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What employees need

Guest post by: Douglas Long

Article Overview: Research shows that there are 4 key things that followers need if they are to provide peak performance - in other words, to do the things that their leaders need them to do in obtaining desired results - safe, respected, listened to, believed in.

What employees need

The research that lead to the concept of Third Generation Leadership showed that there are 4 key things that followers need if they are to provide peak performance - in other words, to do the things that their leaders need them to do in obtaining desired results. These are:

1. The follower needs to feel absolutely safe both physically and emotionally. This means that there can be no bullying, harassment, or discrimination just as much as it means that the highest of occupational health and safety standards should apply. When a person feels threatened in any way their attention is directed to avoiding, eliminating, or minimising the effect of the threat and so they are unable to give other activities the engagement required and performance suffers. Any form of threat will reduce long term overall performance even if, in the short term, it achieves results.
2. The follower needs to feel respected by his or her leader. Where the follower does not feel respected, this lack of respect is reciprocated and the follower is not committed to giving his or her best to the task at hand - in the worst case scenarios the follower will actively work to denigrate or embarrass the leader. While most leaders are perfectly happy to give conditional respect - in other words, 'do what I want and I will respect you' - the evidence is that only unconditional respect can totally remove all feelings of threat.
3. The follower needs to feel listened to by his or her leader. This is clearly related to the concept of unconditional respect. Virtually every consultant with whom I've spoken, as well as from my own experience, knows that people "down the food chain" generally know both what are the issues in any organisation and they can generally tell you pretty sensible ways of addressing these issues. When a leader acts as though he or she has all the answers they invariably limit the ability of people to perform at their best.
4. The follower needs to feel believed in by his or her leader. Its the old concept of self fulfilling prophecy. People perform in accordance with the belief shown in them - and this belief shows itself in actions and attitudes rather than in words.

Third Generation Leadership isn't rocket science. Third Generation Leadership is learning how to engage followers with each other as well as with the things that need to be done.

Although most managers and leaders claim to do these things, the evidence shows differently. General observation and research makes it clear that threats are commonplace in the working situation, respect is very conditional, listening is limited, and belief is sometimes non-existent.

The reason is simple - we live in societies in which achieving economic goals is generally paramount. Our societies are competitive - and we are all aware that "winning isn't everything, but coming second is nothing at all". Consequently we want to maintain tight control over what our people do. We have targets to meet and these must be met. Excuses are not acceptable: failure is not an option.

The result is that we make it clear that sanctions right up to the level of dismissal are options for failure. This leads to us showing respect (and reward) only to those who comply with our wishes and demands. We couple this with making it clear that it is our (the leader) role to make decisions and to control information flow so questions should be related to getting things done - never question whether we are doing the right thing or, indeed, whether what we are doing is really necessary or appropriate. All of these give employees the feeling that they are not believed in - and many of the problems we face arise directly from this combination. As managers and leaders we have implemented a self fulfilling prophecy.

This is especially the case in times when the economy is tough - such as exists in most of the world since the Global Financial Crisis. We want results NOW. we need results NOW. And all of our training and most of our experience says that the way to get these results is to be tough. This is no time or place for wimps.

Recently a major company tried a new approach - the approach nominated by the Third Generation Leadership concept. They trialled an application with 3 teams, each of 6 people, for 10 weeks while they assessed the impact. They were totally in control of the assessment. By their own assessment, at the end of the 10 weeks:

1. Team 1 generated $1,645,000 in extra revenue.

2. Team 2 generated $1,833,000 in extra revenue.

3. Team 3 generated $3,931,000 in extra revenue.

In all, the combined force of three teams over the 10 week trial period generated the following results:

The total new revenue was: $ 7,409,000

New revenue annualised was: $ 29,636,000

At the end of 10 weeks of operation, the trial program increased the value of new revenue by a figure of 98.79%. This figure also indicated exponential growth.

So what did they do?

Management made it very clear that there were no penalties for failure - they ensured everyone had emotional safety. Management coupled this by showing total respect for everyone through listening to their concerns and working through these with everyone. And finally management made it very clear that they believed in their people. The results were far and away beyond anything that had been predicted or expected. Everyone was totally engaged and each person gave peak performance.

The evidence is clear – Third Generation Leadership works!

There is material about Third Generation Leadership on YouTube. Look up "GreatLeadership3G"

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Article Tags: Belief, Listening, Peak Performance, Respect, Self Fulfilling Prophecy, Third Generation Leadership



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