I don’t know whether it’s the current economic situation or just coincidental interest, but I recently started reading the classifieds. Not that my current employer has to worry, but with unemployment figures still rising, it’s interesting to see what happens with the job openings that do get out. What do companies demand from future employees?
What a company especially can’t afford these days is hiring someone that costs too much time and energy. They have to be useful as soon as possible, preferably from day one. “Hello, these are your colleagues, this is your desk, you know how to do your job, so nail it!”, that’s basically the welcome speech every employer wants to give, a quick ten minute briefing after which the employee can earn money for you straight away.
So they start writing job applications that are hyperspecified. They want to be sure they’ve got the right man for the position. They know what’s needed in the company, what’s wrong, what needs to be fixed. But do they really? Isn’t it a bit overzealous to imagine that just because you work someplace you know everything about your business? Isn’t it possible that a company can benefit from someone who doesn’t fit the profile? Maybe he has new ideas, new insights he can share. If you keep looking for the perfect match, you might miss out on a lot.
And the result? Any creative type will tell you that the result is a company where everybody thinks the same, where everybody lives on an island of his own and where creativity is seen as time wasted. That’s great if you want results very fast, if you want short-term success. But in the long-run? You’ll lose one of the most important advantages every company has, the flexibility to adapt to a new situation. It’s the reason why a lot of companies got into trouble in the first place and it looks like they’re not learning from their past mistakes.
Bernie Madoff got sentenced today to 150 years in jail for probably on of the biggest fraud schemes in financial history. After years of scamming investors, it was a financial crisis that brought it all to the surface. It’s also the same week where a lot of kids get their final report card. Where a few among them face the fact that lying to your parents doesn’t pay of in the long run.
It always starts very innocent. Just one grade, to make them both happy, so you can go to that party, no worries,… It’s so small, who’ll notice? But how small it may be, it’ll never go away and the treshold to take it one step further will keep moving away. It’s a basic snowball effect, the handful of snow you started with is a long way from the ball that’s steaming down the hill.
We don’t have to become saints. Sure, it would make life easy, but boring as hell. Give me a few sins to enjoy, just for the fun of it. Nobody is more holier than the pope, so we don’t have to try. If we only stop and think for a few seconds from the moment that little voice inside our head says something. Think about how we started, how we got to that decision and if the risks are worth it. Maybe they are, maybe they aren’t, but if you don’t even try to convince yourself of your choice, how can you convince someone else later, down the road?
Especially these days, where customers, even friends and family are more important than you can imagine, why risk so much for so little? We all know what can go wrong, the worst case scenario. If you’d know for sure that it would become true, would you still go ahead with your plans? If Madoff would know that his scheme would be exposed, would he go on with it or would he stop? We think (hope) we’re getting away with it, but we rarely do.
Freelancers, small companies, start-ups,… It’s not unusual they work over 80 hours week. Their livelihood depends on their success, they don’t have anything else to count on. If they don’t do it, no-one else will. So they work, every minute of the day, 7 days a week, just to be sure they’ll be fine.
You have to do it, you’re responsible for your own success, if it all goes wrong, there’s nobody else to blame but yourself. So you put in every possible hour. I know freelancers who haven’t been on a holiday for over 8 years! People who call in the weekend and act like it’s any other day in the week.
But it brings a lot of stress, because many can’t let it go. They plan their day at the breakfast table, eat lunch while working, finish some calls while they fetch the kids from school and do some paperwork in bed, get up in the morning, same ritual. Over and over again, wondering why they can’t relax, never feel like they’re ‘done’.
People need a real place, not just a time or a mindset, where they are really free from work. It doesn’t work when you try to relax in the same room where you worked just a few hours ago. Subconsciously you’ll always link the place to work, just like some smells take you back to a certain place in time. If you don’t create that place, you’ll never feel like you’re done. Even if you’re not doing anything, you’ll still think if there’s anything you can do.
by Tom on June 25, 2009
in Blog
Somehow we believe that we can make bad things better. We can stimulate a lazy employee to be more productive, we can create a marketingcampaign for a retailer with a bad reputation, we can even try to learn Chinese for that matter.
But is it worth it? All the time spent on a person or a project is time gone by. We only have 24 hours in a day, so we should spend it wisely. Because what’s there to gain when you spend 8 hours a week coaching/controlling/managing that lazy employee when his productivity goes up maybe 5%, or even make it 20%. Is it worth it?
Because at the same time you’ve got other employees who perform every day of the week within the best of their abilities. They know that one person is underperforming, they know you want to motivate that person, they only wonder why? Why are you motivating someone that obviously isn’t bringing much to the table while others are working like maniacs without the same feedback.
Can you imagine what would happen if you invest the same amount of time on every employee? It’s a very basic input vs. output story. Time is valuable. What do you get in return for that 8 hours of coaching every week. If you’re sales go up and other employees are happy with it, by all means, continue. Some people forget that you have to make a SWOT before AND after the problem.
Sometimes the greatest insights come from places you really don’t expect it. Not that this one will blow your mind away or will have a TED-spinoff. It’s just that sometimes people are in such a hurry to get the job done that they don’t think about what they already know. Even if you’re only 24, you have tons of experience!
The great thing about these moments is that you have to be aware that they can happen at anytime, at any place. You don’t have to go to every networking event, speak to every industry insider you know or have weekly brainstormsessions. Just keeping your eyes and ears (!) is enough. The place, a hotellounge in Amsterdam. The foods and beveragemanager said to one of his waiters something like: “When will you finally get how we work around here?”
He was frustrated, obviously since he was screaming rather loud, but he wasn’t angry at the employee. It’s a small difference but it’s there. He was frustrated that he failed to put the right guy in the right spot. Nothing more. The employee looked like he was trying, he wasn’t lazy, he listened, was friendly and frankly made one of the best mojito’s I’ve tasted. But his manager has another vision of what should be in his mind.
The best manager is one that doesn’t do anything! Or to be more specific, one that doesn’t have to do anything. It’s the perfect picture, find the right people to do the job. When that moment comes, you don’t have to do anything anymore, you’re done. In fact the perfect manager is probably one that makes himself obsolete. Maybe that explains the success of consultants or interim managers these days.
