How to really accentuate the positive in Employee Engagement.
by David Zinger
Part 1 of a 2 Part Interview
Jerry Pounds is a management consultant with over 30 years of experience in applying positive reinforcement, reward, and recognition strategies to business and industry. He has written and spoken on the application and problematic nature of corporate motivational and rewards programs and personally trained thousands of executives, managers, and supervisors in the use of praise and rewards. Jerry is a thoughtful and engaging blogger and writes Positive Influence a blog that offers positive strategies that encourage employee engagement.
1. Jerry, what got you so interested and involved in positive strategies to encourage employee engagement?
While I was working my way through college, I got a job as a clinical assistant at a psychiatric hospital that used behavior modification. Positive reinforcement was used to encourage behaviors that would get the patients back into the community as productive people.
In 1971 I began consulting to business and industry—where the command and control leadership model promoted a “that’s what the hell that get paid for,” approach to managing people. That model did not work; I knew that positive reinforcement would work to elicit high levels of engagement and performance. Having worked at hourly jobs for several years, I knew what it was like to work for punitive, authoritarian supervisors.
2. What are 3 to 5 key actions a manager can take to encourage employee engagement?
- Treat all of your direct reports with respect. I think real engagement is emotional commitment to the company which is direct product of your relationship to your supervisor. The supervisor’s verbal and non-verbal behavior has to send the message that they respect the employee, even when they are presenting corrective feedback. You have to be in charge of your emotions and be aware of your own behavior—the effect it has on others. Envision a moral leader—someone you respect and honor—and talk to everyone as if you were talking to him or her. I use Albert Schweitzer.
- Talk to your employees—I mean talk, not lecture or posture. Show an active interest in their daily job life. I don’t mean socialize, although that’s fine at some level. I mean talk to them about the job, safety, their work, systems, processes, resources—give them feedback about what they have done that is contributory; let them know what they need to do differently
- Learn how to listen—one of the hardest things for anyone in a position of authority to do. Talking at people becomes a habit. Listening is one of the best ways to positively reinforce people. Look them in the eye, nod your head as they speak, and punch good comments with—“Right; uh huh; that’s great; how did that work…?” Attention is a positive reinforcer that we don’t use tactically.
3. What is the strength of a behavioral model to focus on engagement?
The behavioral model has been misinterpreted as a prescription for praise. I don’t like that word when used in the work setting—and neither do managers or employees. Providing employees with objective positive and corrective feedback is good for them and for business.
The behavioral model points out the value of managing behavior in addition to results. Results are easy to throw plaques and tangible rewards at; managing (strengthening critical safe or productive behavior) requires a manager to be where the work is being done—where employees are behaving. It requires the manager to provide some form of positive verbal or non-verbal consequence for employee behavior that is linked to safety, quality, or customer service.
If you talk to your employees frequently (several times a week) and weave performance coaching feedback into the dialog, it has the proper effect. Noting the things an employee did right is positive reinforcement—most of the time. Walking out into the workplace every week or so and saying something appreciatory about something they did comes across as insincere and manipulative.
Positive reinforcement, recognition, and rewards can be perceived as gimmicks if they are not delivered properly. Nobody wants to work for someone who is using tactics with them—trying scripted approaches to get them to work harder. Nobody wants to work for someone who cannot talk and listen respectfully, treat them with dignity and behave like a human. You have to be able to say, “I’m sorry, I made a mistake.” Or, “You were right about X, I should have listened to you.”
Read part 2 in the next post on Employee Engagement Zingers.
Jerry is absolutely right about top-down being a disaster. It actually creates the very poor performance by employees that it purports to prevent.
But Jerry doesn’t go far enough. It is not apparent that he has ever managed people and proven that what he professes is capable of creating the best results.
I managed people for over 30 years, my first 12 years using the traditional top-down command and control approach to managing people. I read a book and started listening to my people for the first time. In that position, as Commanding Officer of a destroyer escort that was a real basket case, by listening to people and respectfully responding to their complaints, suggestions and questions, most of which were valid), I turned it around to superstar status in just 18 months. In the process, I learned that as a group people were twice as capable as I had thought possible.
When I went to my next assignment, the man who took over was a top-down type who returned the ship to being a basket case in less time than it had taken me to turn it around. Why had I just made a house of cards?
In the following years, I developed a strategy to address this “house of cards” problem and proved it in two subsequent turn arounds, the second being a 1300 person unionized group in New York City. In the process, I learned that as a group people are at least 4 times more capable than I had originally thought possible.
There is a “mother lode” of creativity, innovation, productivity, motivation, and commitment in any workforce and it takes a superior strategy to cause them to unleash it all. We are talking a 500% gain in productivity per person from a poorly motivated group to one with the highest levels of morale and commitment.
To learn more about what I learned, please read these Leadership Articles starting with the article “Leadership, Good or Bad”.
Best regards, Ben
Hi Ben,
I appreciate you commenting but not sure I care much for your second line.
Jerry states his perspective and offers concrete and specific actions managers can take.
I read your comments and visited your website and you are very short on specifics and the content seems geared towards copywriting and selling your material or services.
Am I missing something?
David
David,
I don’t sell my material or services. I am not sure if you read any of my articles, but according to most readers they are long on specifics, not short.
Sorry if I misjudged Jerry as not having managed large numbers of people.
Best regards, Ben