Great Work Cultures Book Available on Amazon Now

Bill Sanders Culture, Future of Work, News

The new book written by leading business professionals from the Great Work Cultures consortium titled From Hierarchy to High Performance, is now available for purchase on Amazon.

Great Work Cultures (GWC) is a group of business experts who are committed to helping companies of all sizes realize and unleash the power within their organizations. GWC prioritizes collaboration over control, human experience over bureaucratic rules and networks over hierarchies. Their knowledge and expertise in management, organization and more have fueled their philosophies and solutions for a more productive and healthy workforce.

From Hierarchy to High Performance shares the secrets for companies that want to restore people to their rightful place as leaders who are poised and eager to make a difference at work and in the world. The book focuses on how forward-thinking leaders are developing new, successful models of self-management, and attracting the energies and visions of a young, modern workforce who rightfully demand autonomy and flexibility.

Adam Grant, New York Times bestselling author of GIVE AND TAKE, ORIGINALS, and OPTION B (with Sheryl Sandberg) praises From Hierarchy to High Performance saying: “Managing culture might be the hardest part of a manager’s job. In this actionable book, seven leaders share their lessons of experience about creating workplaces where people are empowered to excel, find meaning, build trust, and drive change without sacrificing their well-being along the way.”

In this book, seven experts share their solutions and insight into better work environments. Chapters include:  “The Momentum of Change” by Bill Sanders; “How Companies are Creating Costs by Ignoring Workplace Health” by Dawna Jones; “From Profit to Purpose: How Purpose-Driven Leadership Drives Companies to Thrive (and Still Make Money)” by Ozlem Brooke Erol; “The Trouble with Scale: How to Keep Company Culture from Going Wrong in Times of Growth,” by Josh Levine; “Creating a Culture of Trust in the Workplace” by Sue Bingham; “The Age of the Self-Managed Organization,” by Doug Kirkpatrick and “Beyond Emotional Intelligence to Whole Body Wisdom” by Anna McGrath.

From emotional intelligence to profit, From Hierarchy to High Performance shares stories of success and examples of how to implement and embrace positive change throughout your organization, and achieve higher levels of productivity, profit and engagement among employees. This book offers a change in the way the workplace is viewed to help a business achieve new levels of success even in uncertain times.

The authors of From Hierarchy to High Performance are optimistic about transforming workplace cultures and have this to say, “Through this book, we hope to activate and instigate interest in leading the transformation to collaborative, networked organizations where human experience is valued over bureaucratic rules.”

To purchase From Hierarchy to High Performance visit: www.amazon.com/dp/B07GD26GRT  and other national book retailers.

For more information on about the Great Cultures Authors visit: www.hierarchytohighperformance.com.

Writers from Great Work Cultures Set to Publish Upcoming Book in August 2018

Annie Snowbarger Culture, Future of Work, Leadership

By News Room

Members of the Great Work Cultures (GWC) have announced August 2018 as the release date for their upcoming book, From Hierarchy to High Performance: Unleashing the Hidden Superpowers of Ordinary People to Realize Extraordinary Results.

The book expresses the GWC philosophy of creating great workplaces and is written for entrepreneurs and business leaders who want to create great work environments for their people. The GWC movement began with Joan Blades, a prominent activist for positive change, and her collaborators who are passionate about designing work cultures that make businesses great places to work. According to the authors, “By writing this book, we hope to activate and provoke interest in leading the transformation to collaborative, networked organizations that value human experience over bureaucratic rule. Join us in the movement!”

The book will feature seven chapters by various authors/experts. The first chapter is called “The Momentum of Change” and is written by Bill Sanders, who speaks about the power of embracing change.

Read the rest of the article here…

 

 

How to Boost Performance at Work: Assume the Positive, Eliminate the Negative

GWC Editor Culture, Future of Work, Resources

By Sue Bingham

These 33 policies assume the worst about employees; ditch them, and treat employees like adults instead.

For decades, traditional management practices have infected leaders. As a result, executives continue to endorse Neanderthal workplace policies and freedom-crushing micromanagement. Employees? They’re left craving empowerment, wishing they could buck the status quo and put energy toward achievement and growth.

The only antidote to a command-and-control style of workplace hierarchy is to toss out what no longer works and envision an environment built around people being inherently valued. In such an atmosphere, all workers are seen not as dispensable or stupid, but as irreplaceable team members who deserve to be treated as respected peers.

