Whidbey Island Worries:Engagement Should Not Be a Function of Circumstances
I was reading an article this week that appeared recently in the Whidbey-News Times. This was the headline:
UPDATE: Whidbey loses Poseidon, thousands of jobs in doubt
If you just read the headline you’d be inclined to think that the people on Whidbey Island, located north and west of Seattle in the Puget Sound, were facing an immediate economic crisis with 2600 jobs in jeopardy. In truth the jobs may be at some risk, there are still a lot of unanswered questions; however, any phase out of these positions would take place over a nine year period, if it takes place at all. This all becomes clear if you read the article which is written in such a way as to emphasize the uncertainty of the situation. But the headline sells the news media!
On Fidalgo Island, just north of Whidbey, where I live in the town of Anacortes, we have two modest sized petroleum refineries employing about 800 people between them as well as several hundred contractors on an ongoing basis, very likely an additional 300 jobs. The people in our town can and have been frightened by headlines similar to those in the Whidbey- News Times on more than one occasion with threats of the loss of these jobs, and will continue to be into the future. Such is the cost of economic dependency.
Being mindful of the potential economic threat facing the people of both islands I was reflecting today on the way many people, much like many in these two communities, unwittingly position themselves to be emotionally and psychologically “whipsawed” by forces beyond their control. I currently participate as a member of the economic development subcommittee of my local Chamber of Commerce in Anacortes. My intention, along with those of my fellow committee members, is to be able to stimulate economic and employment alternatives for the island, not to avoid the loss of our refineries and the employment they bring. Whether we like it or not that eventuality is very likely beyond our control. As a community we need to be responsible for the potential loss of these assets and have in place alternatives that could replace many if not all of these positions or serve as incentives for new citizens to be drawn to our area because of the opportunities we represent. As a committee of invested citizens we are operating freely into a new future rather than being paralyzed by the fear of the loss of our present. Time is always going to be our primary limitation which means that there is no time like right now to get cracking on creating solutions.
Scenarios similar to those portrayed here on both Whidbey and Fidalgo Islands are played out on a miniaturized scale day in and day out in organizations all around us. Managers seeking solutions to producing significant gains in employee engagement are being unconsciously undermined by the very lifestyles of employees they wish to engage. Many employees, managers too, live at or near the limits of their economic wherewithal. These very same people have no disaster plan or exit strategy in place in the event they experience a loss or decline of their income flow. Consequently they often live in a state of quite desperation, hoping that they do nothing to cause the loss of their employment. They are not grounded in their responsibility for their own economic future. In their world opportunity is something someone creates or offers to them and has little or nothing to do with who they are or what value they may bring. They live in a state of economic dependency without necessarily a corresponding awareness of the risk they continually place themselves and their families in by failing to insure against a catastrophic loss of income.
You may think this sounds preachy or judgmental, even critical. Well….yes, if that is what it takes to wake people up! Managers need to wake too for that matter.
People who are scared for the future of their income are rarely if ever fully engaged, they lack the capacity for full engagement. About the best they are able to offer is compliance or adherence to desired direction. Furthermore, they are not trustworthy.
By now you should be very uncomfortable but consider this; I am not talking about absolute untrustworthiness. What I am referring to here is people being rendered untrustworthy by virtue of being held hostage by their own economic need. Honestly, can you count on people to do the right thing when they believe it may in some way threaten or constrain their employment situation? Hopefully this is a rhetorical question.
We will not drive fear from our organizations without being responsible for the many employees that are coming to work scared and consequently limiting their contribution to that which appears safe. I am not suggesting that we need to address the external conditions that promote the fear but rather the fear itself and how catering to it unwittingly contributes to lessening the perceived value our employees can provide.
- Where do you suspect that you have employees who are operating so as to limit their own risk of losing either their current position or employment with your firm?
- What conversation can you imagine having with such employees that would bring the fear out in the open and allow it to be addressed directly?
Terrific article, Mike. As always, very thought provoking. I appreciate your ability to courageously call out the elephant in the room. I run across the fear you're speaking of daily in the classroom. People who are staying on the job because they are afraid to leave, but totally disengaged and even resentful. They lay in wait for better opportunities, but are giving their current employers the least of what they have to offer. Your call to action - to bring the fear out to the forefront, is a good one. But given that most managers I encounter are experiencing the exact same thing, I'm not sure they're equipped to start that conversation. It comes down to leadership from the very top. Are they being real with what people are feeling? Are they being transparent enough that people aren't caught in the web of the unknown and frozen in wait for their demise? Thanks for continuing to put good content out there that gets everyone thinking!