5. Demand Contribution; Be Worthy of Receiving It

There’s a big difference between making an effort, even a heroic effort, and making a contribution. Yet even though they are different—and offer wildly different outcomes—the vast majority of organizations, executives, and managers regularly demand the wrong one. Instead of requiring contribution from the people they hire and pay, they opt for demanding effort, and the visible evidence of same, whether it be face time, volume of output, maximum activity, or even the healthy glow of perspiration. The problems for organizations arise because managers who focus on effort are likely to 1) characterize “high energy,” perpetual motion employees as “A” players, and 2) view those special talents who appear to breeze through projects and processes without much stress or wasted motion as uncommitted, or worse.

Managers who demand effort instead of contribution are seeing the workplace much like a nonhomemaker (me, for example) sees the automatic washing machine in the family laundry. The machine whirrs, spins, and sloshes the clothes around, and there is much agitation. So the uninitiated person (me, again) assumes that outstanding results, immaculately clean clothes, are forthcoming. And that’s a desirable and greatly productive outcome. However, there are washing machines, and there are washing machines.

When leaders approach the parts they play in accomplishing tasks through people, and their manager-employee relations, in this same way they really expose two organizational vulnerabilities, both damaging to the process of building an engaged workforce: They reveal their naiveté of how to build long-term sustainable value through people; and they wrongly communicate what the organization values are. If an organization repeatedly signals that it demands and rewards effort, it is only a matter of time before it gets what it asks for: a lot of motion without a focus on results. That’s bad enough, but worse is the probability that the employees who have a bias and a commitment to producing positive outcomes, see that productivity is not the key to personal success and migrate to “the dark side.” And why not? It is certainly easier to run in place than it is to cover any ground—uphill, downhill, and into the wind.

Once the “reward for effort” mode is established it is a short decline into an accelerating cycle of cynicism and disingenuous behavior where even the best and the brightest of your employees add to the problems. Employees say to themselves, and sometimes to others, “There is little difference in the recognition given to me when I deliver results, and to Joe or Mary when they put in extra hours or face time without results. So, I guess just showing up is 75 percent of the game. Why should I do more, accomplish more, care more, if the bosses don’t? It doesn’t make sense for me to care more than the execs. After all it’s their company!”

Game over! The toxicity has set in. Your best and brightest see no logical alignment between achievement, commitment, and engagement.

Well, I think you get the picture.

Now the question is, are you aware of the way your own reward system is working? Does it discriminate between effort and contribution? Let’s take a look through a somewhat unique example. A few years ago I worked for a short time for a fairly large Business-to-Business dot-com, where I was brought in to put the pieces in place to fashion this company into an employer of choice. Though the arc of that company’s short history can be expressed in just eight words (greed, arrogance, impatience, naiveté, spending, debt, burnout, and bankruptcy), we did have some very talented management staff. One guy who landed there before I arrived was a capable, but inexperienced, director of corporate communications. He was a smart young man, with great feel and skill for the job, and he had real passion for his work. But as the dot-com grew to employ more than 1,200 employees, it was clear to me that he was in deep water when it came to picking up on the signals that were flashing brightly in that environment.

What fascinated me about him was that—unlike just about everyone else I encountered there—he didn’t seem to be in it for the money, or the stock options, and the potentially lucrative initial public stock offering (IPO). He was involved in the work and displayed a commitment to getting results. He was effective as all get-out. He got us press coverage on a global scale, and he built solid relationships with the analyst community. But he was frustrated all the time. His angst came from the fact that the dot-com world he had entered revealed itself to be largely made up of motion, smoke, and mirrors, with little interest in outcomes and deliverables. (Remember the “dot-bomb Year 2000? We could have been the Poster Children.) You see, although he had a frantic energy about him, and he always looked to me as though he was rushing to a three-alarm fire, he did his best work out of the sight and hearing range of the high-flyers on the executive staff.

I pulled him aside one day, sat him down in a rare calm moment, and asked, “Why do you always skip around here as though your hair is on fire?” He answered that his perception was that this was a dot-com and what dot-coms really valued was fast forward motion [read effort]. He said he knew that if he didn’t look as though he were manically tumbling forth, the results he produced, and, therefore he, wouldn’t be valued—his career would suffer.

