The Heart of Engagement : Leadership Development, Management Education, Retreat Facilitation & Executive Coaching : Mike Cook : AMJ Group

He said, “Wouldn’t it be great to take off for someplace warm for a while this winter?”

She said, “I think so too. What do you have in mind?”

He said, “I was thinking of Mexico but if we go I want to stay at least two weeks.”

She said, “I can’t be gone that long, I need to be working.”

He said, “Well so do I but what if we could find a place with an internet connection so we’d stay in touch?”

She said, “That’s great but what about phone service?”

He said, “I’ve got us covered with Magic Jack, I can buy international minutes at low rates…

Before this ends up sounding like a commercial for a phone service or a travel agency, let me tell you that I have written my last two posts from La Paz, Mexico, where we have been staying for the last 17 days. We’ve had a great time. Rather than pretend we were on vacation and sneak peeks at our email everyday and feel guilty we just worked each morning from 7AM to noon and then set off for exploration the rest of the day.

I travel a lot for my work with companies around the US and for the past several years our “vacations” have been used to visit our several children and grandchildren around the country. No complaints of course but this trip was something special, something we’d heard that other people do but had never tried for ourselves. It has worked out brilliantly, so brilliantly in fact that we trademarked the name for future adventures. Just kidding about the trademark but it has been an eye opener to see how relatively easy it has been for both of us to stay up on our work and address some leisure action at the same time. “Work-Cation” We really like the sound of that and it captures the last two plus weeks perfectly because now there will not be that pile up of emails to answer or phone calls to return as we’ve stayed right up to date with everything.

And I need to make special mention of the people of La Paz, Mexico and the surrounding area. I think many people in the US have a very slanted view of the Mexican people based on limited to no first hand experience of what the people of Mexico are like when you meet them in their own country.

From the very first evening we arrived, we were the “fish out of water.” Neither my wife nor I speak Spanish beyond the conventions of “Hola!”, “Gracias!”, “Buenas Noches!” and “Yo no hablo Espanol!,” which I used repeatedly throughout our stay. Our experience of the warmth and customer orientation of the average Mexican citizen began upon our arrival in the airport in San Jose del Cabo and continued until the waiter in the beach side restaurant where we watched the Super Bowl gave me a “fist bump” on our way out the door. We found only a limited number of people who spoke fluent English, but everyone we asked for help would not quit until we had what we needed and this included sign language, drawing pictures and sketching out maps. We stopped people on the street, in stores, in the markets and gas stations and once even in a dark alley. No matter, they acted like all they had to do was help us out.

The extreme example of this was Arturo, an assistant manager at the local Mega supermarket. We met him in the produce department on our first trip into the store and he personally escorted us throughout the store, helped us get acquainted with the location of various items and translated for us when we went to the butcher and deli counters. While we were in La Paz, we made five more trips to the store and each time Arturo noticed we were there and made sure we did not leave without finding everything we had come in for and none of this was because we asked. He insisted on helping us.

It may seem trivial to report in this space on an experience that sounds a bit like a travel log but as someone who spends a lot of time focused on how organizations work, I found this town of 200,000+ to be a working wonder. We noted literally thousands of small businesses, retailers of just about anything who would direct us to competitors down the street or around the corner if they did not have what we were looking for. I wish I could count on the type of customer service I experienced here in Mexico at every turn when I am home to the US. 

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One of the most traumatic experiences of my life occurred around the time I was turning thirteen years old. That was a birthday more meaningful than many because I knew from conversations with my parents that they were going to increase my allowance. I was the oldest child and I’d be moving from the $.50/week my other siblings received to $.75/week. In my world, where baseball or football cards were $.05/pack w/ gum these were going to be high times!

Not wanting to get my hopes too far out of line with my understanding from past conversations I decided to check bets with my Mom before the big day. To my surprise and disappointment I was informed that yes, I would be getting the increase as previously discussed but with the stipulation that from the day of my birthday onward I needed to run each of my purchases by my mother in advance so she could insure I was making good choices. Yikes! This is now remembered as my "Bait and Switch" birthday. Up to that point, I had spent my weekly $.50 however I chose, mostly on the sports cards that I so dearly prized at the time. What would the future hold? Somehow this didn't feel at all like I had expected it would.

To say the least, I was crushed! What if she didn’t agree with my spending choices? Moms have different priorities than young boys; they are often looking for opportunities to teach them lessons about the value of money, saving for a rainy day, that kind of thing. Drat! My excitement was dashed in one short conversation. What was the point of having the extra money if I couldn’t decide how to spend it?

Fast forward to right now,... the event just described never took place! For the record, I never had a $.75/wk allowance, I topped out at $.50/wk. Sorry for the ruse; I was trying to imagine myself in the situation many managers have reported finding themselves in. A scene similar to the conversation I fabricated with my mother would come after several rounds of the annual budgeting process. Managers then receive their final numbers along with the admonition from the granting authority that they must submit a request for approval of any expenditure of either a certain type or size. Almost anything of consequence is covered by this caveat.

Yaaaaaagh! Hey, Senior Budgeting Authority, what’s the point of granting a budget if you aren’t going to grant full spending discretion along with it? Oh, yes, and by the way, how exactly is it that you hold someone to account or tie their compensation to a number you have final control over?

I am not going out of my way here to be a smarty pants and you are welcome to question the accuracy of the analogy I have created; but not much. Let it burn! I actually think practices like this are frequently and thoughtlessly held in place by habit. How are they tolerated? It is a tough economy where new opportunities are hard to come by.  Or maybe, the managers involved just don’t care enough to push back.

Practices like this one are often fiercely defended by their practitioners if questioned (I doubt that you need me to provide examples, I am sure you unfortunately have plenty of your own).

“Back in the day” , when command and control was the only management approach maybe no one thought a lot about practices such as this, it was just the way it was. These days when every organization is counting on discretionary effort, especially from managers we need to step back and ask, “What exactly is it that we are hoping to accomplish with this constraint on our managers? Maybe we could gain more by encouraging initiative, innovation and creativity?"

Here’s a thought, Senior Budgeting Authority, If you aren’t willing to question your restrictive practices, how about considering that the scores on your engagement surveys are really more of a measure of apathy in a tough job market?  

• Think about what you do as a manager that may be a) communicating to people that they are not trusted or b) constraining them from taking full accountability for what you have told them is expected?    

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Am I no longer young

and still not half-perfect?

Let me keep my mind on what matters,

which is my work,

which is mostly standing still

and learning to be astonished.

~ Mary Oliver

From the time I was about fourteen until the present “going to work” for me has always been about being with people. I should more accurately say being with people while in pursuit of some shared objective; that has been my passion for over fifty years. That has been my work; it really hasn’t mattered so much what I was doing as long as it was done in some sort of team or community structure.

Fifty years ago or thereabouts I was a freshman in high school. I went to a small school in a catholic parish in my hometown of Lansing, Michigan. Small catholic schools were plentiful in those days. In our town there were six that fielded athletic teams in three sports for boys, football, basketball and baseball. We all played each other, the catholic schools, and the rivalries were fierce. I played all three sports and while never a star athlete I gave it everything I had. In later years I have come to learn that it was less the sport I was interested in and more the opportunity to participate in those team environments.

Historically my school was the doormat of the catholic leagues. Through some convergence of the planets in that one school year, 1961-62, we assembled a group of student athletes that succeeded in winning the league championships in all three sports. It was the first time ever our school had won any championship much less all three in the same year. Given the history of our school I can only say that this was an astonishing outcome and that was my experience as well, astonishment. The events of that one year have shaped my life ever since, not in a nostalgic way but rather in the way of knowing the thrill of joining others in pursuit of a worthy objective and knowing the thrill of witnessing astonishing performances on the part of ordinary people.

