“I Can’t Get No (da, da, da) Sa-tis-fac-tion!”
Author: Joy Kosta | Source: HCI
When Mick Jagger first sang that lyric in 1965, The Rolling Stones probably didn’t foresee it would become embedded in classic rock, let alone resonate with talent today, regardless of one’s generation. Whether you’re a boomer, Gen Y or in between, talent engagement today is near an all time low. Why is it that people are getting less satisfaction from their work?I had an insightful conversation with an HCI advisor from the financial sector– he said, “people have learned to ‘work like a water bug,’ because they’re asked to do four to five jobs, and the best they can do is skim the surface.” An article in last Sunday’s NY Times business section, “Job Satisfaction vs. a Big Paycheck,” pointed out that beyond a certain point, satisfaction does not correlate with pay increases. What’s a leader to do? Put your heads together with leaders at HCI’s Re-setting Engagement conference in Boston Oct 4-6 to come up with insightful approaches and hear 20 practitioners present on best and next engagement practices.
Leaders who inspire through ethics can make a significant impact. Sharon Allen, on Forbes’ list of the world’s most powerful women, discusses the importance of creating a values-based culture and the role of ethics in building and sustaining an organization.
Connection impacts engagement. When you’re leading virtually, it’s a challenge to both recognize local customs and influence from afar, leveraging your organization’s overall culture. Karen Sobel Lojeski, author of, “Uniting the Virtual Workforce,” says that once you get beyond 30 meters between two people’s physical locations, communication is at risk. Yet Gartner Research says that only one third of companies have a model for working virtually, and people can feel more isolated even though they have more ways than ever to communicate.
A pair of practitioners from different industry sectors meet to discover in both their companies that by asking talent to contribute to corporate objectives they can identify with, and providing talent with a way to maintain a sense of progress, helps people be successful. They also make performance-based learning a continuous vs. a discrete event. Speaking of learning application that sticks, join me in the upcoming Executive Conversation with the authors of, “The Six Disciplines of Breakthrough Learning- How to Turn Training and Development into Business Results.” Upgrade to Executive Membership and invest in your own leadership development, while we’re still offering the special of $199 (that’s spending 54 cents a day on yourself- you can’t get even one publication for that anywhere- and HCI aggregates and organizes hundreds of webcasts, articles, research reports, and recordings to further your work as a leader, where you can engage in discussion with progressive talent management leaders.)
Recall that Mark Twain said he could live for three months on a good compliment- so go ahead and make someone’s day.
To read Joy Kosta’s original article, visit the Human Capital Institute.