How can leaders create the liberating workplace employees crave? Identify and eliminate anything that minimizes an employee’s feeling of value to the organization.

Timberland, the company behind a leather boot that’s a cultural phenomenon, is somewhat of a “cultural” icon for other reasons. It has combined its deep commitment to community service with policies that value employees by offering up to 40 hours of paid time off to volunteer.

According to Jim Pisani, Timberland’s global president, people come first: “When certain corporate policies are necessary, we aim to trust and empower our employees and have them come to the office every day knowing they can work for a company that gives them that flexibility to live their values,” he told us. “We’re not only representing who we are as a brand through service, but the employees also have the freedom to serve in ways that are meaningful to them.”

During my years working with brands like Timberland that want to proactively invest toward a self-managed model, I’ve witnessed plenty of small and large ways companies send devaluing messages to their employees. In particular, 33 rise to the top as the biggest demotivators in action today:

Read the rest of the article here…

About the Author: Sue Bingham is the founder and principal of HPWP Group. She works closely with company leaders to analyze their organizations and facilitate the implementation of commonsense systems that have a positive impact on their organizations’ bottom line. She has a passion for helping companies embrace and transition to high-performance work environments. Sue is the bestselling author of Creating the High Performance Work Place. 

 

The “Two Weeks Notice” Rule Is Dead

GWC Editor Leadership, Management

By Doug Kirkpatrick

I recently coached a millennial through a job change, and one of our learnings was that the obligatory two weeks notice tradition is dead. I no longer believe that a such a standard exists. The time, place and manner of quitting one’s job depends entirely on the context and the circumstances.

The young man I was coaching had been working in a midwest marketing company for a little over a year. The company promised him a bonus for meeting or exceeding certain metrics, which it then failed to pay when earned (it did pay later, upon being reminded). The baby boomer leadership group was incredibly self-centered— they made it clear that they were far more concerned about their own millennial children’s success outside the company than the success of the people working for them. Power politics, ham-handed employment policies and palace intrigue fueled a top-heavy, bureaucratic and authoritarian structure. Bosses chastised subordinates in front of clients during meetings, to the embarrassment of everyone present. The concept of career development was nonexistent.

Managers attended secret meetings to decide who would get the axe, after which employees would huddle in fear wondering who it would be. Morale tanked. My coaching client spent the better part of his tenure fruitlessly asking for the “leaders” to make good use of his considerable skill set, which they consistently failed to do. His in-depth knowledge and advanced technical ability would have provided considerable value for many accounts, but management largely misused and wasted his time and talent. He was bored beyond belief.

He finally reached a point where he had literally nothing to do. He was fully caught up on all current account correspondence, had prepared a tiny spreadsheet of potential follow-up calls for someone else to handle in his absence, and set out to find another job. The job search took almost no time at all, he landed a great job at a profitable and growing startup for an immediate 25% increase in pay and great benefits (including stock options) where he could use all of his considerable skills and more.

How to break the news to his current employer?

Doug Kirkpatrick is the author of Beyond Empowerment, The Age of the Self-Managed Organization. He is an organizational change consultant, TEDx and keynote speaker, executive coach, writer, educator, and SPHR.

He played the first season of his business career in the manufacturing sector, principally with The Morning Star Company of Sacramento, California, a world leader in the food industry, as a financial controller and administrator. He now engages with the Morning Star Self-Management Institute, Great Work Cultures, The Center for Innovative Cultures and other vibrant organizations and leaders to co-create the future of management. Contact Doug at Twitter @Redshifter3.

Are we really willing to face the real reasons for turnover?

Brooke Erol Culture, Future of Work, Leadership

By Brooke Erol

 

One of the challenges I hear from CEOs, entrepreneurs, Human Capital Directors is retaining great people. “Great” people here means they are a good fit for their position and are also aligned with values and culture of the organization. They tend to have the highest performance. They care about what they do and how they do it. They outperform since they use their strengths. As Gallup studies always find out, people using and improving our strengths are six times more likely to be engaged at work.

Many leaders I meet have major concerns about attracting, retaining, and replacing good talent. This is true everywhere. I had many trips to different countries where the common theme among executives is around low engagement and high turnover rates. Some leaders have good clues to the reasons why, some do not seem to have any answers.