I am sure it sounds corny but my pursuit of the surprise and pure joy of unexpected performance has become something of a positive addiction. As an adult I have recognized that life in time become much more complex, marriages, families, career goals and so on may and do in fact dilute the singular focus that I experienced for that year so long ago. However, on just enough occasions and when I have possibly least expected it people have proven to be worth the patience and produced in an astonishing fashion.

It may in fact be childlike to hold out for the unexpected but for me it is what makes tolerating the ordinary completely worthwhile and why I go to work…because that’s where the people are.

• When was the last time you allowed yourself to be astonished?

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Let’s say you are a senior project coordinator for Apple in Cupertino,CA and you’re looking for that next opportunity for yourself. Isn’t the obvious choice to open a gourmet cupcake store in Bellingham, WA. ? OK, cupcakes might not be the first possibility you come up with and it wasn’t for Liz Kovacs either, she did make a few stops in between. But..Apple was where she started as a grown up and where has she ended up? With a gourmet cupcake store, Icing on the Cake in Bellingham, WA.     

  What I found when I entered Liz’s store at 314 Champion Street was an experience that is about a lot more than cupcakes. It feels like you are walking into a high end jewelry retailer there in the downtown Arts District. If you ask her Liz will tell you that for her it is about a lot more as well, it is about the qualities of the experience when you are a customer of ‘Icing on the Cake’, among them are the baking and presenting of a cupcake that passes the ultimate test. As it turns out she designed the ultimate test herself but when she shared it made sense to me. “You have to try the cupcakes out on kids, kids will always eat the frosting but if they eat the cake, that’s a great cupcake!” The kids I saw in the store while I was there ate every last bite. Her cupcakes were clearly passing what seemed to me to be a pretty rigorous quality test.

But as Liz said, ‘Icing on the Cake’ and the products offered there are about a lot more than just the cake in the cupcake. When she told me that since she was 5 years old she has been obsessed with out-baking the cake on the Duncan Hines box I knew this endeavor involved passion. You know which cake she is talking about too, the white cake with the gooey vanilla frosting! (Liz loved that look but thinks they probably cheated on the frosting and anyway, she is not about to serve anything that starts in a box.)

But this cupcake business is also about artistry and craftsmanship. When Liz made the commitment to bake as a profession she already knew she was creative.  Baking was an avenue for the expression of her creativity. She also recognized that being creative was not enough, she needed to be skilled as well so she took the initiative to address her skill gap and enrolled in and completed the Wilton Cake Decorating Program at the Wilton School near Chicago. If you don’t know about Wilton you should take a look, pretty amazing stuff!

Passion, Creativity, Initiative , unleashing these qualities in our places of work is the challenge that people like Gary Hamel say lies in front of all organizations. And here is Liz Kovacs, without any management support exercising passion, creativity and initiative like there is no tomorrow. What gives? How do we differentiate between people like Liz Kovacs, the wonderful playful crew at Pike Place Fish Market , and the place where you work?

I write, read and think a lot about engagement. What I read often disappoints me in that it seems to be more of the old “carrot or stick” approach. Employers and managers, despite well developed definitions of employee engagement, still continue to think in terms like Hamel described in The ‘Future Of Management’.

“How do we (meaning management) get more (meaning units of production per hour) out of our people (meaning the individuals who are obliged to follow our orders)?”

                     The operative question for 20^th century managers. Gary Hamel

And we been repeatedly told, by those who reportedly measure such things, that the current state of engagement, of the American work force at least, is dismal, apparently only about 27% of workers report being fully engaged. In my view there are a lot of maybes when it comes to engagement and there will continue to be until we begin to explore the degree to which Choice and Embracing Interdependence factor into this equation.

What gets young men in the prime of their lives to get to bed early every night to participate in a 6AM set up routine that is exactly the same day after day seven days a week? Pull the fish out of the freezer, shovel the ice, stack the fish, and sell the fish; Choice, and a group of co-workers who are counting on them and will hold them to account. They choose this experience, this work and these co-workers each day as though it was their first on the job.

So what does Choice have to do with Liz Kovacs and cupcakes? It is the backdrop against which her whole business takes place. And let’s face it, her routine is pretty much the same every day, even she’ll tell you that. On more than one occasion she has been approached by people who are inspired by her product, at least the idea of it. When she describes to them the actual process behind all the pretty jewels in the case out front, which she calls high production baking, they become almost immediately disenchanted.

And Embracing Interdependence? I would hope it would be obvious that none of us really make it alone in this world but in case the point needs to be made you can take a look at this piece about Liz and her cupcakes from the Bellingham Business Journal back in October of last year. She’s the first to tell you she could not being doing this alone.

 “Her daughters, Emily and Ona, help with baking, decorating and cleaning. Emily also operates the business's booth at the Bellingham Farmers Market...

Kovacs' husband, Steve, has also been instrumental. He helped build her first commercial kitchen, which she used for a small baking business she started in 1998. He was also her guinea pig for the six months she spent refining her recipes."He's a retired taste tester now," Kovacs said

Her brother, Steve Sieler, an independent art director in Santa Cruz, does all the marketing for the business, he designed the logo as well as the retail space.."

 Ultimately Liz is a business person, her focus is the customer experience, as you can readily tell when you spend time with her as I did. Those years at Apple served her well. She is a business person operating a gourmet bakery not a baker operating a business so as she sat in front of me talking she was also working on the business. As we talked she was taking pieces of silverware fresh from the dishwasher and wiping the water spots off with a towel. She does it as a matter of Choice because everything about ‘Icing on the Cake’ is done like it matters. 

    - So where is "what matters" not being attended to in your area?

   - Can you tell if it Choice or Need that keeps your people coming back?

   - Have you fully Embraced the Interdependence and do you make

     sure your supporters experience appreciation?

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This past Saturday evening I once again got off a plane feeling sluggish and nursing a low grade headache. More than once I have found myself ill with a cold, even one time pneumonia within a couple of days of completing a cross country flight. Such are the experiences many of us share who travel regularly for business.

Somewhere along the way someone got the bright idea that if you fortified yourself with enough vitamins and minerals ahead of time maybe you could stave off the ill effects of an extended plane trip. They invented something called Airborne® which must work to some degree because it seems to be doing quite well in stores.

This experience got me thinking as I often do in metaphorical terms. I began to wonder what might be the organizational equivalent of Airborne® now that we are organizationally launching new flights (fiscal years) all around the country and the world.

What initially came to mind was some sort of plan for professional development. So I did a couple of searches through the blogosphere and lo and behold almost everything I came upon had something to do with advancing skills and knowledge. Not at all the medicine I was looking for!

I wasn’t interested necessarily in new skills or knowledge, not that I am against that sort of thing. No, it really was something like an opportunity to create a preventative regimen that I was seeking.

What I have noticed in recent years, especially having my own company, is a tendency to become isolated from ideas and thinking outside one’s own environment as that environment begins to require more and more maintenance. I found myself going a couple of years without attending a workshop or seminar offered by someone where travel and time away from my familiar environment was required. And there always seemed to be plenty of legitimate reasons to put these opportunities off.  

“I recall that my father became very uneasy when he and my mother moved into a new home, one requiring little to no maintenance. He only lived there a couple of years before he convinced my mother to move to another, older home, one requiring considerable maintenance. Once there his peace of mind was once again restored as he was able to return to old familiar habits of painting and patching which allowed him to solve problems with existing knowledge and experience, no new learning required.”