A classic case. Textbook. This guy was committed and capable of adding mountains of value to the company. But he didn’t see results as the notable factor of his presence; he was led to believe that his effort, and its appearance, was the really valuable commodity. He didn’t see that the results of his work were his mark on the company because he was led to believe otherwise.

When I asked him why he had that impression, why he had to look and act frantic to give the impression he was adding value, he said he had observed who the “players” were within the company and who got praised and/or listened to. He saw that little attention was paid to outcome, and lots of fanfare was heaped on activity and motion. Although no one had told him that effort was the valuable commodity, he could see the reality clearly, and figured it was the path to riches, both tangible and psychological. It took awhile, and some interesting run-ins between him and a few of the gasbags around the office, to convince him otherwise.

There is a moral to this parable, and it applies far beyond dot-coms. Don’t demand effort; demand contribution. And the only way to effectively demand contribution is to show employees where their contribution adds to the big picture, where an employee’s contribution adds to the organization’s overall goals.

Too simple a moral to be applicable or true? Is this common knowledge a little too common?

Come on, let’s face it, if you ask the average employees of a Fortune 1000 company how they add value or how what they do adds value to the organization today, right now, what do you think most of them would say? I know the answer. You do too, I suspect. Most of them don’t have a clue. Oh, they would be able to tell you what they do—in terms of daily tasks and routines. And they’d be able to tell you what they think they are paid to do. Some may even venture to say that they are a gear in a large machine that drives the enterprise forward. But the overwhelming majority of them have no idea what and how they contribute to the fortunes of the company that employs them. Typically, no one has ever told them, or better yet, showed them how what they do is not just an effort, but a contribution to a win-win-win paradigm: a personal win in terms of their professional development and ability to continue to earn a good living; the enhancement of the company’s bottom line, brand, and reputation; and the value delivered to the customer by the company’s products and/or services.

Now, let me give you some very clear examples of what I am talking about. One is an abstract example that you can apply today, and the other is one you’ll probably never see in your lifetime.

You may employ an office receptionist, a person to answer phones, sort mail, greet visitors, and control access, right? Okay, take a piece of paper and write down the person’s job description. Include a primary duty or two and limit yourself to two or three sentences. Piece of cake, right? Are you sure?

My bet would be that most of you wrote some variation of the following: answers phones and greets visitors in the waiting room, sorts mail and keeps the reception room looking neat and clean.

Well, that may accurately describe the regular activity and the effort the person must exert. And maybe that’s what was advertised in the job posting or newspaper. Help Wanted: Person to answer phones and greet visitors....

Do such ads and postings attract candidates who have the interest and potential to make a meaningful contribution and who are willing to be value producers? My guess is that the people who respond are more likely to be those who seek a paycheck and benefits, not those who want to help your company become a competitive force. You see, the posting is focused on the effort expected, the routine. And frankly, the job sounds boring, when described in terms of effort and duties.

But what if you were to describe the job in terms of its significance and contribution potential? Let me write the want ad for you. Help Wanted: Customer service-oriented individual to act as receptionist and to manage the first contact that visitors, vendors, business partners, guests, and callers have with our company. Must serve simultaneously as ambassador and representative of our image and our brand(s); other clerical duties as assigned.

I think you might get some better resumes. You will hear from people who want to be part of something larger, people who want to satisfy one of the most basic human needs: to belong, to count, to contribute—to add value.

Here’s another example. Recently, I was asked to do some work with the CIA. (Yes that CIA.) It was a fascinating engagement because the CIA, like any large organization that strives to be great, is concerned with attracting and retaining top-grade people. But that part of the CIA’s efforts is for another part of this book. Right now, I want to talk about the “seal.”

When you enter CIA Headquarters, the main building, you walk by, or over, the impressive CIA seal. And man, it is impressive! It lays imbedded in the floor of the main reception area; it is spotless, spit-shined, and who knows what else they do to it. Every time I have seen it, it looks the same: shining, pristine, immaculate, daunting, and impressive.