Even though many leaders are concerned by turnover, they are not aware of the real cost of it.  You will be surprised to see the numbers.

According to Bersin by Deloitte Research, the average turnover rate is 13%. Thus, if an organization has 30,000 employees and an average voluntary turnover rate of 13 percent, the potential cost to the organization is a staggering $427.7 million in one year.  The problem is many managers look at the average direct cost only (which is $3,976 in average) that does not include interim cost of labor, training, orientation, indirect costs, lost productivity, and other factors that cause loss that totals up to $109K per person.

Read the rest of the article here…

Brooke Erol is an advisor, a speaker, and an author who is interested in the future of work and how organizations can thrive in this new world. She works with executive teams to increase employee engagement, lower turnover rates, and hire the right people based on both culture and job-fit using a three-phase methodology that uses Emotional Intelligence practices.  She is the author of Create a Life You Love. Her purpose in life is to help as many individuals and organizations as possible to find their purpose and actualize it. You can connect with Brooke on her website or on Twitter (@boerol1).

The 6 Components of Company Culture

GWC Editor Culture

by Shelby Jones

Excerpt from chapter 1 of GREAT MONDAYS: How to design a company culture employees love.

What will it take to be a place people not only want to work, but love to work? A persistent and consistent commitment to designing culture. *Persistent* because culture is a core business capability. Don’t think of it as this year’s priority; it will certainly be usurped by the next shiny business imperative that comes along. *Consistent* because the best solutions come from constraints. Design is messy. Imagining, creating, and implementing something new is hard, particularly in business. (Just ask any executive who attempted to build an innovation team.) But by having a system in which to work, the tasks become much more understandable. And do-able.

The six-part framework in this book can enable leaders at all levels in all types of organizations to imagine, create, and implement a work-life that supports employees, customers, and business. It is a process that builds on its own momentum to become a self-reinforcing system. An upward cycle that will draw in the people who want to help an organization reach its purpose.

Read more…

Equal parts visual and verbal, Shelby dances between design and strategy at Great Mondays. She’s passionate about cereal, fashion, and family.

Trust is the ultimate tool to unleash your team’s potential

GWC Editor Culture, Leadership

Pixabay

By Sue Bingham

Trust is the keystone to managing a team. Just ask Jack who, after 17 years working job sites for a respected construction company, moved into a management role.

Once in his new position, Jack decided to replace the deadbolt on the tool room, which had been broken for years. While there were no immediate or evident concerns about the change from his team, Jack’s assistant manager asked why he felt a locked door was needed now. After all, the tool room had been consistently unlocked to no ill effect for years. The assistant manager suggested the locked door made it seem like Jack didn’t trust his team.

As Warren Buffett put it, “Trust is like the air we breathe. When it is present, nobody really notices. But when it’s absent, everybody notices.” So regardless of his team’s response, we’d be remiss in believing employees hadn’t noticed Jack’s first act as a leader involved locking all supplies away from them. This inadvertently tarnished trust — even if it was never Jack’s intention.

Distrust in the workplace isn’t always as literal as a deadbolt. Historically, training for new leaders has centered around maintaining company rules. But focusing on making a team adhere to a set of rules does anything but show trust in your employees; it shows you don’t believe their behavior will benefit the company and their colleagues.

A team led with trust performs well: Tool rooms (or their equivalent) are unlocked, and no one needs a key. Risking a small theft isn’t as dangerous as risking the alienation of an entire team by showing you don’t trust your employees.

Read the rest of the article here…

About the Author:  Sue Bingham is the founder and principal of HPWP Group. She works closely with company leaders to analyze their organizations and facilitate the implementation of commonsense systems that have a positive impact on their organizations’ bottom line. She has a passion for helping companies embrace and transition to high-performance work environments. Sue is the bestselling author of Creating the High Performance Work Place. 

The Future of Work Manifesto: Self-Management and Emotional Self-Mastery Are The Most Powerful Skills for Business Success in the Next Decade

GWC Editor Future of Work, Management

by Milton Pedraza & Doug Kirkpatrick

As the 21st century roars on, rapidly advancing technology such as the Internet, mobile devices and artificial intelligence, have generated intense global interconnectivity that drives massive interdependence within and between organizations and individuals. Focused on implementing technology, a ubiquitous commodity that is easier to grasp, leaders are missing the big picture of self-management and emotional self-mastery, and how these two powerful new skills will make or break organizations in the next decade and beyond.