As economic conditions have tightened or remained challenging one historical pattern has reemerged just about everywhere and another is emerging. Non-essential training budgets have been and are continuing to be cut or shrunk. More emphasis is being placed on on-line learning and LMS systems. Both these trends are troubling to me and I believe should be to you as well as a manager, leader and developer of people.

No doubt you have heard this quote from Albert Einstein more than once in your professional career:

"The significant problems we face cannot be solved at the same level of thinking we were at when we created them."

If we are not intentionally engaging with environments outside our own how will we manage to develop new thinking? How will we keep ourselves well and sharp if we continue to re-think the same thoughts with the same thinkers? Is the situation really all that different than the metaphor I suggested earlier with the plane trip, recycled air producing sluggishness and sometimes even illness? I think not, and yet there is the reality of the economics and sometimes budgetary discretion being beyond your control.

So what can you do?

Here are a few things I can think of and I am sure you can add some more yourself.

• Attend continuing education programs at a local community college. These are usually offered at really bargain pricing. I took a class on “economic gardening” this past summer, it was fascinating and I didn’t even know there were people working on growing local economies.

•  Read, read, read, and not just business books or those in your technical area but also non-fiction non-related books.

•  Visit www.TED.com and peruse the Talks section. Make arrangements to watch a few of them next year with the members of your staff, stay after and hold a downloading discussion on ideas that were generated.

•  Create a Peer-to-Peer Coaching Group. Gather up to eight other managers outside your function. Meet monthly for two to three hours to work together on resolving problems in each other’s areas. Make it a committed activity, if you are going to participate you must attend every session or don’t play. (I like groups that can break into threes to work as pods).

And what can you add to this list? How will you get outside and into the open air of new thinking?

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Heart of Engagement:The Small Business Forum

   Why This, Why Here, Why Now?

Benton Harbor, Michigan may be the last place you would look for a world class coffee shop and café.

If you know anything about the history of the Benton Harbor area you’d be familiar with the facts, extremely high unemployment, 17% by recent count, and median family income below $20,000. The local economy, currently ranked 347Th out of 366 US metropolitan areas, was devastated by the loss of six large manufacturing facilities in the 1980’s and hasn’t improved much since. But if you show up at 124 Water Street in Benton Harbor on any morning around 8:00AM you’ll be in for a treat; great coffee, service, music and possibly the best ham and cheese croissants on the planet among the other treats that are all made on the premises. So, why this, why here and why now?

Four years ago Elizabeth Frost, owner and muse of the Phoenix coffee shop, was in China following the path of family members from previous generations. If she had continued on her path she would have become the family’s third generation of Montessori teachers. She changed her path.

One afternoon while still in China Elizabeth met a man on his vacation who was starting a school in south western Michigan, a school with apparently similar commitments to the Montessori philosophy and the two clicked in terms of visionary paths. Before their meeting concluded Elizabeth had been offered a position at the new school and an opportunity to participate as a founding member of the faculty.

Fast forward to early 2009. The school thing hadn’t worked out for Elizabeth. The opportunity was not all that was promised. Elizabeth is not cocky but she doesn’t lack for confidence so she left the school and started to look around for what was next. Being stranded in southwest Michigan at this time in history would be daunting for most people but when you get to know Elizabeth you realize that she does not take her cues from the circumstances.She is guided by vision, the origin of authentic engagement.

She hung around Benton Harbor for a while, picked up whatever work she could and waited. Eventually she noticed a combination real estate office/coffee shop that didn’t seem to be doing well in either endeavor. Elizabeth approached the owner and found him willing to part with the coffee shop part of his business and all the associated equipment. She had never run a business and knew nothing about food service. However, a little thing like lack of knowledge and experience was not about to stop her, she had created a vision and that was now her guide.

In her own kitchen Elizabeth taught herself how to bake, she baked hundreds of croissants and gave them away to friends until she got the response she was looking for. She was ready for business! Eighteen months later the Phoenix is a social and commercial phenomenon in Benton Harbor. If you drop by Saturday morning between 9AM and Noon you better plan on take out because you’ll find all twenty or so tables filled with locals and folks who drive over from nearby St. Joseph not only for the croissants but incredible quiche options as well a daily special that by itself makes the trip worthwhile. The environment is very warm and inviting, no one gets rushed at The Phoenix.

According to Elizabeth it hasn’t been all “butterflies and sunshine” but the satisfaction comes from the tiny pleasures of service. I asked her about the choice to stay in the area when clearly she could have moved on. In her words, “There is something special going on in Benton Harbor now, there’s an opportunity to be part of the community’s rebirth, progress is easy to see, the cost of entry was very attractive and it is rare to be there at the beginning of anything.” That’s the power of  vision; saying there is opportunity when none is apparent. I can tell you not everyone would have seen Benton Harbor as Elizabeth has. But then not everyone had a plan to “take over the world one sandwich at a time.”   And she is not alone.

• So now take a look at your own business. Who has had the say about how things have gone, you or the circumstances? Who will have the say for the future?

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                             “The arc of history is long, but it bends towards justice…”

                                                  Martin Luther King, Jr.

                             “ …but it does not get there without a little help from its friends.”

                                                  Michael F. Cook

Today I will not be practical, this is a day for the philosophical and inspirational.

Are we really all that shocked when we hear stories of bad or seemingly unjust behavior in our places of work?

There are a couple of ways to interpret the allegations of gender bias filed recently against Citigroup by six current and former female employees. 1) This is a continuation of a pattern of gender bias as shown by previous admissions of guilt and don’t forget that Citigroup has been involved in the flashy case of Debrahlee Lorenzana, the “Too Hot Banker” in recent months as well. 2) The Citigroup situation, while lame on its surface is merely a placeholder for reality as it evolves. (We are not there yet, “there” being a world of workplaces designed for full engagement, in case you hadn’t noticed!)

I prefer the second interpretation. This is not to say that we should put up with the behavior Citigroup management has been accused of, far from it. I see the law suits as a positive sign that people, in this case women, are fully engaged and insisting on entirely new working relationships with employers. These battles must be fought, and they will be, by small groups of courageous individuals on behalf of the rest of us, and they will not always win.

“A small group of thoughtful people could change the world. Indeed, it's the only thing that ever has.”

           Margaret Mead as quoted by Pamela Slim

In the workplace of today the challenge for individuals to stay engaged goes well beyond merely finding the right work with the right people, though that is a big part of the story. Not seeing the Citibank scenario against the background of a larger context is no different than simply pouting when British Petroleum welshes on its promises to do right by the people and the environment of the Gulf Coast. (You can bet that individuals in small groups are already taking action to hold British Petroleum to account, and the fight will be long and full of setbacks.) Did Exxon immediately and completely live up to its word in the case of the Valdez catastrophe? Many people still do not think so, in fact the case against Exxon was only resolved by the US Supreme Court on June 25th, 2008. But someone carried the fight for twenty years after the events in Alaska’s Prince William Sound and many, many people were still not happy with the resolution. The list of similar events and disappointments goes on yet the fight is a good fight and it is ultimately a fight not against anyone other than ourselves, perhaps better said a mindset we share based in a belief that life’s benefits are scarce and "whoever dies with the most toys wins." As Pogo so rightly said so long ago in 1953, “we have met the enemy and he is us!”

There are always going to be people who will serve as placeholders for the existing reality, Kenneth Lay at Enron comes quickly to mind, but it is ultimately the mindset, the current version of reality, which is the real enemy. And what does this have to do with the commitment of many to developing engaged workplaces? Everything! If we move forward with programs and training and systems; we write books, conduct assessments, blog, hold conferences, blah, blah, blah…and do not address ourselves as the carriers of the beliefs that give rise to the actions we despise we will have missed the opportunity to take part in the true revolution/evolution of both the American culture and workplace.

