Thoughts on Leading and Managing in the Era of Disposable Workers
Filed under: Career, Crisis Leadership, Leadership, Project Management
Note from Art: this topic has me deep in thought. While the issue is generally a negative one, I do wonder whether it contains the seeds of significant management and leadership revolution. I would love your thoughts here.
In case you missed it, the article, “The Disposable Worker” in the January 7, 2010 issue of BusinessWeek offers a sobering look at the increasing trend for employers “to create just-in-time labor forces that can be turned on and off like a spigot.” And guess what folks, this trend is not just for those near the bottom rungs of the ladder, this current fashion extends all the way up into the CEO Suite.
While one might get the impression that this is a fairly modern “management innovation,” enabled by advances in technology and easy access to low cost labor around the globe, I’m reminded of the scenes in Upton Sinclair’s gruesome and powerful book, The Jungle, chronicling the early days of the meat-processing industry in Chicago.
I last read the book in high school, but the images of men (in this case, they were men) lining upside the gates of the stockyards and processers, and the foreman stepping out and indicating how many that he needed for the day, jumps to mind. If you were lucky enough to be picked on a given day, you were invited in to literally put life and limb on the line for a few cents. On other days, your family went hungry. If there was no work or you became injured, often, you died.
I’ll stop short of comparing the modern organization to those firms described in Sinclair’s pro-union classic, however, the picture painted in this article has that haunting specter of The Jungle hiding in the shadows.
My perspective here is not pro or con and don’t take my use of The Jungle or the union reference to mean anything other than highlighting a point in history and the message contained in this book. Organizations are striving and struggling to cut costs, compete and in some cases survive and desperate times call for desperate measures. The use of on-demand talent is well established in consulting and technology and in some cases it works well. However, I do think that the tasks of managing and leading and competing in an era of “workforce on demand” are about to change in ways that we might not yet fully understand.
Thoughts and Issues on Managing and Leading In the Era of the Disposable Workforce:
-The challenge to choose the right tasks for “just in time” resources. While it might be tempting to broadly apply the “on/off” approach to the workforce, managers should carefully evaluate the impact on business execution, customer satisfaction and innovation of replacing formal employees in core areas with contract workers. The short-term cost savings might just cost the firm its future.
-The difficulty of acclimating the remaining workers to this new reality. One of the more laughable parts of this not so funny article was the example of a firm adopting this model and then bringing in a resource to train the remaining employees on positive thinking. I suspect that more than a few workers were pretty positive what they wanted the firm to do with this speaker! While those that remain will likely be happier with a job than without, there’s little chance they will be happy. And while work doesn’t have to be an endless group hug, there’s something to say for the ability of an engaged, motivated workforce to satisfy customers and fuel innovation.
-The pain of living through the destruction of a firm’s culture. Whatever the firm was before, it no longer is the same after retooling with temporary workers. Instead of something that had a history and stories and artifacts and all those tangible and intangible components of a culture, the organization’s new environment might best be characterized as one that lacks a culture. Thoughts of Dystopian environments and various science fiction novels are beginning to jump to mind here.
-The challenges of measuring and maintaining quality and identifying and implementing critical improvements will be more difficult in the on-demand environment. The dearth of individuals that understand how to get work done via the informal organization will challenge firms to create new systems for these issues.
-The role of the Project Manager and the field of project management take on a very, very high importance in this new style organization.
-The impact when the worm turns! If and when recovery occurs, watch out! Somewhere, some wise firm will catch on to the novel idea that they can compete more effectively with an engaged workforce and the “jumping ship” will happen so fast that the firm’s leadership will be checking the news for information on the tsunami that cleared out the buildings.
-The role of the leader will change significantly. Many of the core focal points that are written about daily in the leadership blogosphere and in shelves filled with books from name-brand authors will no longer be relevant. The leader as a transaction manager with accountability for output with no concern for development, coaching and well-being may disappear.
The Bottom Line for Now:
I recognize that I’ve taken a mostly dark look at this issue in this post. The beauty of writing these things is that they force the author as well as the readers to think through the issues at a deep level. Intellectually, I do wonder whether the current economic situation contains the seeds of a new approach to management…an evolution or as Gary Hamel describes it, management innovation, and that the real challenge and issue here is truly how to rethink management and leadership.
Hmmm. Back soon with some more thoughts. Meanwhile, I would love to hear yours.
Can You Create A Mission-Driven Focus in a For-Profit Business?
Leaders from the top on down in Not-For-Profits hold an unfair advantage over their erstwhile counterparts in the For-Profit world. Managers in Not-for-Profit are driven by a powerful sense of purpose that delivers meaning and context for even the most mundane of activities. As one young Not-For-Profit manager in my recent Leadership Mastery workshop indicated, “I can’t imagine not having the mission to inspire and energize me everyday.”
