Working it out
A few years ago, when I was working in Minimum Wage Hell (MWH), a colleague commented that working was against the natural order of things.
His argument was that we have a natural tendency to avoid doing things we don’t want to do, and usually in a work environment we’re asked to do things we don’t want to do and therefore, work was unnatural and irritating.
I’m not sure I agree with his philosophy, but then maybe I have an idealistic view of what work should be.
My frustrations in the workplace are generally about poor planning and other managerial mistakes. It’s not actually the work that bothers me. In fact, I feel immense pride when something that started out as a vague idea becomes real.
Dignity
I wonder how we can give people that sense of working pride. I think the first step is dignity. Again, my experience in MWH taught me that if you treat people like children, they will behave childishly. If you never communicate what’s going on they’ll either a) formulate crazy conspiracy theories and so have no time to do any actual work, or, b) become so disinterested their work suffers.
Encouragement
The second step would be to praise the good things. I’ve recently started working with someone who I have a sneaking suspicion is more talented at doing what I do than I am. At the moment though, they need to develop their skills and the best way for me to help is by encouraging them as often as possible.
Inclusion
Finally, I’d try and eliminate the ‘us’ and ‘them’ mentality, which bedevils so many workplaces. ‘Manager-only meetings’ fosters tribalism. Employees become un-cooperative and those higher up the organisation lose touch. Then suddenly there’s a ‘crisis in morale’, key staff leave, and the business is in trouble. There will always be a need for leadership, but as many traditional industries are discovering, today’s leadership model has to be ‘leadership by consensus’, not by diktat.
I guess the ultimate way of surviving work is to be the worker you’d want to work with. Would you want to work with someone who treated you as an equal, as an adult, as a friend, who valued your opinion and was always on hand to offer you advice and support?
Of course you would. In fact, going to work would then hardly feel like work at all.
Written by Kev Kennedy.
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