Not too long ago, I addressed a group from the Baker Leadership Fast Track Program, a program dedicated to empowering young-minded Pittsburgh professionals to learn more about civic engagement, community leadership, and service. The subject was “Serving Leadership,” and we were talking about values, or “doing and being what you say.” In our discussion, I made the following point: “The reason that the greatest businesses and organizations on earth are so great is precisely because they are filled with great people intent upon doing great work that day on the job!”
I’ve made the point many times. Strip the data to the bones, and the secret you find inside every out-performing organization is what Industrial Scientific founder and chairman, Kent McElhattan, calls “a people competitive advantage.” You want to shine in your sector, then pack your team with people who think like owners, serve like soldiers, do what’s right at any price, and never whine that something’s not in their job description. Great organizations are filled with people who do great things without being told.
The world is filled with such places, though newspapers and popular culture are bereft of any of their stories. As I crawl inside great businesses around the world, and observe their disciplines, I see the pattern as clearly as the nose on a face. Great organizations have many great people doing great things, above and beyond management’s demands and the dictates of their job descriptions.
Not only do I see the pattern of behavior from place to place, but I hear remarkably identical language. An example from a line-worker at ProMinent Fluid Controls: “Here at ProMinent, everyone is authorized to do the right thing without needing to check with a manager first.” Great organizations are bursting with people behaving greatly by making daily ordinary contributions that go above and beyond managerial mandate.
As I walked through these points at the Fast Track Program, I said, “Once you declare your values, you must live them, stand by them, die by them.” I then asked a question, “Why is it imperative, when you face a clash between your principles and your profit that you, as leader, MUST stick with principle?” Sonja Spangler, a fast-tracker from the group, raised her hand. “People won’t do their best for a leader who violates their own principles.”
What more is there to say? Great organizations are great because they’re filled with people who freely choose to do their very best. It’s maddeningly simple, yet stunningly hard. We leaders can’t make our people do their very best. We don’t have the muscle to pull this off, and we aren’t mind-readers. We don’t know what someone’s best is; we only know what we want them to do. Someone’s best is far, far more than what we have the ability to tell them to do. Someone’s best is what they, freely, by their own private choice, decide to do, whether it is asked for, paid for, or even conceived of by the boss.
Do and be what you say! This is a must-do of full worker engagement. Show that you don’t really mean what you say, and you’ll still get to keep your employees. They’ll “quit but stay,” swapping out the notion of making an actual difference for the notion of protecting their paycheck. After all, human beings are rational and self-interested; however much you disappoint them, they still have bills to pay.
On the other hand, show that you do mean what you say, and some incredible human beings will start showing up. They will, because a human being wants more than a paycheck; a human being wants a calling, a worthwhile day, a story to tell at night about how their work makes a difference. Do and be what you say and awaken greatness all around you!