My question: Can For-Profit organizations replicate the motivational and contextual power of “The Mission” through other proxies like goals, strategies, bonuses and targets all focused around competitors, financials and metrics like market-share and compound annual growth rate?
My short-answer: It’s hard to simulate a mission and develop a sense of purpose in an environment focused on issues that are significantly more mundane than human welfare. Difficult, but not impossible. I’ll explore some ideas for this below.
First, a sidebar on my observations about leading in Not-For –Profit:
Having spent my entire career in the For-Profit world, I learn something every time I have the good fortune to work with the dedicated professionals that staff and lead the organizations that do so much good in our communities. It’s refreshing to work with people laser-focused on serving their customers and motivated by the belief that they are making a tangible difference everyday.
I have also been impressed by the level of leadership maturity and sophistication that I see in the younger leaders in these organizations. Many Not-For-Profits run on volunteer workforces, and honing great leadership skills at a young age is a survival skill for a manager in this environment. The sophistication and good practices that I have seen displayed by managers with less than five years experience are impressive. Important habits and concepts including professional development, goal-setting, providing feedback and establishing genuine connections are well understood and readily applied by many of these young leaders.
Last and not least, it’s hard to look at the good work being done in many Not-For-Profits and not acknowledge that these dedicated and capable leaders might earn considerably more money if they were plying their profession in a profit-driven organization. The skills that they are developing and honing are the very skills critically needed by almost every organization attempting to grow and win in the market. And yet in many cases, the lure of money is not a driving force for those serving in Not-For-Profit.
What For-Profit Leaders Can Learn from Their Mission-Driven Counterparts:
- People thrive and commit when they feel a greater sense of purpose in their activities. Leaders in For-Profits must strive to connect the firm’s activities and offerings to the benefits that they provide to customers. Even seemingly mundane offerings contribute to improving someone’s life, making hard tasks easier or solving other problems. Leaders must connect the dots between these benefits and an employee’s reason-for-being.
- Mission statements should not be a gobbledygook of pie-in-the-sky motivations, but rather, brief, meaningful descriptions of the reason-for-being of an organization. Additionally, instead of the poster on the wall proclaiming the lame mission, the content and context of this mission should be taught, reinforced and referenced liberally. Just like corporate values, statements of mission are useless unless practiced and ultimately embedded in the organization’s DNA.
- Leaders should ply their trade as if they are operating with a volunteer workforce. Imagine having to walk in the door everyday and reach out to your employees, support their professional development, provide them with timely feedback, encourage them to strive for new levels and help them find the lessons-learned from mistakes. Armed with the context of “my workers are volunteers and it is my job to keep them happy, motivated, learning and here,” I suspect that many leaders will suddenly discover their true priorities.
- Just as people require context and purpose to do their best work, they tend to thrive in environments where success breeds more success and big, new challenges are viewed as great new opportunities. In my informal polling of several hundred managers over the past few months, I have only found a handful that feel as if they’ve been a part of a high-performance team at some point in their careers. What a shame. I suspect that most leaders don’t preoccupy on the notion that their goal is to create an environment that results in a high-performance team….one that is highly innovative or one that is operationally excellent (or both). Not-For-Profit leaders understand that the mission will only be successful if the team gets it right, and they naturally focus on the tasks needed to support team development.
- Many (not all) Not-For-Profit leaders stay close to their mission by working with and serving their clients in the community. Sometimes out of necessity and other times out of the sheer joy of serving, this is an outstanding way of staying Tuned- In to customers. For-Profit leaders would be well served to push away from the desk and spend some time helping and learning from their customers.
The Bottom-Line for Now:
Working in Not-For-Profit may not be for everyone, and in fact, while I’ve painted a picture with the positives that I have observed, there are many familiar challenges as well. Large organizations struggle with politics and bureaucracy, “lifers” suffer from chronic “We’ve always done it this way,” and turnover and burnout are common maladies plaguing many organizations.
However, in spite of overwhelming challenges and never-ending pursuit of funding, many of these organizations persevere, in large part due to the incredible dedication of the people working and leading at all levels. Most For-Profit environments lack the sense of purpose and mission that I’ve observed in Not-For-Profits, yet managers everywhere have the same set of tools at their disposal. For-Profit leaders are well served to take a few tips from their lower-paid and in many cases, more effective counterparts.
The Emerging and Strange Alliance Between Boomers and Millennials
If you are leading a team today, chances are you are dealing with one of the fascinating experiences of our time: how to manage teams increasingly comprised of aging Boomers and newly graduated Millennials. Your first thought might be that you couldn’t find two groups farther apart in terms of values, priorities, interests and capabilities. Well, your first thought is wrong.