Now go out there and sue somebody!

       …and while you are at is visit www.pachamama.org

       "All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing." 

                                          Wordsmost often attributed to Edmund Burke, Irish born member of 

                                British Parliament

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OK, first, this post is waaaay too long. I'll do better next time. Promise!

Employee Engagement**, as measured using the Q12 was first introduced as the now popular TRUTH by the Gallup organization back in late 1998, early 1999. Many of us first heard of the Q12 while reading "First Break All the Rules" by Marcus Buckingham whenever we may have read it, in my case 2001.

But I am not writing about the Q12 today, only  marking its introduction into our conceptual framework. I am also noting that it seems that once Gallup told the world what it had found much of the western business culture suddenly realized that there was some connection between an employee’s level of engagement and their performance/productivity.

Like so many other things in business (that most pragmatic of worlds) we came to care about this subject when we were in enough pain and not much sooner. Honestly, if you look back in the literature you’ll find references to engagement, albeit called by other names,  as early as the 1920’s in the writings of Mary Parker Follett.

 Unfortunately, as has often been the case before with newly promoted management ideas the general drift of the studies and literature that followed the introduction of the Q12 has reinforced the fundamental power differential that has come to be accepted in the workplace. Basically, employer/management has the power and employees don’t. And so it goes with codifications of the so called “drivers” of engagement such as those presented to us by The Conference Board.

Based on a distillation of several intensive studies by varying sources TCB in 2006 presented its clients with the following common drivers of employee engagement:

•  Trust and integrity – how well managers communicate and ‘walk the talk’.
• Nature of the job –Is it mentally stimulating day-to-day?
•  Line of sight between employee performance and company performance – Does the employee understand how their work contributes to the company’s performance?
• Career Growth opportunities –Are there future opportunities for growth?
•  Pride about the company – How much self-esteem does the employee feel by being associated with their company?
•  Coworkers/team members – significantly influence one’s level of engagement Employee development –
• Is the company making an effort to develop the employee’s skills?
•  Relationship with one’s manager – Does the employee value his or her relationship with his or her manager?

To all this “driver” stuff, and similar notions that employers are responsible for employee engagement  I say Poop! They are postured in an allegorical tale of good and evil with all the appropriate archetypes. Consider that what we have all been talking about (and I suspect sincerely) is how to resolve the seeming paradox that only arises when we accept that there is an irresolvable conflict between the interest of workers and employers. Again, I say Poop! The non-resolvability is in the eye of the beholder.

If there is any responsibility to be assigned it must include all parties in equal measure. If nothing else I say that that what we have struggled with since the introduction of the Q12 is to find who is at fault for the awful statistics provided us by Gallup as output from their famous survey. They found:

Engaged employees- 29%
Not engaged employees – 56%
Disengaged employees -15%

If you have any sense of pride as an employer these numbers were bound to drive you crazy (and launch 1000 consulting practices!) and if as an employee you had previously bought into your role of worker as victim you now had evidence for the case you pleaded daily in the break room. Humbug to all of this, the pride and the prejudice!

Yes, as employers we do have environmental factors affecting employee engagement within our control that we are well advised to attend to. Failing to heed the research has it its own consequences and they are well deserved.

At the same time, Yes, as employees maybe we have our own set of guidelines for maintaining our own engagement. I propose to you the following Employee Guidelines for Staying Engaged, developed by me without survey instruments or statistical analysis.  (Myers-Briggs type INFP) Are these rules? The question makes no sense to an INFP!

Mike's Employee Guidelines for Staying Engaged         

#1 Whoever sees it first gets to do it. This is the principle of Responsibility. There is no
validity to the statement "That's not my job." until you say so.

#2 Nobody likes anybody's ideas better than there own. This is the principle of
Participation. Everyone wants to play, they will play your game if they can play their way, let
them.

#3 Organizational life will provide as much nonsense as you can deal with, do not add
to the confusion. This is the principle of Persistence. There is normally nothing and no one
assigned to your success at work.  At the same time, there is nothing and no one assigned to
make sure you do not succeed. Whining is not a good substitute for performance and it adds to
the mess.  Hang in there and don't take it personally.

#4 Do not confuse your beliefs with the truth, it makes you stupid and an annoyance to
other people. This is the principle of Perspective. Your "point of view" is valid, as "your point of
view." As "the point" it makes life at work really crummy.

#5 When you have no control you must communicate. When you do not communicate,
apologize.  When someone fails to communicate with you, forgive. This is the principle of
Traveling Light. The work is hard enough all by itself, don't collect or create baggage.

#6 Nothing is more valuable to your performance than your working relationships, respect and maintain them.This is the principle of Managing Mutual Understanding. Never, never, never leave your motive or your intent up to someone's imagination.  If you really need to communicate pick up the phone or walk down the hall. Communication is a process, not a transaction to be trusted to email.

#7 Give up your right to say, "I told you so!"  This is
the principle of Partnership. If you don't say it when you first see it, forget it, and get to work.

#8 "We are all, as individuals, in over our heads. That's just the way it is." The greatest barrier we all face to performance and productivity in our organizations is our unwillingness to ask for help.

#9 “Be ready to walk away today” Given the overall uncertainty of the times in which we live and the general condition of nothing being guaranteed you do yourself enormous honor by being prepared to leave your current employment at a moment’s notice. This means to handle your personal finances with the primary objectives of protecting your confidence and ensuring the comfort of your family. Enough said?

# 10 Remember. . .  If you can't laugh at yourself, someone else will always be
happy to do it for you."  Embrace the interdependence; it is the path to both success
and satisfaction.

Of course there are 10, there are always 10 when it comes to Guidelines,Rules, etc.!)

If you can't remember these 10 Guidelines write this on the back of your hand..."Life First, Business Second, May The Force Be With You"--Pam Slim

 Thank you for your attention!

**My thanks to David Zinger , Steve Roesler , Abhishek and Patricia Soldati for addressing this dilemma months before me.

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Probably the most common mistake I watch managers make daily in the workplace is addressing their reports as if they are in the same frame of mind. When people are nodding their heads, it means they are nodding their heads; that's it!

(* This post applies anytime you are counting on the collaboration of others., manager or not.)

Take a look at this group in the picture above. (Never mind the boats and water in the background, get back to business here!) Are they ready to contribute or have they assumed some pretense? Look, they have their paperwork out and turned to the first page and they seem attentive! (So do you when you assume this posture so now you know how much stock to put in their appearances.)

 You may have never thought about it but as a manager you need to be aware that engagement has at least three voices, Contribution,Compliance and Resistance, which are frames of mind your reports can be in at any time...

·         depending on the day

·         the conversation topic

·         what happened to them last night at home or this morning

·         what they were doing or

·         who they were talking to just before they came to your meeting

·         and, and, and …or, or, or…life will not leave us alone.

So now, what do I mean when I reference “frames of mind?”  Frame, like window frame, the place we are looking at the world from at any moment is more kaleidoscopic than fixed. (What you said to me yesterday was fine and welcome, say the same thing today after I have just had a tough conversation with a peer in another department and I may ‘jump down your throat, much to your surprise and dismay.) We are always giving voice to our frame of mind if others would just listen and watch

Engaged, associated by choice, is a condition of being, and there are both ultimate and interim conditions of being to consider. Ultimate engagement arises from commitments to choices made. Interim engagement is subject to the slings and arrows of everyday/every moment life and constantly in flux. Ultimately, I am completely committed to the success of my marriage; in the interim, my wife has asked me to check under the house for a water leak! Given my aversion to both maintenance and the underside of the house about the best I can muster up for this one is an “Okey Doke honey!” and grudgingly crawl under after just about anything else I can think of that just “has to be done” before checking for the leak. As it turns out my wife knows that my ultimate commitment to the marriage always wins out over my weasel mind and she will get her report on the alleged leak sooner rather than later, so she doesn’t try to handle my dawdling.

