On Monday, I gave a keynote address to 1000 IT and technology managers on the subject of people skills.
Not just the fine art of getting along or motivating the troops, but something any engineering mind can relate to: Enterprise and Work-life design. If a company, or even a group within a company, is designed to bring out positive mood state, a culture of cooperation and a human working environment - the end result will be excellence.
Consider the findings of John McKean in Information Masters: The Secrets Of The Customer Race (illustrated above in the chart). He studied hundreds of companies and identified a segment he calls "Information Masters." Wal-Mart is an example, where IT Supply Chain excellence delivers every day low prices and Pac-Man growth opportunities. These companies are excellent in areas of tech, information management and how it relates to supply chain and CRM performance. When he broke down how these companies invested, he found out the real difference between Good and Great when it comes to IT: People-centric business.
In his research, he found that most companies pile the cash on data and technology. Machines, programs, consultants, etc. And all of it, a whopping 92% of the budget, produces a mere 25% of the outcome. If you add up their 2% investment in people, 1% on culture development and 1% on leader (training) - this small batch of cash produced 50% of success in terms of productivity, ROI and customer value.
This explains why companies like Google, SAS Institute and Genetech all roared to the top of their piles even though they didn't have the same mountain of machines and service providers as their competitors. In each case, people were considered the heart and soul of the business - relegating data and technology to the extremities of the company. And when you step back and think about it, the whole finding makes perfect sense - unless you are steeped in the engineering mindset.
To quote Tom Peters, the difference between a good software engineer and a great software engineer isn't 20% or 50% like it is in the world of sales and marketing. Nope, the difference between a Good-Geek and a Great-Geek is more likely 10,000% or 30,000%. These highly engaged innovators produce the breakthrough products and make the competition obsolete. The trick is to get them to come to work, collaborate with others, finish what they start and guard the company's culture like a parent looks after a newborn. You don't generate that with checks, you generate that with an obsession on people. BTW: all three companies above are also on Fortune's Top Companies To Work For list year-over-year with SAS Institute ruling at the moment.
Here's how you can re-engineer your business to put people at the center and race to the top:
1 - Hire nice smart people only. NEVER hire a depressed, negative minded or anti-social person. One of them can bum everyone else out, and destroy your culture. You've got too many good candidates to choose from, you are being lazy when you hire a jerk. In fact, if they are high-performance on paper, but Larry David like in the interview (or the reception area), call your competitor and send over a referral!
2 - Measure and manage the mood state thoughtfully. If your employees come to work with a song in their heart, Heartmath and Daniel Goleman both found that the resulting chemical flow produces higher engagement, creativity and desire to please customers. And that's money. Don't let the mood state be driven by the market though, that's also lazy. Walk around, look at your people's faces, analyze the spirit of your groups. If there's not 'buzz,' you need to find out why. A few companies I know put 'mood state leadership' into the annual reviews, holding managers responsible for the emotional quality of life of their people.
3 - Invest heavily in people via training, development and wellness. Don't just teach them how to program, teach them how to present, problem solve, meet better, etc. By investing in their soft-skills, you'll take the tech edge out of your group. The end results will likely be more minds coming together around problems. And as Steve Jobs says, "Every good idea starts out as a bad one. That's why it takes so long." Wellness programs are the silver bullet too. They have a four to one return on investment due to less sick days and higher productivity. They are also very popular with your employee's family - causing them to cheer from you when a poacher or high flying competitors comes calling.
Pink Elephant knows this: Check out their new video (Are You Ready?) that illustrates the value of people in the face of fast changing IT developments (from social media to cloud services).
The people are the source of your business success. You cannot go with your business if you don't have good people at your side. Re-engineering your business to put people at the center and race to the top is not that hard. If you just follow correctly on the tips on how to select good people, I believe your on your way to success.
Posted by: Rodden Gainey | January 27, 2013 at 10:12 AM
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Posted by: Friendly Seminar | February 25, 2011 at 09:09 AM
Our manager is an engineer. We just had all of our social media projects (Facebook, Twitter) killed because "we don't have conversations with our customers." Now we're being moved into cubicles based on our salary.
And this management wonders why they rank so low on employee surveys? I can only dream of an organization that valued people.
Posted by: LA | February 23, 2011 at 10:53 AM