On the surface, the evidence seems to support your case that Boomers and Millennials are polar opposites. Consider:
- Millennials were practically born with a cell phone in one hand and a computer mouse in the other. They are the most technologically sophisticated generation ever. While some aging Boomers have embraced technology, for a large number, many of the latest advancements are truly foreign. Ask a Boomer to contact someone and they pick up a phone. While the Boomer is dialing, the Millennial has texted and received an answer, scheduled a social engagement and made small talk about last night’s game, all with their thumbs.
- Boomers have the benefits that accrue from age and experience. They’ve forgotten more than the Millennials know about the big bad world, with much of this experience developed during some tumultuous times.
- Boomers have one eye on retirement and Millennials have both eyes on a bright future.
- Millennials are used to getting trophies just for participating and Boomers are used to working hard at thankless tasks. Boomers have put in hard time in organizations that showed them the door without hesitation. Millennials expect to start a job and be promoted within the first few months.
- Millennials want to work where and when they want and they are adamant that the conditions are right, the work interesting and that it not interfere with their inalienable right to the pursuit of happiness. Boomers want….
It’s at exactly this last point that the differences between these two generations begin to melt away with a unique and perhaps surprising alignment developing. Millennials and Boomers share many of the same life and career priorities. Your understanding of this emerging alliance may prove critical as you increasingly deal with managing the generations in the years ahead.
For all of the reasons described above: long years in thankless jobs, falling victim to the lack of corporate loyalty and gaining experience through tough times and hard work, the Boomers can now afford to begin looking at life and career through different lenses. As the tidal wave of demographic change starts to hit the workforce over the next few years, Boomers will increasingly require:
- Opportunities that allow them to work when and where they want
- Interesting assignment that leverage their vast experience
- Engagements that provide psychic and social rewards
- Flexibility driven by a high priority on social time.
- Varying experiences and short-term engagements where they can learn and grow while contributing.
Boomers and Millennials are almost in complete agreement on the above priorities, and while the cynics among us might be quick with “that’s nice, but it’s not reality,” comment, it is most definitely going to be the new reality. The demographic numbers don’t lie and the world is not growing less complex.
Over the next decade, organizations will increasingly struggle to bring the right talent to bear on executing complex and ever-changing strategies in this global world, and both the Boomers and Millennials are the source of that talent. Enlightened organizations get this situation and are already creating systems and approaches to meet the needs of these critical groups. Less enlightened organizations will be clubbed over the head by this issue in the not too distant future.
In the interim (between now and the exodus of the boomers), what’s a manager to do?
Some Suggestions for Leveraging the Strange Boomer/Millennial Alliance:
- Create opportunities to leverage the experience of age and the energy of youth by blending project teams where the respective skills and energies spell success.
- Use judo on the age differences by openly encouraging Boomers to provide mentoring and guidance on career development and any of the broad areas in business that Boomers are experienced at.
- Encourage Millennials to educate Boomers on technology, current trends and social issues, and all of those issues that have changed so radically over the past few years.
- Create and celebrate victories regularly. The Millennials expect the celebrations and the Boomers are overdue for a few trophies.
- Embrace this new project-driven world, and provide Boomers with the flexibility to work when they want on projects that truly interest them. Boomers as contract knowledge workers may be your secret weapon to success in the years ahead.
- Get rid of the last vestiges of “I have to see someone to know that they are working.” There’s still some of this running around and it is silly.
- Challenge the HR functions in organizations to enable this new alliance and to provide the systems and support necessary for virtual teams and projects and contract knowledge workers. Most of this doesn’t fit the old HR model…and the model has to change.
- Quit giving lip service to “people are our most important asset” and start living it. (This is one of the most abused phrases in all of business…stop the abuse.)
The Bottom-Line for Now:
The great news is that for forward thinking managers and organizations, the availability of experienced talent has and will never be better. The trick of course will be how to capture and benefit from all of that talent. In my book, recognizing and leveraging the strengths of Boomers and Millennials is essential for success. The Millennials will moderate over time (as happens with every generation) and the Boomers will ultimately fade into history. However, for the here and now and for the next decade, managing the generations is one key to success.
Some Great Insights at the Latest Carnival of Human Resources
Check out Jon Ingham's Strategic Human Capital blog for the latest Carnival of Human Resources and some global perspectives on on compelling issues in managing and leading. Thanks to Jon for featuring one of my recent posts.
In Search of the High Performance Project Team
I recently conducted a leadership workshop for a group of technical professionals at an industry conference, and as always, I walked away from the session with a couple of insights gained from the input of the participants. One that surprised me was that after talking about characteristics of high performance project teams, I asked for a show of hands from anyone that had been a member of this type of team. Only 5 out of 58 raised their hands. Even discounting for the people that don’t tend to respond to "showing of hands" requests, anything even close to the 10% range here seems abysmal.
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