Motivating Employees: Great Managers are Experts on Human Nature
July 18, 2007 • By Liz Wheeler
Motivating Employees: Great Managers are Experts on Human Nature
What elements in the workplace motivate employees? Jim Harter of the Gallup Organization answered this by looking at the 12 key elements of great managing. However, he said, if you don’t have the first six, the last six are pointless. Here is a crash course on becoming a great manager.
The first six elements of great managing are having employees who:
- Know what’s expected;
- Have the materials and equipment to do the job;
- Have the opportunity to do what they do best every day;
- Receive recognition and praise;
- Have someone at work that cares about them as a person;
- Have someone at work who encourages their development.
Gallup Organization, although known for its polls, focuses on business consulting. They begin some of that consulting with extensive employee surveys—to date, about ten million employee interviews were used to compile these 12 elements. Information gleaned from that data include the fact 30 percent of workers are actively engaged in what they do—“They look out for you,” Harter said. More than half (55%) coast through their day and about 15 percent are actively tearing down their workplace. And surprisingly, longer tenured employees are less engaged.
Harter said for many years, one question asked was, “Are you committed to doing quality work?” And, without surprise, most employees responded yes. However, by re-wording the question slightly, new answers came. The new question? “Are your fellow employees committed to doing quality work?” So while we think we’re engaged, our co-workers don’t necessarily agree with that assessment.
Business units that were higher performing had a manager that focused on strengths, not weaknesses. In those units, 61 percent of the employees were engaged and only 1 percent actively disengaged. If a manager focused on weaknesses, only 45 percent were engaged with 22 percent actively disengaged. And if employees were ignored altogether, 2 percent were engaged with 40 percent actively disengaged. “Great managers are experts in human nature,” Harter said. “Work hard to do the right thing for your people and you’ll do well.”
Some other poignant thoughts from Harter’s presentation:
o Great managers are not super human; they understand humans are messy.
o Engaged business units are significantly different than disengaged business units.
o Building good accountability is very important.
o When people are not held accountable, group productivity declines.
o Getting people in the wrong jobs brings down morale almost as much as those with ability who don’t perform.
These elements are more fully explained in Jim Harter and Rodd Wagner’s book 12: The Elements of Great Managing published by Gallup Press. Harter presented at Training magazine’s Leadership Summit in Phoenix in June.
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