Marcus Buckingham and Curt Coffman of the Gallup Organization conducted a multi-year study asking what makes a great company to work for. The result (published in the book First, Break All the Rules: What the World’s Greatest Managers Do Differently) is summarized by asking 12 questions. More than 80,000 interviews were conducted to get the answers.
How good are you and your company?
1. Do I know what is expected of me at work?
2. Do I have the materials and equipment I need to do my work right?
3. At work, do I have the opportunity to do what is best every day?
4. In the last seven days, have I received recognition or praise for doing good work?
5. Does my supervisor, or someone at work, seem to care about my development?
6. Is there someone at work who cares about my development?
7. At work, do my opinions seem to count?
8. Does the mission/purpose of my company make me feel my job is important?
9. Are my coworkers committed to doing quality work?
10. Do I have a best friend at work?
11. In the last six months, has someone at work talked to me about my progress?
12. This last year, have I had opportunities at work to learn and grow?
We all find difficulty in finding and then keeping good employees, top performers. Money is the most often talked about subject between us and staff and yet it does not even show up on this list. We do have to pay our staff and they want to be treated fairly. But that is not the driver to keep them happy.
You may look at this list and say “sure, I do that. My staff knows what is expected of them” or ”of course their opinions count.” There is more to each of these criteria. For example, here is a snippet from the description of Question 1:
The best managers tell us they define the right outcomes first, and then let each person find his or her own route toward those outcomes. This approach resolves the manager’s dilemma. It allows for growth of the individual to occur via the individual’s discovery of his or her own “path of least resistance.” It appreciates and values differences between employee styles and flow, and allows individuals to use their strengths to their fullest potential.
I have clients that would say they meet the first goal but they are thinking in too simplistic a way. If you read the paragraph above, it is much more involved than just telling them what their job description is.
There is a lot of really good information in this book and I highly recommend it. If now is a bad time to sit and read the book, I have downloaded a detailed description of the 12 steps. I would love for you to read through them and begin the process of implementing all 12 of these. Click here to download the paper.
And click here to buy the book on Amazon. A couple of hours reading could help transform your company into an even better one.