 What is this interim Voice of engagement  thing, the one we usually hear from in the moment?

 Voice of Contribution- “I am on it honey thanks for letting me know there may be a problem”, followed by action.

 Voice of Compliance- As above, “Okey Doke honey”, followed by going to the refrigerator ,making a sandwich, watching some of the ballgame and then crawling under the house.

 Voice of Resistance- “It rained last week and I don’t want to get muddy so I’ll get to it next week, its probably nothing.”, followed by no action until asked again.

 I hope that you can translate these personal examples into your own when addressing your team or another co-worker while engaged in getting something done.

Message for today: If you don’t check in with people (ask) you run the risk of talking to yourself and assuming that head nods, Okey Dokes and even “You got it boss” means that something is going to happen and you can count on it.

So, do you know your reports as well as my wife knows me; I didn’t think so.

• How many times have you been burned by talking with your folks as though they are right there with you?
• How many times have you known they were not right there with you and you went right on talking as though you could talk them into it?
• How many times have you taken their silence to mean assent and walked away hoping you were going to get what you asked for. 

Is this too basic? I wish it were and I don’t by any means want to insult anyone, unless it will help get this clear, when you are not winning as a manager start with where people are at. Address them where they are, not where you wish they were. Be curious, find out why they may not be engaged, ask what you can offer to address misunderstandings or fears directly. In the interim getting in communication is the result to be produced, ultimately it will get you where you want to go.

Where are you assuming engagement and getting egg on your face?

For an alternative to the manager's perspective, to see how "life at work" can impact the individual, take a look at All Things Workplace by Steve Roesler especially the post of February 25th, What Happened to the Talent? 

I recommend a regular visit to Steve's site, you'll get hooked.

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If a hip reference to a well known rock band (Rage Against the Machine) from the 1990’s, known for their highly political lyrics, made by a 63 year old white guy, has a tendency to tweak your beak then we are probably already off to a bad start this week. If not then hang in there, I promise this gets better.

Now wait a minute, if you are reading this you are probably quite a few years away from 63 and the only one who really needs an explanation for the title of this post is me! My bad.

'Rage against the Machine', I do like the sound of the phrase and it really is an example of a term that is self-explanatory. As an obstacle, anything that interrupts the ability to engage freely with our work is worthy of a conversation, especially when it involves something that is completely within our control, the rage that is. Rage against whatever or whoever, whether it is…

• A co-worker
• A manager
• A policy
• Them
• They
• Those guys in the ivory tower

(…you know who and what I mean, that which we grind our gears about), is unequivocally a waste of time, precious lifetime, the one resource you have that is truly yours and is non-renewable. Whenever I hear someone raging, ranting about their situation all I can ever think to ask is whether they understand the game they are playing. Business, it is a high contact pastime. Even in real high contact sports, when it is a matter of business, there is more than one way to get your bell rung. Here’s a really current example of what I am referring to...

February 22,2010, ‘CBS Sports Wire Reports’ earlier today reported that the San Diego Chargers of National Football League fame announced they have dismissed long time star running back LaDainian Tomlinson after a nine year career with the team. To quote the story, "The yards didn't pile up as easily as in previous seasons. LaDainian Tomlinson was slowing down because of injuries and age, becoming less and less the face of the franchise as his role was reduced in a pass-happy offense. On Monday, he was released by the San Diego Chargers, a franchise he helped revive with a brilliant nine-year run in which he became one of the NFL's greatest running backs.”

Oh by the way, Mr. Tomlinson had a $2M roster bonus due in March. Aaaaaahh! That’s not fair, after all he did for the team. Read the story. Back during Super Bowl week LaDanian spoke with his agent Tom Condon and let him know that he thought it was time to move on. This is a sign of someone who understands the game they are playing, he looked at the wall, he saw what was written there and he chose, to engage with the reality in which he found himself. Did he like it? I can’t imagine that he did. Could he change what was going to happen? Not very likely. Rather than rage against the team or wait for decision that was probably inevitable LaDanian chose to initiate action on behalf of his future. So am I saying you should always walk away from a fight? No, I am saying walk away from a whine!

Kris Dunn recently took a whack at this topic from where he sees things in his own post titled in part “…Rage Against the Machine.” His takes come from a different perspective as he poses the challenge to us where there is at least the possibility we can do something to preserve self-respect, rather than curl up in a ball and going catatonic.

Either way, Kris’s or LaDanian’s, it’s about being a player in the game going on right in front of you, that’s a choice for staying alive, for acting like you are on the playing field and not someone who got their popcorn spilled by some other rowdy fan.

Back in 19 and 79 I found myself getting all whiney about my situation in the big oil company. I was a rising star, by my own admission. Maybe my trajectory was a bit shallow but I knew I was meant for better things than waiting in line for the next available management opening blah, blah, blah. Truth be told I had educated myself as an HR professional to insure that I would be able to make a good living (reasonable but not inspirational) and while that was proving to be the case I was increasingly interested in things that I would later learn were part of the study of Organizational Development. "How could this Fortune 50 company not be doing more of what I was interested in doing?" Well they weren’t and for the most part they would not begin to for nearly another 10 years, at least on any scale.

One day late in that year I woke up and realized that there was nothing wrong, especially nothing wrong with the company where I was working. What had happened through no one’s fault was that I had discovered that something mattered more to me than simply making a living, its called a passion. Most importantly it dawned on me that I was the one who needed to take action. Within a very short period of time I had tendered my resignation and began plans to become my own employer in a company offering the services I wanted to provide. Along the way over the past 30 years there have been plenty of ups and downs and I have been on the field for everyone of them. What a great game I created for myself!

Can you say for true that you love the game you are playing today?

*There is no real order or rank to the Obstacles, I am just making a list as I go along.

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In the “world according to me”, engagement is defined as “association by choice.”  To choose is often defined as, ‘to select freely, after consideration.’ Anything that stands in the way of associating freely is then an obstacle. When trust is construed in such a way as to place the burden of responsibility outside oneself then by definition we have made trust an obstacle to engagement.

Can you imagine being at work, in any workplace, and not trusting people? I don’t necessarily mean specific people, I mean people in general. Unfortunately, I think many of us are unconscious of our biases in this regard, having “handy stories” justifying behavior that might otherwise be considered paranoid. I think you know the stories I mean, they usually include some element of “well you can never be too careful,” or “if you want something done right do it yourself.” Both of these are versions of how to avoid depending on or trusting others. These “stories” do a major job of invisibly undermining accountability in any organization. Put in the simplest terms, no trust = no accountability. So let’s take a closer look at trust in a way that opens space for accountability.

“Trust is more an attitude about myself, an estimate of my own capacities, my own ability to handle whatever comes up. If I do not trust someone, … , a more accurate statement might be that I am not happy with the way I act or feel when I am around this person.  It is my sense of being out of control that bothers me…”                                            Peter Block

 Preparing for this post, it occurred to me that for many thoughtful people there are three truths about trust and no common definition. The three truths are:

1.       If I trust, I can count on being disappointed.

2.       If I do not trust, my life will likely be safe but it will feel more like surviving than thriving.

3.       If I am up to anything of consequence—anything that will really make any difference—then I will need the involvement of others. Therefore, trusting is a foregone conclusion: I will trust or I will accomplish very little in this lifetime.

