A recent post by Dan McCarthy of Great Leadership - Is Passion a Reasonable Performance Expectation - really got me thinking about passion in the workplace.
From Dan's post...
As a leader, is it a fair and reasonable expectation to expect our employees to be passionate about their work? What if an employee's doing an adequate job, but does not give a @#%*? ... as a leader , I don't just want someone that's good enough at what they do; I want them to be good and love it. To me, it's that enthusiasm for the job that separates most "A" players from the rest of the "pack".
I agree with Dan here - passion frequently separates the "A" players from the rest of the pack. The million dollar question is how do we get our employees and team members to be passionate about their work? I do not think the answer is a workplace passion training program.
Passion is a "by-product" of many elements of work being in "alignment".
From my experiences I have found that passion for one's job typically originates in four areas:
- Work that is personally interesting - This makes pretty good intuitive sense. However, an interest or passion for a particular line of work or industry does not guarantee success in a job. I think Wally Bock sums it up best in a comment he left on Steve Roesler's blog: "The discussion so far seems to take as given that if you have a passion for something you will be good at it.
- Work that one is naturally skilled in - We all have a unique set of natural skills and abilities. This might be the ability to create beautiful things with our hands, an aptitude for quantitative analysis and problem-solving, or the ability to read and communicate with people to persuade them to see your point of view. Whatever it is that we are naturally skilled in, it makes good sense that if our job allows us to do the things we do best that we will be happier and more passionate about our work. Your HR Guy, Lance Huan seems to agree. After all, nobody wants to struggle to meet a minimum level of performance every day just to keep their job.
- Work that is personally rewarding - When the nature of one's job is in alignment with and rewards one's personal values, passion often follows. Good examples of this include a social work or nurse who truly and deeply cares about helping others. Another example... An engineer who places great value on the acquisition of new knowledge that comes from solving a complex problem. Yet another example... The sales representative who feels a great sense of reward and personal satisfaction after closing a big sale and taking home a big sales commission.
- Work that allows one to be his or herself - For many people who are "one person" at work and "another" at home... The bigger the difference, the greater the stress. There can be a number of reasons why this occurs. The single biggest reason people are different from who they are at home compared to at work is because their position does not match well with their natural behavioral style. Think of a research scientist who naturally enjoys frequent social interaction working a full day in a quiet laboratory with minimal human contact. Consider an individual who naturally prefers a steady and consistent workplace characterized by many rules and procedures working in a fast-paced, ever-changing entrepreneurial start-up where rules and procedures are often made up "on the fly".
These individuals will be constantly "bucking" their work environment and existing systems. As a result, sustainable passion is difficult to attain. On the other hand, when one's job allows a person to be "themselves" at work, passion for one's job is able to grow and thrive.
Over the years of consulting with Clients of all sizes and in a wide variety of industry from defense contracting to medicine, I have come to realize that true passion for one's job comes from the combination of all four factors listed above.
Essentially what this boils down to - and it will come as no surprise to regular readers of this talent management blog - is how well an individual fits the job. In my years of consulting I have yet to come across an employee who is both passionate for their job and performs at a high level that is not a great fit for the job. However, I have seen many cases of individuals who are high-performers but lack passion (right skills and behaviors, but lack of interest and value in the work) and cases of individuals who are passionate for their work but do not perform well (the right values and interest in the work, but wrong skills and behaviors).
The key is to bring it all into alignment - Personal Interests, Skills, Behaviors, and Values. Improve these employee engagement factors and Possibility will be enhanced in your organization.
Getting back to Dan's original question - "Is passion a reasonable performance expectation?" I think I have an answer. For employees, "no" and for managers, "yes". Please allow me to clarify...
You cannot force an individual to be anything or anyone other than what and who they already are. However, you can help an individual better understand who they are and ensure that they are placed in a position that naturally fits them. This is ultimately the responsibility of the manager. While I do feel that some of the burden does fall on the employee or job candidate to accurately represent themselves at work and during the hiring process, ultimately it is the managers in an organization that hire and place people in jobs.
There are a number of excellent tools available to managers to ensure that they place the right people in the right "seats" on the "bus". Ignorance is not an excuse.
What should you do if you want to improve employee engagement? If you are really serious about improving employee engagement, do not water your money and their time sending them to a training program. Most employee engagement training is what we call "trainertainment". This type of training which is all-too-common makes employee team members feel good for a day or two or a week, but the underlying employee engagement problems are still there.
They just go away during the "trainertainment".
Instead, spend time and resources getting to know and understand who your current and future team members really are. Learn their preferred behavioral style, their personal values that motivate their behavior, and what their natural talents are. Most importantly, make a serious effort to truly understand what is needed for success in the positions you manage and make sure hte people in these positions are a good fit for the work they perform every day.
Improve these four employee engagement factors and employee morale, employee performance, and employee turnover will all improve.
Now go Maximize Possibility!
Other blog posts you may be interested in:
- Would You Hire Fred Again?
- Employee Favoritism and Nepotism - Employee Morale Cancer
- The Employee Love Paradox
- Climb, Camp, or Quit - You Decide
- Improve Employee Performance with Coaching Score Cards
- The Costs of Employee Turnover
- How Poorly Fit Employees Can Pose as Top Performers
- Ten Ways To Dramatically Improve New Hire Employee Performance
Chris Young helps organizations Maximize Possibility through talent management, cultural transformation, and strategic intervention. Bring Chris in today!