If the custodian who maintains the reception hall, saw his role as nothing more than keeping the floor clean, I doubt that I and others would be as impressed with the area. But what I learned in casual conversations with CIA employees is that it is made clear to the maintenance crews at the agency that part of the value they bring is in keeping the appearance of the facility worthy and representative of the status and mission of the agency.

Do you think that the custodian who maintains the spotless condition of that seal takes pride is his job? You bet he does. It’s obvious. Do you think that the janitor is focused on effort? Or on contribution? I am guessing that janitor is focused on contribution. He clearly knows what part, if small, his work activities play in the overall impression that the CIA wishes to convey to visitors. I am sure it was communicated to him during the hiring process. Even though the placement ad probably described this job as “custodian for a large government agency.” The value of the position was likely described as “diligent, dutiful worker needed to contribute to maintaining the image of the world’s most prominent and notable intelligence-gathering organization.”

Let me ask you this: Are you advertising for and hiring “janitors for a large company”? Or are you recruiting “diligent, dutiful workers needed to contribute to maintaining the image of one of America’s most-admired companies”? And can you guess the cost to your company, to your brand, to your customer experience, and to your bottom line by having a broom pusher in that role, instead of someone who recognizes the role they play in “shining the seal,” so to speak?

Now let’s move this concept up the chain of command, and to your organization. Migrate the discussion from the level of janitors and receptionists, as important as they are. Let’s look at employees in IT, sales support, HR, marketing, tech support, engineering, and manufacturing. Think about the staff in accounting, and the middle managers, regional managers, project managers, and even senior management. Speaking metaphorically: Do they behave as solitary workers—answering phones, pushing brooms, and exerting disconnected effort? Or do they view themselves, their work, and their results as contributors to the mission of the company? Do they behave as first responders to the needs of customers and fellow employees? Do they see where they fit and the impact of their work on the big picture?

Motivating For and Evaluating Employee Contribution

It’s a given that great organizations have carefully nurtured cultures. But that is only part of the battle to draw the best possible contribution from employees. That culture has to be wisely and regularly communicated, so the employees know and recognize without doubt what part they play in the company’s progress and ultimately in the customer experience. They must be advised regarding what a contribution means and what it looks like. And they must be told that contribution is what is expected, what counts, and what will be counted. For example, the IT staff must know and understand that when they keep the Internet up and all the databases fully accessible, the customer will be the eventual winner through a better experience, which keeps them loyal, which keeps the company profitable and growing. The marketing communications teams must see the part collateral material plays in the presentation of the company to customers and prospects, and how much even a typo in a brochure could damage the brand, “scuff the seal,” so to speak. The same is true for the sales support, because their contribution is part of something larger, the total sales effort and the ways the customer experience is set in motion by sales reps and account managers. This is true for every department, for every member of your organization. And only the executive team, the leadership, can authentically communicate the connection between each employee and the bottom line.

The message must be “You are important; what you do is important; the result of your effort is important; you can add value; we expect you to add value; and recognition, reward, and advancement will be based on your ownership and response to those challenges.”

So you see, it’s not how many autos roll off an assembly line and are shipped out on car carriers that count. It’s the employees’ connection to the impact their work has on customers and prospects that brings the recognition of contribution full circle. Ultimately it’s the organization’s obligation to communicate that impact to everyone who contributes.

Now it may seem to you and me that the effort of installing power steering units on new minivans would be a boring task. But is it a stretch for us to imagine the value to the company to have assembly line workers recognizing the importance of their role in the driving experience of the vehicles’ future owners, the possibility that they are a part of driver comfort, owner satisfaction, and even future sales? Doesn’t it help employees’ commitment to producing great results to also know that an owner’s experience and satisfaction may mean stable employment and a better financial future for them and their peers? That’s the kind of employee communication and message that elevates efforts to contribution.

What are the metrics for determining contribution? They can’t be the same for everyone. Not everyone can contribute at the same level. And not everyone should be expected to contribute at the same level. An organization that values only superstars and A players won’t have the support staff essential to keep those A players on point. And those lesser, but essential, contributions need to be recognized. The salesman who puts up seven figure numbers each year—the equivalent of a high scoring forward on a championship basketball team—couldn’t even be on the court, per se, without the passes (opportunities) vetted by sales support, and the plays (strategies) coordinated by marketing, or the coaching (team leadership) from management that put that salesman in position to score.

