Enthusiastic Employee : How Companies Profit by Giving Workers What They Want

by Sirota, David; Mischkind, Louis A.; Meltzer, Michael Irwin

• ISBN13: 9780131423305
• ISBN10: 0131423304
• Edition: 1st
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2005-01-01
• Publisher: Prentice Hall

Summary

Enthusiastic employees outproduce and outperform. They step up to do the impossible. They rally each other in tough times. Most people are enthusiastic when they're hired: hopeful, ready to work hard, eager to contribute. What happens to dampen their enthusiasm? Management, that's what.

Author Biography

David Sirota is holds a doctorate in social psychology from the University of Michigan Louis A. Mischkind taught courses in social and organizational psychology at New York University and holds a master's degree in experimental psychology from Columbia University and a Ph.D. in organizational psychology from New York University Michael Irwin Meltzer holds a J.D. from Brooklyn Law School

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments	xiii
About the Authors	xvii
Introduction	xxi
Part I: Worker Motivation, Morale, and Performance	1	(54)
What Workers Want---The Big Picture	3	(30)
Blame It on the Young	4	(3)
What People Actually Say About Work	7	(2)
Three Factors	9	(11)
The Evidence	20	(6)
How the Three Factors Work in Combination	26	(2)
Individual Differences	28	(5)
Employee Enthusiasm and Business Success	33	(22)
Making the Connection	33	(2)
Tell Us in Your Own Words	35	(4)
A Few Leading Organizations	39	(5)
Enthusiasm and Business Performance	44	(3)
Building the People Performance Model	47	(8)
Part II: Enthusiastic Workforces, Motivated by Fair Treatment	55	(82)
Job Security	57	(20)
Justice and Job Security	58	(10)
Best Policies and Practices	68	(9)
Compensation	77	(32)
Money as Seen by Workers	77	(1)
Money as Seen by Employers	78	(3)
The Level of Pay	81	(7)
Pay for Performance	88	(8)
Strategies for Effective Compensation	96	(13)
Respect	109	(28)
The Heart of Respect	112	(1)
Humiliating Treatment	113	(2)
Indifferent Treatment	115	(5)
The Specifics of Respectful Treatment	120	(1)
Physical Working Conditions	121	(2)
Status Distinctions	123	(4)
Job Autonomy	127	(4)
Constrained Communication	131	(3)
Day-to-Day Courtesies	134	(3)
Part III: Enthusiastic Workforces, Motivated by Achievement	137	(102)
Organization Purpose and Principles	139	(28)
Elements of Company Pride	140	(3)
Company Ethics and Business Results	143	(7)
Ethics in the Treatment of Employees	150	(4)
Getting Practical: Translating Words into Deeds	154	(13)
Job Enablement	167	(24)
Ah, Bureaucracy! The Evil That Just Won't Go Away	173	(6)
A Management Style That Works	179	(4)
Layers of Management	183	(3)
The Benefits of Self-Managed Teams	186	(5)
Job Challenge	191	(16)
Is This an Aberration, Are Workers Delusional, or Are They Lying?	193	(2)
Given a Choice, Few People Volunteer to Fail	195	(3)
Push and Pull Forces	198	(9)
Feedback, Recognition, and Reward	207	(32)
Do Workers Get the Feedback They Need?	207	(2)
Guidance: Cognitive Feedback	209	(3)
A Short Course on Giving Guidance	212	(11)
Evaluation, Recognition, and Reward	223	(8)
Promoting From Within	231	(2)
Dealing with Unsatisfactory Performance	233	(3)
Feedback Sets Priorities	236	(3)
Part IV: Enthusiastic Workforces, Motivated by Camaraderie	239	(24)
Teamwork	241	(22)
A Look Back	242	(1)
Are We Doing Better Now?	243	(1)
Socializing While Working	244	(1)
The Negative Effect of Uncooperative Co-Workers	245	(1)
Contentious Workgroups Are a Drag	246	(4)
Building Partnership	250	(4)
A Short Course on Effective Partnership Workshops	254	(9)
Part V: Bringing It All Together: The Total Organization Culture---and How to Change It	263	(40)
The Partnership Organization	265	(16)
Partnership and Its Alternatives	266	(13)
Application to Other Constituencies	279	(2)
Translating Partnership Theory into Partnership Practice	281	(22)
It Starts at the Top	283	(2)
The Action Process	285	(18)
Part VI: Appendices	303	(32)
Appendix A: Survey Administration and Population Composition	305	(4)
Appendix B: Reliability and Validity of the Data	309	(8)
Appendix C: Job Satisfaction: Demographic, Occupational, and Regional Breaks	317	(4)
Appendix D: Comparisons with Other Norms	321	(4)
Appendix E: The Readiness Questionnaire	325	(10)
Endnotes	335	(12)
Index	347

Excerpts

IntroductionThe impact shook everything for blocks. Fire, charged by thousands of gallons of jet fuel, sucked so much oxygen out of the air around the impact zone that windows in nearby buildings blew out as the towers of the Word Trade Center began to wither and then collapse. On the 32 nd floor of the World Financial Center, the offices ofBarron'sMagazine shook. Computers, office supplies, and equipment flew out the windows. Stunned workers held on for dear life. Then, they carefully made their way out of the building to safety. The editorial and business offices ofBarron'sMagazine had been almost instantaneously decimated. The damage was so great that it took more than a year to refurbish the offices.Yet, on September 11, 2001, as people fled the building,Barron'semployees had already turned their attention to the task of publishing the magazine on time. Months later, Ed Finn,Barron'sManaging Editor, recalled that the attack had not prevented his employees from publishing a full edition of the magazine three days after their offices were destroyed. In fact, the idea of not publishing never even came up; the only question any employee asked was how the team would accomplish it. None of us would want to face the challenges thatBarron's--and many, many others--faced that day, but we can all appreciate what theBarron'semployees did. We can all agree that most organizations would love to have employees who display that level of enthusiasm for their jobs, their companies, and their colleagues.This is a book about enthusiastic workers.Managers at all levels often spend an inordinate amount of time with "difficult" individual employees--employees who are angry, uncooperative, or perhaps neurotically demanding of attention. In fact, the task of dealing with such behavior problems is often perceived as a significant human-resources cost. But, the reality is even worse, because the bigger problem is the vast number of workers who are not openly troublesome, but who have become largely indifferent to the organization and its purposes. This is the greater problem because the troublemakers can be identified and dealt with; the "walking indifferent," however, are silent killers. They have learned to expect not too much and to give not too much. Yet, these workers are normal people with reasonable human wants. Somehow, their human needs are only marginally satisfied, if at all, by the companies for which they work. In return, they give to the companies a mere fraction of what they are capable of contributing. The economic cost of this underutilization to the affected businesses is enormous.How does a company tackle this problem? One approach is to more closely supervise employees, pressuring them to do more. On a more positive note, other managers treat their workers to a procession of "motivational" speakers, rah-rah events, and programs. Neither approach will do much good--in fact, the former will likely exacerbate the problem. We need to get to the root of the matter, the source of employee indifference, and we need to address it. The real challenge is to turn indifferent workers into enthusiastic workers. The solution might surprise you.First, we must understand what workers want. Then, we must give it to them!This might sound absurd to some, a sure road to insolvency. On the contrary, it is a powerful path to business success.Why do we say this? Because many years of research has established that, surprisingly, little real conflict exists between the goals of the overwhelming majority of workers and those of their employers.It is a common, but harmful, misconception that people and their organizations are in a natural state of conflict. This book starts by setting the record straight, examining th