Want your staff to support 'The Company'?

In my previous post I talked about how the company/corporate values matter and that you really should be seeking to fully engage your staff in setting those values. The reasons WHY are numerous and I attempted to layout those backing reasons. One of the items that I didn't discuss in that post - what happens when you ask the staff to 'hype' the organization in public forums.

At many times in my career - the companies that I have worked with have requested that I spend time using my personal online persona in supporting, retweeting, reenforcing the various interests (hint: and values of) of the company. They may request that I repost - like - or other wise 'bump' a specific post to enable it to have a larger reach and larger impact on the platform in question. This request has come to me in a myriad of forms over time and has involved one or more of the following platforms:

Linked In, Google Reviews, Facebook, Glassdoor, hiring/personnel sites, etc.

Here is the thing though, if I want to be seen and feel as if I am being true to myself AND in public be understood to be supportive of and aligned with a certain set of values, then I have to also believe that the corporate values and things that I would be 'bumping' for that organization also align with those values. e.g. I want to be seen and understood to be true to myself, and true to a certain set of values. If by supporting the company in bumping content and posts I am betraying those values because I feel the corporate values are either unaligned or are made empty because i was not offered the opportunity to buy into them... then I won't be doing any bumping. Being requested to 'help' the company doesn't help me if what I am supporting is contrary to who I am or the persona I am attempting to portray. In the best case scenario - I am granted the ability to essentially 'ignore' the request to support the specific company posts. In the worst case - the company makes supporting them a part of my review and part of the determination for raises and promotions. As I said in my previous post - how we win matters and if you couldn't bring me on board with the values of the company and work to get me aligned and involved with those then mandating I take an action that affects my personal / social credit is going to fail at best and be harmful at worst.

It should also be noted - that having the staff bought into the values will allow them to continue to be supportive of the organization long after they are no longer on the staff.  How the staff interacts with the Organization when they leave voluntarily matters. As a company writing and then having them sign documents when they leave that they will not directly impact the companies reputation is a cop out to the idea that you should be working to gain them as net supporters rather than net detractors while they are working for you. Not everyone will be a super supporter - but better to be over 50% of the staff supporting you then having the broom on the floor again and asking people to jump over it.

You want your staff helping the company grow? You want them singing praises to others about working there and how great a situation it is - GET THEM INVOLVED IN YOUR VALUES. Give them reason to support you, not commands to do so.

Your culture, buy-in, and the corporate kool-aide

There are plenty of things that annoy me about how companies run things, from the compute environments that we all work with, to the red tape and paperwork that is mandated by every organization that I have ever worked for. None of these items is nearly as annoying as missing the opportunity to set a culture, to create a feeling of community for all the people that work in the organization. Having a culture established and providing a framework for how everyone behaves and considers their role within the organization is vital - in my opinion more so than simply 'making money'.  I have not seen anything be nearly as essential as the shared culture a company (and their staff) has.

A tale of two situations

Situation one:

I used to work for a company long long ago in a land far far away in my youth (ok, it was my 20s... but I might as well have been five). In this company when we were on-boarded - all of us went through the same training, we were all told what the values of the company and the values of its people/staff were. All new staff were introduced to existing staff in the company that held those same described beliefs and values. Now - It didn't hit me then, but this was one of the most powerful things I have ever been involved with. This company was taking steps to align all the staff to the same culture, to the same goals, to the same ideals. In short - they were working to get everyone pointed towards the same North Star set of values. 

Aligned to the North Star....

This on-boarding, described the values everyone was asked to be beholden to. This process allowed people to know what the company was doing and why they were doing it. The Kool-aide (TM) gave permission to all the staff to BEHAVE in a way that aligned with those values, and invite them into also owning them, espousing them, and upholding them in the interactions and work they were doing. In short - this 'training' actually got everyone in the company roughly pulling in the very same direction. Making the entire company a force to be reckoned with.

In contrast to the above, I have also had the cliche experience of having zero buy in and zero involvement in the values of the company I am working for - the difference is striking.

Situation two:

In this situation - the company is new and small, not yet having all the trimmings and trappings of a larger organization. In this case, the values of the company have not yet been established let alone written down. Training/on-boarding is not really yet defined, hiring practices and interview type/style not yet clarified etc etc. As the company is growing and changing - there exists an opportunity to both define the values and get the staff bought into those values, have them "Drink the kool-aide" if you will. There exists a unique opportunity to get everyone marching towards the same North Star, going in the same direction. Getting EVERYONE pulling for the same things. 