With the above three truths in mind, I would do well to establish a tolerance for disappointment. If this sounds paradoxical to you I empathize. It appears that there is always a paradox to be dealt with where trust is involved, if I insist on defining trust as having anything to do with someone other than myself!

In my experience, most people I encounter do offer their definition of trust in terms of the behaviors of others. While there is considerable power in defining trust in reference to oneself, this "conventional reality" is neglected at great personal peril. The subjective reality concerning trust is dealt with masterfully in TRUST AGENTS: Using the Web to Build Influence, Improve Reputation, and Earn Trust.*

*(Kevin Eikenberry provides a timely review of this book in his post of February 15 and his blog, Leadership and Learning, merits a regular visit from readers who subscribe to this site.)

In contrast to the conventional practice, as I read hundreds of quotes from "fairly famous/successful" people to prepare for this article, a single insight became clear: there is no power in any definition of trust that depends on the behavior of others. None of these “famous/successful people” defined trust as having anything to do with anyone other than himself or herself.

 Consider this:

 A definition of trust that generates power is a function of my relationship with myself.

•  Do I have the confidence in myself to deal with whatever comes my way?
• Can I interact successfully with various personalities?
• Can I have direct reports who clearly have superior subject knowledge to my own?
• Can I work for a manager who can see clearly my limitations and openly accept coaching?
• Can I willingly depend on colleagues who's knowledge and skill I need?
• Can I honor my intentions when interacting with people of differing agendas?
• And most importantly, can I count on myself to respond and deliver without excuses even when someone has let me down?

This self-referential perspective on trust gives me reason to think that I can be effective no matter what and no matter who is involved. I say perspective because after reading all those quotes I concluded that trust, like we often say about beauty, is in the eye of the beholder. By adopting this perspective I place the responsibility for trust in my own lap. My power comes from the fact that there never was anything I could do about the behavior of others except to ask for what I wanted and hold them to account for what they said they would do.

I was blessed to have a manager who operated in this fashion early in my career. I made mistakes and each time he dealt with the situation gracefully and responsibly. If he had delegated something to me and it did not get done well he always held himself to account for having allowed me the opportunity to either meet his expectations, or let him down. This is not to say that he did not hold me to account; he did, and from our discussions around my accountabilities I learned from my mistakes. With him there was never any concern for being "thrown under the bus." We sank or swam together and as an outcome I was able to gain the confidence of other senior managers at a very young age. His trusting that he could deal with whatever mistake I might make allowed me the freedom to bring the best I had to offer and rapidly learn what worked and what did not. Of course, like any truly great manager his trust in me cost him in the end; I was promoted and moved on. And of course, he trusted that whoever took my place would eventually be exactly what he needed, until they moved on as well.

Where have you abdicated your responsibility for trust? When will you take it back?

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Don’t try to reach my Dad at home during the day, at least not during the week before 4:00PM, he’s at work. Monday through Friday 9-4PM, that’s his schedule. Now you might say that doesn’t sound very demanding, he’d say that it is just about right. My Mom can drop him off in the morning without getting up too early, she usually doesn’t go to bed until around 1:00AM, and he can take the bus home in the afternoon and still have time for about a 30 minute nap before dinner. He is 86, she is 85, they are fully engaged with their lives and have schedules that they keep and don’t you interfere with the timing either, it throws them off!

This may seem like a funny place to start a conversation on your responsibility for your own engagement but read on and see if you continue to feel that way.

My Dad was one of those people who found out the hard way that loyalty to an employer is not always rewarded; he worked for one company for 30+ years and then was replaced without notice by the boss’s son. I guess you could say that he was as old school as you can get when it came time for putting his company’s interest before his own. He had actually had several offers over the years to move on but he always came down on the side of his employer having been good to him.

The events surrounding his dismissal are still somewhat foggy for me but the good news was that it took him about a half a day of feeling sorry for himself to realize that he was now released from his self imposed bondage and could go on to do anything he wanted to. That was almost thirty years ago now and he has not missed a day of work since. After coming to his personal epiphany, he set out to work as an independent electrician for several years, staying as busy as he wanted to be but eventually went back to an employed situation, not so much for the security as for the camaraderie. He had come to realize that as much as anything there was a great deal of social reward for him in the employment situation.

Pretty ordinary story, I agree, except for the part that I haven’t mentioned which was that other than the personal ego discomfort and maybe some embarrassment about not seeing it coming my Dad really got over the shock very quickly, my mother as well. They didn’t like what had happened but neither were they devastated, they didn’t go into the tailspin I have seen take over so many families when there is a loss of income or position.

My parents are both children of the Great Depression and that fact of life had so significantly shaped their lives that they had always lived as if those events could occur again. I don’t mean like living in fear, they took a pragmatic approach, "If something happened once it could happen again." So when what they were prepared for actually occurred they rolled through it and on into the rest of their lives and have not looked back.

Simple story, profound lesson, one worth considering; so are these questions…

• Are you living like there is a tomorrow you can count on and income that is predictable into the foreseeable future?
• Are you playing your cards close to the vest so as not to draw too much attention to yourself at work in hopes that being adequate will be sufficient?
• Are you committed beyond your financial means?
• Do you have an identity that is based on that you are what you do, who you work for, where you live, where your kids go to school?

If you answered yes to any of these questions you are severely compromised, you cannot possibly be fully engaged, and essentially a detriment to yourself and your employer; not only that you are extremely vulnerable whether you realize it or not.

These days doing good work is not necessarily enough to keep you secure, even if your company is doing well. A “tip of the hat” goes to Kris Dunn who suggested that we take a look at Henry Blodget’s piece in the Business Insider War Room from January 6^th and ponder the questions he poses there about whether we should make a practice of dismissing our merely adequate employees. Yikes!

Speaking of engaged I recommend a regular visit to Kris’s blog, The HR Capitalist, even if you are not involved with HR. Kris is an example of what a fully expressed, passionate fully engaged HR executive looks and sounds like and his posts will make you want to apply for work at his company. It is just good for you, like taking strong medicine.

So back to my Dad and Mom now. Do you still think they were a strange example of being responsible for your own engagement? If you do I should send you over to their house some evening where you will most likely find them sitting quietly together in the living room, my Dad working crossword puzzles, my Mom fussing with a sudoku. They both love being alive and have read that keeping your mind active is one of the best way to stave off the mental effects of aging. Be prepared to talk loud though, as engaged and curious as they still are they are both deaf as a door jam and not willing to do anything about it!

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"Creating a great place to work is one of the best things a company can do for its bottom line. It’s no accident that the organizations consistently identified as winners also happen to be some of the best places on earth to work.  This occurs not as an afterthought, but as a vital, premeditated element of business strategy."

        Bill Catlette and Richard Hadden, The Contented Cows Partners

I have been associated with Bill Catlette and Richard Hadden since early 2000, just about the time they self-published their first book 'Contented Cows Give Better Milk.' Since that time Bill and Richard have remained among the vanguard of voices providing fact based reasoning for why it is a sound business practice to take good care to see that employees have an environment to work in that fosters productivity.; appreciation, training, tools and technology etc. For them and for me it isn't simply a matter of values,it isn't just "nice to be nice to the nice", this is dog doo practical stuff and the facts back it up.

As practical but perhaps not as easy to swallow is the notion that leaders/managers must be willing to consider themselves among the environmental factors that affect overall levels of engagement. Much is made of the idea that customers will vote with their feet, highly mobile employees, usually the most highly prized, will do the same thing but maybe faster when faced with disengaged managers.