Industrial Age organizations, and their corresponding scientific management style, are being dismantled at a torrid rate. Scientific management that views organizations as machines, instead of complex adaptive systems, and human resources processes that treat people like robots, instead of human beings, are making themselves irrelevant. Millennials, who have grown up digital and collaborative, are eagerly waiting for their current leadership to step up to the challenge. Traditional organizations are learning that the essence of new leadership is not a position in a hierarchy, or a static job description. Leadership now requires the humanistic expertise to design purposeful and meaningful work for human beings that inspires them to join an organization. It requires designing and building an organizational context: the connective tissue, or scaffolding, required to create a highly adaptive, open system that enables human beings to grow, and express their creativity. This mastery of new skills will generate massive value through collaborative human relationships across internal and external networks. The future of work requires the symbiotic new skills of self-management and emotional self-mastery from every worker.

Self-Management: The Why and What of Work

Organizational self-management is the philosophy of individuals freely and autonomously performing the traditional functions of management (planning, organizing, coordinating, staffing, directing, controlling) guided by principles and without mechanistic hierarchy or arbitrary, unilateral command authority over others.

Read the rest of the article here…

Are Your Slack Chats Accidentally Destroying Your Work Culture?

GWC Editor Culture, Management

https://www.rawpixel.com/image/391651/group-diverse-people-using-digital-devices

by Lydia Dishman

Most of us who use Slack (or other instant messaging platforms) to communicate with colleagues don’t spend a lot of time thinking about how we are saying what we say. It’s just quick chat, after all. But according to Anna McGrath, a partner in culture and transformation at the design firm Godfrey Dadich Partners, we should all be more conscious about this kind of seemingly casual conversation.

“Slack shows us exactly as we are,” McGrath asserts. “We are all a walking billboard for who we are and our current evolution,” she explains, for better or for worse. Taken together over time, unconscious Slack messages can serve to undermine a company culture.

McGrath noticed this several years ago when she was working with a client and talking about fear in the organization. The example this staff member gave was a Slack communication that was intended to be feedback but quickly devolved into public shaming. Although McGrath doesn’t recall the particulars of the message, she does remember that it was delivered in a public channel with 25 members, and it was the first time this person had heard this feedback.

Read the rest of the article here…

 

Lydia Dishman is a reporter writing about the intersection of tech, leadership, and innovation. She is a regular contributor to Fast Company and has written for CBS Moneywatch, Fortune, The Guardian, Popular Science, and the New York Times, among others.

Would you hire 10 people to have only 3 working?

Brooke Erol Culture, Future of Work, Leadership

 

by Brooke Erol

Probably you are saying “of course not”. It sounds ridiculous, right? Well, this is what we have done over the last decades. We never got rid of the industrial age mindset that told us how to hire and “manage” people. We never let go of the belief that work is only to pay the bills and if we are lucky to use some of our skills. We still assumed people need to be told what to do, not to be trusted, and to be controlled. We told them not to bring their whole selves but only the professional skills they have to work. Women were even told to act like a man since it was a man’s world. All those emotions we women have had no place at work. We were supposed to have fun after work: at night and during weekends. If we had bigger dreams that do not fit into that schedule, then we could wait until we retire. If we had to take care of someone we love, we better find some help, especially if it is going to take us away from the office for long hours. If we had to leave to look after someone, then we felt guilty like we were doing something wrong; like our priorities are out of place. Work needed to come first. We felt like if we come to the office earlier and leave late, people saw us as a hard worker: we sacrifice our beautiful personal life and prefer to work. If we complained about how much work we have, how hard our work is, we got more positive attention. If we played with the big guys at work, we knew we would promote faster.

 

Read the rest of the article here…

Brooke Erol is an advisor, a speaker, and an author who is interested in the future of work and how organizations can thrive in this new world. She works with executive teams to increase employee engagement, lower turnover rates, and hire the right people based on both culture and job-fit using a three-phase methodology that uses Emotional Intelligence practices.  She is the author of Create a Life You Love. Her purpose in life is to help as many individuals and organizations as possible to find their purpose and actualize it. You can connect with Brooke on her website or on Twitter (@boerol1).