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ManagerZine Archive Favorite
7. Climate: The Weather Inside The Office
Let’s suspend normalcy for a minute and engage your imagination. Say you
work for a well-known American air carrier on the ground crew, moving
airplanes around and loading and unloading cargo, luggage, food and the
like. Which airport would you like to work in, Airport A or Airport B? Airport
A is Chicago O’Hare, the world’s biggest and meanest. High volume of
traffic, bad weather, congestion. Unpredictable stresses and pressures.
Always a swarm of intense activity. Airport B is San Jose, south of San
Francisco. Weather tolerable, relatively low volume of flights, manageable
hassles. Beautiful setting. Everyone said Airport B, right?
Well, when researchers took a close look at these two stations for the
airline, they were surprised to find the turnover at Airport A was much less
than at B. Not only that, at the time, there was better attendance, on time
performance, and general all-around signs that productivity was higher at
Airport A. What was going on?
The answer is that the Station Managers made a difference in what it was
like to work there. The Station Manager at Chicago O’Hare, an incredibly
busy and stressful job, was fair, firm and friendly. He required teams to
solve their own problems; he rewarded creativity and innovation; he was
clear about high standards and held people accountable. He was decisive
and clear about how things worked. The Station Manager at San Jose was
less so, and as a result, researchers discovered employees made a habit
of ducking out of work, ignoring problems they could have solved, and
generally taking every short cut they could find.
What does this mean?
It means that organizational climate—what it feels like to work here—is
directly tied to motivation of employees. And the climate is formed for the
most part by the actions managers practice on a day-to-day basis. Sure,
internal factors like policies and procedures, systems, organizational
structure, changes at the top, the type of people historically hired, etc.,
have an impact. But, management behavior shapes climate most of all.
This research finding has been validated in dozens of organizations and
represents a fundamental axiom of organizational development: The climate
of a work unit is directly related to the management practices of the
manager of that unit.
Bottom line: The key to motivation and productivity lays not so much in the
individual employee, but rather in the manager. If managers understand
what employees need, they can foster those factors in the work unit through
their day-to-day interactions, creating a climate in which employees feel
engaged.
For more information, read W. Warner Burke, Business Climate Shifts,
(1999) or find a copy of George H. Litwin and Robert Stringer’s classic,
Motivation and Organizational Climate (1966).
More On Climate
From our far-flung readership:
“I’m having trouble getting a grip on what I can do to
improve the climate in my work unit. Are there any
general guidelines I can follow to make work more
‘engaging’ for employees?”
Every year, Fortune magazine publishes its list of the 100 Best Companies to
Work For in the January issue. We’ve analyzed these articles and discovered
that three factors persist for a company to have a running start for “Best”
category: It has to have 1) supportive and aligned organizational services
(recruiting, training, career path, recognition, incentives and rewards,) 2)
senior managers that visibly work toward reinforcing an environment of trust,
challenge, fairness, inclusion and freedom from fear and 3) managers who
take responsibility for creating an employee “success” climate.
Here’s a checklist of ideas from managers in the 100 Best Companies you can
think about that will help create a high performing “success” climate. What do
you emphasize? Where can you do more?
Obviously, there is much more to being an effective climate builder. The key
ingredient is to become employee-focused as you marshal their energy
towards your goals.
© 2006 Singularity Group
7. Climate: The Weather Inside The Office
Let’s suspend normalcy for a minute and engage your imagination. Say you
work for a well-known American air carrier on the ground crew, moving
airplanes around and loading and unloading cargo, luggage, food and the
like. Which airport would you like to work in, Airport A or Airport B? Airport
A is Chicago O’Hare, the world’s biggest and meanest. High volume of
traffic, bad weather, congestion. Unpredictable stresses and pressures.
Always a swarm of intense activity. Airport B is San Jose, south of San
Francisco. Weather tolerable, relatively low volume of flights, manageable
hassles. Beautiful setting. Everyone said Airport B, right?
Well, when researchers took a close look at these two stations for the
airline, they were surprised to find the turnover at Airport A was much less
than at B. Not only that, at the time, there was better attendance, on time
performance, and general all-around signs that productivity was higher at
Airport A. What was going on?
The answer is that the Station Managers made a difference in what it was
like to work there. The Station Manager at Chicago O’Hare, an incredibly
busy and stressful job, was fair, firm and friendly. He required teams to
solve their own problems; he rewarded creativity and innovation; he was
clear about high standards and held people accountable. He was decisive
and clear about how things worked. The Station Manager at San Jose was
less so, and as a result, researchers discovered employees made a habit
of ducking out of work, ignoring problems they could have solved, and
generally taking every short cut they could find.
What does this mean?
It means that organizational climate—what it feels like to work here—is
directly tied to motivation of employees. And the climate is formed for the
most part by the actions managers practice on a day-to-day basis. Sure,
internal factors like policies and procedures, systems, organizational
structure, changes at the top, the type of people historically hired, etc.,
have an impact. But, management behavior shapes climate most of all.
This research finding has been validated in dozens of organizations and
represents a fundamental axiom of organizational development: The climate
of a work unit is directly related to the management practices of the
manager of that unit.
Bottom line: The key to motivation and productivity lays not so much in the
individual employee, but rather in the manager. If managers understand
what employees need, they can foster those factors in the work unit through
their day-to-day interactions, creating a climate in which employees feel
engaged.
For more information, read W. Warner Burke, Business Climate Shifts,
(1999) or find a copy of George H. Litwin and Robert Stringer’s classic,
Motivation and Organizational Climate (1966).
More On Climate
From our far-flung readership:
“I’m having trouble getting a grip on what I can do to
improve the climate in my work unit. Are there any
general guidelines I can follow to make work more
‘engaging’ for employees?”
Every year, Fortune magazine publishes its list of the 100 Best Companies to
Work For in the January issue. We’ve analyzed these articles and discovered
that three factors persist for a company to have a running start for “Best”
category: It has to have 1) supportive and aligned organizational services
(recruiting, training, career path, recognition, incentives and rewards,) 2)
senior managers that visibly work toward reinforcing an environment of trust,
challenge, fairness, inclusion and freedom from fear and 3) managers who
take responsibility for creating an employee “success” climate.
Here’s a checklist of ideas from managers in the 100 Best Companies you can
think about that will help create a high performing “success” climate. What do
you emphasize? Where can you do more?
- Capitalize on creativity, knowledge, energy and experience of
employees: Build opportunities for involvement and participation.
- Habitually delegate: Develop people through assignments and
involved coaching.
- Allow access to you and to upper management: Establish a reputation
for fluid communications and availability.
- Be willing to take calculated risks, encourage risk-taking and live with
the consequences: Take no reprisals on those who offer ideas that don’
t pan out; reward those that do.
- Change your mindset: Manage a “talent pool” as coach versus a work
group as boss.
- Preen the best performers: Pay, promote, expose to upper
management, mentor, give responsibility, make them teach others.
- Support low performers: Help them improve, emphasize strengths.
- Ask yourself, how would it feel to work in a place where a manager did
those kinds of things on a consistent basis?
Obviously, there is much more to being an effective climate builder. The key
ingredient is to become employee-focused as you marshal their energy
towards your goals.
© 2006 Singularity Group
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Well-Spoken
"If you want to build a
ship, don't herd people
together to collect
wood and don't assign
them tasks and work,
but rather teach them
to long for the endless
immensity of the sea."
Antoine de
Saint-Exupery
"If you want to build a
ship, don't herd people
together to collect
wood and don't assign
them tasks and work,
but rather teach them
to long for the endless
immensity of the sea."
Antoine de
Saint-Exupery