Do Your Employees Have Heart – Friday Distraction
(Editor’s Note: Today’s post is brought to you by our friends at Kronos, a leading provider of workforce management and human capital management cloud solutions. Want to create an inspired workforce with more heart? Check out Kronos CEO Aron Ain’s new book “Work Inspired: How to Build an Organization Where Everyone Loves to Work”. Enjoy the article!)
I’ve noticed some articles recently that talk about the idea of following your passion when it comes to your career as being passé advice. I get it. Not everyone has a passion. Not everyone wants the pressure of creating a passion.
But that doesn’t mean employees can’t have or shouldn’t have heart. While this Time Well Spent from our friends at Kronos was a play off from Valentine’s Day, it has a message that applies year-around. To me, having heart is about strength and perseverance. We want employees to enjoy their work, focus on customers, and be proud of the company. Even if they’re not following their passion, work doesn’t need to be drudgery.
This places some pressure on career development programs to back off the notion that everyone has a passion and they need to follow it. Here are a few things to consider:
Instead of saying passion, call it rewarding. I think it’s fair to say that people want rewarding work and to be productive. Regardless of their passion, employees don’t want to have their time wasted or unappreciated. Ask employees to spend some time thinking about what is rewarding about work. Maybe a follow-up question is to find out what makes them feel productive and/or unproductive.
Use one-on-one meetings to receive employee feedback. This ties into the first bullet point. Managers should ask employees to share the answers to the workplace questions during one-on-one meetings. Companies want to create work environments that allow employees to feel rewarded and be productive. This will lead to employee engagement and, ultimately, retention.
Support employee self-management training. If employees are struggling to find their most productive selves, consider giving employees the tools to discover the answers. Self-management training can provide employees with insights about themselves and the way they like to solve problems, resolve conflict, and make decisions. These answers can help employees identify their most productive selves as well as what makes them feel rewarded.
Employees want to have heart about their work. I believe they want to care about their responsibilities and the results. Organizations want the same. So, if individuals or organizations think that a little heart is missing, are they asking themselves why. And putting some activities in place to rekindle work that is rewarding and productive.
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