So, the measurement of various types of contribution is essential, and one way to evaluate it is how the individuals—superstars, to B team, to reserves—materially contribute to the organization’s goals. The actual metrics vary from sector to sector. It may be sales contracts signed, or customer satisfaction metrics, product innovations, patents filed, Web site visits, cars sold, tables waited on, units shipped, cases won, or accounts renewed. The list of possibilities is endless, but must be specific to your organization.

When determining rewards, note that—as I point out elsewhere in this book—reward is not always and foremost about money. Money is important, there’s no doubt, and paying competitively fair wages is essential to keeping good workers (it’s one expression of how much you value their contribution!), but you should not be surprised to see how much recognition of contribution through encouraging word or open praise or noted appreciation is important to your employees, and how many would freely chuck a job where they were paid well but treated with ennui.

So, how you express that sense of an employees’ value may well be as important as what’s expressed. If you treat (or seem to treat) workers like indentured servants who have no options, or treat them like interchangeable parts, or if you are disingenuous in your praise, employees quickly learn that they aren’t really important and, perhaps worse, that you’re not being truthful. They will say, “Why should I do more, when it’s clear that you don’t think I am important?” That thought is often followed by something like: “You don’t really care about me, so I won’t care about what is important to you—product, customer, or bottom line.”

Here’s one approach you might consider. It’s low cost, and very effective. Another company I have worked with is American Eagle Outfitters (AEO). I admire the way they work to instill their associates with the pride of being part of the American Eagle team. And one of the ways they do this is simply by asking them what they think. I know that seems too simple to be a solution for a complex problem, but it’s not. The executive leadership of the company travels around the country encouraging in-person feedback from their associates, even part-time associates. And they welcome comments on everything from the presentation of current product offerings to what goods should be developed for retail sales. That one act graphically demonstrates to these associates that they are important, that American Eagle cares about what you say, and about what you think, so you must be of worth, of value—important. It says that these associates are part of the team that includes everyone, from the highest levels of our leadership to the part-time sales associate.

Let me close out this chapter by talking about another company, DePuy Orthopedics, a Johnson & Johnson company. Their business is manufacturing, marketing, and selling replacement shoulders, knees, and hips. They make the actual devices. What’s unique about DePuy is that they are focused on maintaining a high level of interest in their products among their sales force, yet their sales force is largely made up of independent contractors. The leadership of DePuy came to me to ask how to develop sales leaders who can get people who were not employees to remain engaged and to understand how they contribute to the overall success of themselves, DePuy, client, and patient.

Now typically with an independent sales force, you don’t really control their effort the way you might be able to among an employed sales base. (Frankly, even if you could control them, I doubt it would result in a positive outcome, because outcomes are not about control.) What you hope is to influence them to be motivated in line with the company’s mission and values.

Here’s the simple solution: Introduce each of the members of the sales team to the company’s win-win-win philosophy via early contact with a person who has successfully used a DePuy product—a surgeon, or preferably a patient. You want them to push the rock up the hill, day in and day out? You want them to work hard, with laser focus? Why not have them interact with the people they’ve helped through their work? Or the injured people they might help with their sales efforts.

You talk about a triple win! The sales force would not only feel great and make more money, but the company would win by having such a passionate sales force on the street—boosting its brand, customer loyalty, and bottom line—and the patients (customers) will have the highest-quality goods available to them; their lives will improve as a result of DePuy.

Simply put, the sales force has to recognize and appreciate what part they play in that patient’s success/that surgeon’s success. By seeing a successful outcome and the role they have played (or can play) in allowing people to, say, walk again, that will affect even their tone of voice when making sales calls. It will affect the way they dress, and how aggressively and passionately they develop relationships with doctors and hospitals. Why? They are not road warriors selling a mechanical device; they are purveyors of healing; they are helping people; they touch people’s lives.

Note that this sales force can’t generate this passion and this sense of contribution on its own. It has to be shrewdly and authentically done by the organization’s leadership, and that leadership has to have a clear vision of the difference between effort and contribution. Then, without being disingenuous, the leadership has to be prepared to leverage this sense of contribution for the benefit of all involved.