When it comes to answering the question of whether I am pro-management or pro-employee my answer is always "Yes!" If I am anti anything, I am anti-stupid where by stupid I mean to distinguish thoughtless action, driven by force of habit and justified in some fashion by past success or privilege of position. So no, in case you are wondering, I do not mean to imply or assert that employee engagement is the sole responsibility of leadership or management, as you prefer. Engagement, what it takes to be sufficiently involved to be highly productive is everyone's responsibility. However, it falls to leaders to recognize, i.e., not be stupid about the fundamental condition in the workplace. There is at worst an imbalance of power in the workplace and at best a perceived imbalance of power. While I would be quick to say to an employee that their engagement is first and foremost their responsibility I would also hurriedly add that perception is fundamentally, in the absence of trans-formative thinking, reality, and leaders who ignore this truth are, for lack of a better phrase, acting stupidly. Oh yes, and as a manager, since your value is added through the actions of those reporting to you...

Is there evidence for this assertion, for I am certainly making one here? Of course there is, you do not ask a question like this unless you already know the answer! Gary Hamel, in a recent posting to his blog in the Wall Street Journal blog “Management’s Dirty Little Secret” cites the recently published Global Workforce Survey from Towers Perrin showing that of the 90,000 people surveyed 21% reported that they are truly engaged with their work! If I am not mistaken this number is lower than that initially reported in the early Gallup surveys similar in nature some years back.

Hamel chides managers in a more polite way than I do. He suggests that managers are heedless of the issue of engagement where I say stupid about. OK, potato/pototo, tomato/tomoto, he has better  street cred than I do, let’s go with heedless for now. Net, net, after Hamel dismisses the possibility that the heedlessness might result from 1) Ignorance-not realizing that employees are emotionally disconnected. (He uses the Dilbert strip as essentially exhibit “A” for the Prosecution in this instance.) He then goes on to check off 2) Impotence- meaning mindless, uninspiring work as a possible source of the disengagement (surprisingly 86% of those participating in the Towers Perrin survey indicated that they loved or liked their work) and finally he arrives at 3) Indifference – managers see engagement as a nice-to-have but not financially important. In his words,

“…if we’re going to improve engagement, we have to start by admitting that the real problem isn’t irksome, monotonous work, but stony-hearted, spirit-deflating managers.”

While he does not say this, I will; by stony hearted, spirit-deflating managers he means at all levels and most importantly, the top where the privileges provide the greatest disconnect between head and heart.

Hamel, like Drucker in his later years, has clearly made a connection that makes him dangerous to the management establishment. He is “the man” when it comes to the “X’s and O’s” of business so he cannot be waved off. In addition, he has come to understand that while the applications in business may be economic, the operating system is social.

As we roll along here, in future postings we will tackle just what an individual manager can do about this sad state we all find ourselves in, among other things.

Thank you for your attention.

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It must be very complex, leadership that is. It must be or why would Amazon currently carry nearly 382,000 titles containing the word leadership? A quick Google query on the word "leadership" gives a response of over 143,000,000 entries. I smell a rat and I have been smelling a rat for several years now. Maybe there is something else afoot here and it is time to tell the truth about it.

In practice I have had occasion to have more than one senior leader say he or she was interested in seeing  more leadership from the people in their organization. A typical response from me might be to suggest my sincere doubt in this expressed interest! A provocative remark like this better have a good follow up and there is one available, if you can get that first line out of your mouth. Played properly this exchange can have the desired effect of creating a "teachable moment" or at least one where you have an opportunity at offering something I think is infinitely wise. When challenged in these cases, as I always have been my response is similar to that offered by Doug Sundheim, Executive Coach from New York City. I'll paraphrase Doug here; "I bet you have been taking responsibility for all of the critical decisions - and thus the critical thinking behind them. Your people feel alienated, with no sense of ownership, and you wonder why you can't get them more engaged.There is a direct correlation between employee's stepping up and whether there is any room to step up." This exchange often has led to a visible shrug of recognition and a sheepish question from the potential client, "It sounds like you are saying I am the problem?" So here the "teachable moment" presents itself. My response to the potential client will be to say "First, you are not the problem but you are certainly part of the problem and if you are willing to at least be part of the solution we can make some progress. And is there a connection between what you have been doing and the level of engagement you see, oh yeah!"

It is occasions like these that are also moments of truth for those of us who fancy ourselves organizational catalysts, the conversations that now follow are not only going to determine whether this potential client becomes a client, they are also going to determine whether you are going to go back out on that wire without a net yet one more time, make that promise that things can be different. From here the exchange might go something like this, " To begin with when you have been saying you wanted more leadership I suspect that what you meant was more do as I want you to-ship." This is always hard because invariably this assertion produces a flash of recognition coupled with awkward silence and the tension of embarrassment. But it passes fairly quickly!

I then ask the by now fully engaged executive or manager another question, "What are you willing to give up?" This question almost always requires further explanation so I just go right on. "There is a difference between 1) a 'desire to be in charge' and  2) a willingness to lead. The first is a matter of personal interest or motivation and not necessarily even a qualification for the second, where I imagine almost anyone asked about the topic would say that leadership and accountability are inseparable and many who wish to be in charge just want that, not that accountability stuff!  You very likely have no shortage of people in your organization who like the idea of being in charge, because of a number of incentives that go with that territory but they do not necessarily aspire to accountability because it doesn't work that way.Accountability isn't yours to give or expect anyway. It is, however, something you can request or offer and as in any deal there needs to be an exchange of value, something that provides for mutual, not necessarily equal, benefit . If what you truly want is leadership then you need to be prepared to give up something and generally the give up you are least likely to want to give is the final say."

This statement usually brings up the first " I am not really comfortable with that!"  My rejoinder to that might echo the words of Sue Tupling, "Feeling uncomfortable? So you should!" in the piece she authored recently describing the emotional hurdles many senior leaders face when they first begin to confront the need to let go in order to get what they want. Personally, I have seen leaders knowingly choose control over business results or staff development on more than one occasion, especially when they knew they could make their numbers without letting go.

When we reach this point the conversation turns solemn, like something ominous is about to happen. Thankfully, at least on some occasions something really productive emerges from the somber mood and the executive or manager sees that not letting go is going to constrain them to results similar to those they have already achieved and if they are up to anything more the give up is the price of admission into a new realm of possibility. But the positive thing does not always occur and on those occasions my mood may become a bit sarcastic , "If you can make your numbers without letting go what are you complaining about? Unless of course your intuition is telling you there is something more to be had than just making the numbers. Or maybe you simply want someone to blame if things don't work out?" Shortly after this I usually leave their office.

By the way, it was probably initiative they wanted anyway, much less expensive than leadership but to the control oriented, knowing what they would want, that distinction does not readily appear.

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This past weekend my wife and I had an opportunity to visit with our granddaughters, my son and his wife. Besides seeing my granddaughters, I also had another agenda this trip, doing a little recon on my son’s employment situation. In January, this son, the oldest of my three, was laid off from his position as a project architect at a very large firm in the town where he lives. My own response when I first heard this news was, “Yikes!”

Honestly, I had previously wondered for some time about behaviors my son described relative to his employment situation; among other things, he always left his office at 5:00PM regardless of the workload and he did not take work home on either weeknights or weekends. Being somewhat old-school  myself I was concerned that if push came to shove as it sometimes does he would end up on whatever short list was created for staff reduction if there was an economic crunch that affected his firm. Of course then there was an economic crunch and he was out the proverbial door.

So, Friday afternoon as we sat in his living room, just over eleven months after his last day of work. I was curious about his experience of the process he has been engaged with. Economically he and his wife had made the adjustments necessary quite successfully but I was more concerned about his emotional and psychological state.

