Skip to main content

holding on to the best


Where have all the people gone?  Seems as though some carbon shaping anomaly stripped our workforce of skilled individuals. When you take into account service is not young workers "first choice", single digit unemployment, and a significant number of retiring workers, we have a trifecta of challenges facing our labor businesses.  Not to mention many of our workers seen to be progressively ratcheting up "over scale" pay.  We are between a rock and a hard place proclaims Overwhelmed Oscar, what should we do?



Many may be comfortable with contingent motivators, those narrowly designed areas of focus for employees.  While focus is good, when used to motivate it inhibits the power of the right side of your brain.  If you are motivating service personnel, responsible for creatively solving problems, you may consider switching to intrinsic motivation.  Focusing on this practice is straightforward, it requires effort towards; autonomy, mastery and purpose.



  • Autonomy | the urge to direct our own output
  • Mastery | consistently executing expertise
  • Purpose | the yearning to do what we do in the service of something larger than ourselves



Remaining competitive with escalating labor costs will continue to challenge organizations in the future. Aligning your worker compensation with your markets is essential; however, creating opportunities for individuals and teams to succeed will make you an employer of choice.



-----

Next post:  from the field to the office

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Is custom software in 2019 spelled EGO?

I still struggle , as do many, with the rationalization between building software and buying software. Microsoft Excel , likely one of the most widely recognized packaged software applications, was released over 30 years ago . My guess is not many people would consider building a custom piece of software which performs math and other worksheet related tasks. While this is an obvious example, it highlights an important factor for many in deciding between custom and configurable software solutions . Fact is, everybody understands how Microsoft Excel works. Let's mix it up a bit and add the opinions that you have regarding what makes your approach to business so special.   The things that you do, in an industry, which are totally unique to your competitors.   This is where it gets a bit murky, we must tease out the transactional components from the value add aspects of software.   For instance, you use a staffing system to help find, manage, and retain internal and external

no one told you when to run

From the clients perspective, what is the perfect service call? "To interpret my field conditions and apply a solution which resolves the issue immediately and ensures trouble-free long-term operation. Delivered by a professional, courteous, empathetic, appropriately skilled, years of experience, materials required for repair, a good listener, and one that treats me as if I am their only customer; amen"! As you might expect the perfect service call is really a blend of attitudes, attributes, and capabilities. The trick is, while we all may agree that these aspects make the perfect service call, endeavoring to achieve these results is becoming increasingly more difficult. Our customers, with their visibility and awareness of our activities, raise the bar regarding the level of service that we need to provide. Let's unpack a few of these elements: Appropriately skilled :   haven't we all had this discussion in the past?   My workers are all

Modern tech moving us forward?

Think about some of the most recent technologies;   Solar fields, I doubt the designers considered the impact on the bird population; Facebook , do you believe that they thought about the long-term ramifications regarding how false news might be proliferated through this platform; Twitter , could anyone imagine it would be such a haven for bullies; and what about TOR, the US government "internet" built for military families use in foreign countries which has turned into the " dark web " were all sorts of things are bought and sold? I would like to believe that all of these started with the best intentions in mind. Unfortunately it is not enough to dissuade those with impure and nefarious intentions.   I continue to get excited about the future with items such as IOT and cognitive computing machines, assisting us in making better and more deliberate decisions, the other part of me gets nervous that we will inadvertently create a world of "black boxes&