What actually happened was values got defined with no involvement of the staff. Everyone was introduced to the values created long after the values had been launched into the public eye. A huge miss - allowing silos, and poor communication to continue rather than have the staff buy in at even the basic of levels.

We are more powerful marching together - and even MORE powerful marching in ONE direction

A common value, a common direction, a common goal that everyone shares IS powerful. Having this alignment up and down the chain of command enables staff to make independent decisions that are in line with the company North Star using the corporate values as guiding bumpers. This alignment allows all the staff to challenge choices one another are making. This alignment allows for empowerment and flexibility. Without this buy in - lots of meetings to get alignment, lots of items where management feels the need to intervene because the decisions don't have the necessary context and framework. In the end even if it were the case that corporate values were going to be decided only by Upper Management - for everyone else the illusion of having a choice matters in winning them to your side. If they can actually BUY IN - it would be even more powerful leading to great outcomes. Flexibility, and and and - your company more powerful than it was.

In the end "Its how we win that matters" - Enders Game

There are plenty of cliches out there about corporate values and how they are created. IT IS POSSIBLE however to create values and have them be meaningful and fulfilling and direction setting for the staff and the market as a whole. WHEN you can do this - there is no telling what you can accomplish. When you don't do this - you and your staff will just be blah, jumping over a broom stick that has been placed on the floor. We should all strive for something better.

I am broken, but don't require fixing

Was sitting in church listening to the sermon and contemplating all that has happened in the past few months of my life. The sermon this past Sunday was addressing those times when we are sure we are right and those times when we need to be nudged out of our comfort zone. It was the latter of these things that lead me to this post's title "I am broken, but I don't require fixing".

I AM BROKEN

Life has thrown me a series of curve balls
-----------------------

There are times in our lives when something, someone, some situation comes along that pushes or nudges us out of our comfort zone. There are times when we have our notions challenged such that we need to stop and contemplate them beyond just a cursory "Oh isn't that interesting..." This sermon was one of those times for me as I began to realize that my current life state was "Broken" but broken by the situation/choice such that it doesn't require fixing. I am broken in a way that doesn't require someone to come along and lift me up and dust me off. I am broken because what I thought was true, or the things that modeled my world have been disproved. I am broken in a way that allows me to stop and consider what about my world model was wrong. I am broken in a way that provides the opportunity to change how I go about moving forward in the world. For me I have found the following to be my 'Broken' process.

Mourning the Broken

Large life events all have a process that they will trigger and that process may be long or short. It is hard to tell in advance how long a given event may cause one to feel that they are in mourning but it is an important aspect of being broken I believe. In the cases where I have been broken in my life there is always a feeling of loss. The loss can be physical - meaning someone passing or perhaps the lost of a possession, or something emotional like a good friend moving far away or someone you once talked to all the time falling out of touch. Time has to be taken to consider the loss what impact it has had and why has it had that impact in order to attempt to move forward from it. Cry, laugh, smile, focus on the content of the event so that you can feel it fully. In order to mourn it properly you have to be able to see it fully for a moment in your life and its meaning to you. In order to mourn you have to be able to see what needs of your own that thing, that person was filling for you.

Picking up the pieces

As you consider in your mourning what is it that is left behind? What can I take from what has happened? Sometimes you may even be tempted to ask why me? Coming forward from a position of brokenness requires, I believe, that you be able to look at your own reaction to what has happened and understand why you have reacted in a given way. Are you angry? Are you sad? Are you feeling a mix of different emotions? Why are those emotions the ones that have arisen in the current broken state. Maybe you are upset with yourself for feeling, maybe you are upset with some other external factor for how it is or how another individual appears to feel. All of these things, all of these questions and their answers are part and parcel to being broken. Like looking at a bit of sea glass carefully and wondering how it came to be at your feet - each instance and question above needs similar scrutiny.

I don't need fixing

In short I don't need fixing - I need support. I need to be able to put the situations of my life into words, feelings and context that I understand. Moving forward, one step at a time, requires an ability to process without stuffing or ignoring the situation that created the brokenness. Being broken, I think, is like having a surgery scar but on your psyche ... its permanent and part of the story of your life. Scars don't require fixing - just time to heal.

Closing

While I was writing this post originally (now a long time ago in relative terms) I found the following quote:

Treat things as "habit not hill." Meaning excellence is a minute-at-a-time habit, not a hill to climb. Same is true of being less broken, it's a minute at a time habit to improve, not a hill you are standing at the bottom of looking up at the top saying "I need to climb THIS?".