My initial questions to my son on Friday had the effect of uncorking a bottle of champagne! He talked virtually non-stop for the next 45 minutes about what a great time he had been having. I was thinking to myself, “Oh dear, this has finally gotten to him.” A few months earlier, back in July to be exact, he had expressed similar enthusiasm but I thought that would have worn off by now as reality set in and anxiety displaced his early bravado. Actually, he is now more excited than ever and while he did admit that there is a certain amount of anxiety he contends with each day it seems to him to be a natural part of the process that he has accepted and appreciates.

Each morning he gets breakfast for both girls while his wife sets off to work. He takes his now five-year-old first daughter to kindergarten each morning and then spends the rest of the time until noon with his one year old who gets dropped off at day care for the afternoon, when he begins “his work.” Right around 5:30PM, everyone comes home and he gets dinner in one form or other.  Since this process began he has applied for and been granted a general contractors license , taken and passed four of the seven exams to be certified as a licensed architect, visited nearly a hundred potential properties for sale, interviewed and made tentative plans with several specialty contractors,  purchased and learned how to use a bidding and planning software package and is nearly complete with a set of prototype plans for a residential multi-family building that he can use to develop bank financing, something he works on at times until 3:00AM, on his own time.

As time has passed since his layoff he has become clearer and clearer that he had wanted to leave his employed situation for quite some time but the pragmatic “I am a father now with responsibilities!”, part of him held him in tow like a “tractor beam” to an employment situation that increasingly offered him little other than financial reward. To be certain he felt as though the experience he had gained in his first few years with this employer had been a valuable apprenticeship. However, for at least the past three years he was increasingly distracted and I noticed him often finding fault with his employer’s decisions and practices. This was something I found strange since the employer had always seemed willing to accommodate his limited work schedule and habit of extending lunch hours so he could visit his daughter in day care. What is the phrase, “Be careful not to bite the hand that feeds you?”

Aaaanyway, this post has gone on a bit too long. Somewhere near the center of this large question we are addressing together is a lesson to be both learned and shared. If we are serious about optimizing the experience of the time of our life, it is insufficient to find something to be involved with where all that is required is our competence. This is not how our self would want to invest if we truly gave it voice. Competence does not necessarily equal engagement. Unfortunately, I fear that this is among the most common of stories we might hear about how many of our children, or perhaps even ourselves, have chosen to spend the productive years we have been given. The net effect is unfortunate to a degree that is almost unimaginable. While it satisfies the basics that Maslow so brilliantly described in his work it inevitably leads us to adopt a certain bitter perspective towards life in general and resentfulness towards others who have made the choice to satisfy their soul as well as their pocketbook. In the end, it also robs our employers of the opportunity to have the most engaged workforce possible, but that is another discussion for another day.

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Employees, and their managers will be unable to engage with their work at the levels needed today for sustained periods until the issue of emotional intelligence is addressed as a key strategic issue in the "C" level suites around the country.

In virtually every management development program I have created or delivered in the past 20 years the point has been made that the greatest challenge facing managers today is their own limited interest in developing their own understanding of this psychological breakthrough , (probably now more appropriately defined in a workplace context as social intelligence ) or these needs among the people who report to them. The fact of emotional intelligence born out now by years of research and anecdotal references continues to bedevil  managers today and the problems created as well as their consequences continue to grow. (In many instances we simply have the wrong people managing but that is a topic for another day)

It usually goes without saying but bears repeating here that business in general and certainly the experience of being at work must be considered a contact sport.  As our economy has evolved over the last 25 years, the amount of contact has by design, certainly not intent,  increased dramatically and my experience strongly suggests that the majority of people in our American workforce are not adequately prepared to participate in a game that requires significant personal initiative and interpersonal skill. For that matter it is probably safe to say that just as many employers are not ready to participate with a workforce possessed of an high social intelligence quotient if this had occurred as part of the evolutionary process.

Evolution may be a catch-all phrase when talking about how the economy has "morphed" over the years but one feature is worth considering; the process generally happens outside of our standard measurements of time and so changes often go unnoticed for extended periods. Management in the American workplace is now standing in front of the outcome of just such an evolutionary outcome, what Peter Senge undoubtedly meant us all to notice when he popularized the term "unintended consequences" in his landmark work, The Fifth Discipline.  Educationally and emotionally, many, many people in the workplace today are not prepared to deal successfully with the level of interpersonal complexity they face daily.

A quick look back may serve a purpose here. The industrial economy offered the majority of people in the workforce

• narrowly defined sets of tasks
• high degrees of supervision and
• limited individual discretionary action

Never mind whether this was good or bad; it was what it was and created the foundation for the standard of living we enjoy today. As the economy has proceeded along its path and  we have been brought to where we are today certain aspects of that industrial economy were carried over, including some unfortunate ways of thinking about management, meanwhile what we need from employees has changed dramatically. Many managers say they want more initiative, creativity and passion from those reporting to them but are not able to recognize that these additives to the compliance that was the hallmark of a prior time in the workplace are not simple snap-on modules. This outcome begs for transformational education and skill building is also required.

Before patting yourself on the back because you don't fall into the category of the emotionally underdeveloped or see what I am talking about in your immediate reports, ask yourself and honestly answer these questions:

• Am I able to participate successfully in every conversational exchange without hesitation or caution?
• Am I able to have the conversations I really need to have with my reports so I am optimizing their development as well as their productivity?
• Do I ever see instances where my reports "hold back" with me even though I have repeatedly encouraged them to talk to me about everything?

If you answered yes to any of these questions, you were being authentic and the question that remains is, "What is the price you are paying in terms of

1. Your own full engagement at work
2. Your own productivity
3. The level of engagement and productivity of those you are charged with developing

This is not so much an issue of answering a question as it is one of making a commitment. As managers, as executives, are we prepared to work as hard as needed and invest accordingly to bring the social intelligence of our workforces to the levels required by the level of contact and complexity our organizations require to perform as expected? I can tell you from experience that our educational system has yet to even recognize the enormity of the problem.

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Welcome, both to you and to me. Today marks the beginning of a new phase of my life. This is the first entry into this dialogue that I plan to host, and I am more than excited. I am by trade and experience what would traditionally be called a consultant. Personally, I have never felt that name suited, I see myself as more of a catalyst. But that gets funny looks when you put it on a business card.

Engagement is my game. More accurately, "THE HEART of ENGAGEMENT", which for me is less about knowing something for certain and more about establishing a dialogue. The point is to be continually searching for, and then asking the questions that concern what it takes to create and sustain a working environment that fosters engagement. I believe the the power to get things done organizationally, and to produce results, is a function of engagement and engagement alone. A claim like this deserves some further dialogue and maybe even some evidence along the way. My intention with these posts is to provide just that; and I sincerely hope that you will add to the conversation as we go along.

First perhaps a little definition. These days the word engagement gets tossed around so much you'd think we were talking about empowerment!  In a short time, the word has almost become meaningless or so broadly defined, as to have no power when used. I prefer a definition I found in my Webster's several years back; association by choice.  So whatever factors you choose to use to define engagement, you are welcome to. My frame of reference will always be seeking the factors that contribute to working environments and working relationships that are characterized as associations by choice.  There are many questions such as:

• What has an employee make the initial choice to join a particular workplace?
• How does a company's leadership demonstrate continuously that it has chosen an employee?
• How does an employee know that their employer has really chosen them for the long haul?
• How does a company behave that has an authentic belief that its' employees are really its' capabilities?

You are certainly welcome to use your own criteria for defining engagement, and to share that with me as well. I'd welcome that opportunity, but be mindful this is not a debate. So, don't send me a "better definition" as I plan to continue using mine. 

My attention is on distinguishing and managing the factors, aspects, dimensions, whatever, that end up with people being and working somewhere as a matter of choice - and staying in that place for only so long as that is true.

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