Remember the 1947 Merle Travis song phrase “I sold my soul to the company store” ? There is a new kind of truth to that today. We may not be living in a “company town” and giving all the money we earn back to the company in rent, utilities, clothes, and groceries as the song implies; but we may still be “selling our souls” in some ways and and both we and our organizations are suffering as a result. So how can we cut the crap? Let’s break it down…
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I hear countless employers gruffly tell their employees, “Don’t get too comfortable!” And that, by the way, is intended as a motivational speech! Their intent is to energize and inspire creative thought and enhanced action. They are, however, implying that your job is not secure. So that extra energy and creative thinking is now going into job hunting, not your organization. Oh, cut the crap!
What’s up with that? Here it is…
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You’ve got the stuff, the smarts, the experience, the connections to get the job done. You are right there. They are looking right at you! But they don’t even see you. They get some inexperienced person to do a job well beyond their capacity. Or worse…they hire some outside consultant to do fit or more than twice what they pay you. Sheesh. Enough already!
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There is nothing worse (in my opinion) than being told “you don’t know what you’re talking about” when you speak your mind and your perspective from your vantage point. That statement is a cruel putdown designed to shut you up…often because you have a valid point! But you may still feel smaller, uninformed, out of your depth, and allow self-doubt to slowly seep in. Crap! You’re not alone.
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In our desire to create a consistently reliable (and comfortable) method of obtaining results, we lose sight of how the results we seek to attain have changed from those which our management system—our institution’s bureaucracy—were designed to obtain. We then box ourselves into obsolete thinking that we cannot emotionally bear to change. It’s time to cut the crap…
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Do you ever feel like you are just marking time when you’re on the job? Doing mindless tasks, work that will just be tossed aside or redone by someone else? Work that doesn’t seem to serve an understandable purpose or one you care a whole lot about? Are you frustrated by the amount of money wasted on dysfunctional work processes and spent on outside experts when you are sitting right there with potential solutions? You are not alone. So let’s cut the crap…
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The key impact of disruptive change is that an idea which is great for some, causes an unanticipated and thus highly stressful scramble for others. This is a boon for the competitive landscape, but cataclysmic when it occurs within an organization itself. Here’s how to cut the crap….
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Have you ever felt like your organization or your employer only care about money—making money, saving money, making even more money? Have you ever felt like you are expected to keep giving more and more of your time and energy, but aren’t given the opportunity to provide input on how to better utilize that time and energy? Huh! Well I think many of us have had this experience, too. When employees’ needs are addressed, they are able and more willing to give their best and fulfill the organization’s needs. Why do so many organizations struggle with this concept and its execution? (Shout it out so I can hear you…) Crap!
Let’s break it down…
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If your work culture feels empowering, chances are you work in a Learning Organization. If your work culture is disempowering, you definitely don’t. How can you cut the crap and start leading change? Focus on 3 things….
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Do you feel that the learning you engage in is not utilized, acknowledged, or valued by your organization? Do you have opportunities to use knowledge acquired and share it with others so they can also benefit from it? Are there built-in feedback loops in your processes, policies, and procedures? For those who answer yes, you may work for a #learningorganization. For those who said no, well, you don’t. A learning organization has a culture that views every activity as an opportunity to learn something new and uncover blindspots. They are also willing to #cutthecrap...
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Do you experience hope in the harvest of your efforts? Do you even know what the fruits of your particular labor are or will be? If you do know, will many people in the community (local and/or global) benefit? Do you feel gratified and inspired by your work? You can each receive this hope, but probably don’t. Here’s why…
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Many feel there is no hope for higher education institutions in light of recent closures and widening relevancy, expediency, and outcomes gaps. The debilitating cost of higher education degrees seem to be commensurate with the dysfunctional management systems used to run these institutions. Customer experiences (parents and students) are rough and ragged as they navigate the disconnect between perception and reality. The hope for higher education is in each organization’s ability to cut the crap that has created these gaps. I’ll break it down…
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Have you ever noticed that there are so many business, management, and leadership books out there and they just keep coming? How about management and leadership schools, programs, and degrees? It seems like new ones keep popping up but we aren't seeing their positive impact in organizations. Why are we "selling" what too few folks seem to be "buying"? Why are we struggling to lead change with so much help all around us? It's time to #cutthecrap.
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Does every individual in your organization know the number one thing that sets you apart from other organizations like yours? Not many organizations can make this claim but some truly can. What’s the big deal?
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Integrating culture, capacity, and competitive value is the purpose of all mergers and acquisitions (M & A). But how often or how effectively does this happen? Yeah…not very often and not as well as expected. So let’s cut through the M & A crap and see what really happens when two organizations come together.
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I don’t care what industry you’re in or the size of your organization…we’re all hip-deep in this recruiting and retention crap. How can you capture Millennials’ loyalty? Check this out.
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