but because where an organisation’s values are aligned to its vision and strategies,they are an integral part of achieving results.

Yet, all too frequently as in the example above,values get ignored or distorted when the going gets tough or the pressure starts to build. Even the most inspiring leaders can become dastardly dictators, terrible tyrants, or, at the other extreme, limp lettuces when up against it. All of us have the ability to turn to the dark side. There are various psychometric tools that demonstrate how we operate when things are good – and then show our default position when stressed or under pressure. I enjoy seeing the slightly smug faces of delegates when their ‘going is good’ position is revealed – and the knowing grimaces when the negative indicators of the default position are revealed.

For me, and anyone who appreciates a bit of emotional intelligence in our leaders, one of the key measures of a strong leader is someone who can continue to demonstrate the values of the organisation consistently through good times and bad- and who can and will hold to account those who don’t. It starts at the top and must go right through the organisation as part of its DNA if the values are to do their job in delivering results. This means that values and the behaviours that demonstrate them need to be embedded into personal objectives and reviews -and therefore linked to pay and reward; into programme and project reviews and into feedback mechanisms.

If values do play an integral role in delivering results, allowing them to be ignored or distorted risks not hitting precious targets that now more than ever for organisations determine survival, success and safeguard jobs.