During the last several months, as I travel around, I’ve been asking people I come in contact with two questions:
Do you like your job?
Why or why not?
Creates some interesting conversations, I’ll tell you. Almost missed a flight out of Baltimore when my conversation with the Hertz counter rep went into overtime.
I jotted down fairly copious notes for these discussions. And though I realize the lack of statistical “rigor” in my survey methodologies, I think the results were interesting nonetheless.
In about four months, I spoke with 56 people about this. Most readily answered my questions. Some, of course, seemed hesitant to respond candidly to such questions from an unknown traveler (go figure). Most, however, spilled their guts without a drop of hesitation.
16 people said “yes, I like my job.”
11 said “It’s OK,” or “It’s a job,” or something equally noncommittal and nonplussed.
26 replied “no,” or something equally negative. A few expletives were included in several.
(for you math whizzes, this doesn’t total 56; 3 would not answer the question at all)
The #1 reason given for “why?” with those 31 who said, “yes?”
They let me do my job.
Not “the money,” though most in this category did mention the pay was either “good” or that they felt paid “fairly.”
Not “it’s easy,” or “I don’t have to do much work.”
Nope, not those things we frequently imagine are in the minds of employees who seem satisfied, contended, or otherwise happy to work for us.
They let me do my job.
Never forget — the vast majority of successful leadership application is not some fancy buzzword, or the chapter title from some consultant’s new glossy book.
It’s the basics. It’s blocking and tackling.
So, what’s the take-away from this incredibly scientific, statistically strict employee survey?
Hire right. Attitude, integrity, intellect and work ethic… none can be trained, all must be hired.
Set and manage expectations. Keep it simple, folks.
Empower people to do their jobs, and expect that they will.
Since Marillyn Hewson became CEO in 2013, Lockheed Martin’s market cap has more than doubled. I’ll say that again: Hewson has led a doubling of market capitalization for Lockheed Martin in less than three years.
For the mathematically challenged, that means a market cap growth of nearly $40 billion. That’s 40 billion dollars. Paraphrasing a Chairman I used to work for, “A billion here, a billion there… pretty soon you’re talking about real money!”
Lest you think hers was a simple, unchallenging, “just-don’t screw-it-up” sort of effort, realize she took over after the originally anointed heir apparent, Christopher Kubasik, was asked to resign after the board discovered he had a personal relationship with a subordinate.
Oopsie.
(Don’t lose sleep about Kubasik; $3.5M in severance and L-3 Communications saw no problem making him President & COO)
Nope, Marillyn Hewson is the real deal. She dumped commercial services (sucking wind) and bought up profitable competitor Sikorsky for a cool $9 billion.
Last year, she was named 4th in the 50 Most Powerful Women in Business and 20th in the Most Powerful Women in the World. She’s a heavy hitter in her own right, to be sure.
In an interview with CNN, Hewson said that “… while she prefers to be known more for her leadership skills, she does realize it’s important to be a role model for women.” Good approach on both counts.
Finally, and this is my favorite, since it reminds us that really effective leadership, though rare, just ain’t all that difficult… during that same CNN interview, she said that, “…as CEO, she derives a lot of energy from walking the facilities and engaging with employees and their families.” WHAAAT? How can that be?? I thought CEOs were supposed to remain staunchly enshrined in their ivory towers.Apparently, Hewson didn’t get that memo. Adding to that, knowing that 25% of Lockheed Martin’s employees are women, 22% are in leadership roles, and women make up a third of the board of directors, it’s obvious to see how Marillyn Hewson is our Leadership Leader for August.
Leadership Milquetoast
Given Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg’s highly vocal and visible progressive corporate initiatives, it saddens us to see that, apparently, those progressive initiatives do not include employee diversity.
Zuckerberg, CEO (and world’s 6th richest man), and Maxine Williams, Facebook’s Global Director of Diversity (hired in 2013) have given real diversity lip-service at best, quite reminiscent of the stereotype of energy industry’s good ol’ boy’s club.
Though Facebook has grown the Asian percentage by a couple of points since 2012, both Black/African American and Hispanic/Latino (as EEO categories) remain substantially the same (2% and 4% respectively), although Facebook’s headcount has grown almost 350% during that same time.350%!
Female employment is up a single percentage point during that same time.
In 2014, Maxine Williams wrote “So at Facebook we’re serious about building a workplace that reflects a broad range of experience, thought, geography, age, background, gender, sexual orientation, language, culture and many other characteristics.”
2014: “We have more work to do — a lot more. But the good news is that we’ve begun to make progress.”
2015: “While we have achieved positive movement over the last year, it’s clear to all of us that we still aren’t where we want to be. There’s more work to do.”
2016: “We still have a long way to go, but as we continue to strive for greater change, we are encouraged by positive hiring trends.”
“…we’ve begun to make progress.”
“…we have achieved positive movement…”
“…encouraged by positive trends.”
Blah, blah, blah, yadda, yadda… rhetoric in place of actionable results. This isn’t new, of course.
At this writing, Facebook has 1,472 open positions. If history holds true, less than 450 of those hires will be females of any race, less than 90 will be Black/Hispanic (male or female), and over 575 will be white males. The underrepresentation continues… Williams and Facebook won’t release recent hiring data, meaning it’s likely not in the social media giant’s favor.
Williams, taking a page from the handbook of many a good ol’ boy company, deflected accountability by blaming the public education system and “the talent pipeline,” a euphemism for “We just didn’t have enough to choose from; if we did, we’d hire more females and underrepresented minorities.”
“It has become clear that at the most fundamental level, appropriate representation in technology or any other industry will depend upon more people having the opportunity to gain necessary skills through the public education system.”
–Maxine Williams, facebook’s Global Director of Diversity
Not sure how this is any different than any other company on the planet complaining, whining, moaning about how their inability to hire diversity candidates just “isn’t their fault.” If Facebook can’t do it, maybe it’s simply impossible…? Yeah, no.
A copout. Don’t say “nobody can do it.” Intel can. And did.Facebook has the resources to do better, and can/should be an example of a Leader in diversity hiring and employment. Instead, since they pretty much look just like everyone else, we’ll call it a blown opportunity and award them August’s Leadership Milquetoast.
Leadership Laggard
Volkswagen Leadership, past and present. Again.
I know it seems like we’re piling on, given their two-time placements on our Laggard list (here and here). but recent state lawsuits have brought new revelations to light. For instance, now we have allegations that Volkswagen specifically knew that the company’s “clean diesel” engines could not meet pollution standards in normal driving without compromises to performance or fuel economy.
The suits publicly identified for the first time many of these employees (so much for unnamed “engineers”) and accused them of “unlawful conduct.”
The suits said at least eight employees in VW’s engineering department deleted or removed incriminating data in August 2015 after a senior attorney advised them of an impending order not to destroy documents. Whaaat?? How can that be??
VW ex-CEO Martin Winterkorn and ex-marketing dude Christian Klingler allegedly knew in early 2014 of the illegal devices and “did nothing to prevent both Audi and Volkswagen from repeatedly deceiving regulators.” Son of a gun… whouldathunkit??
Bloomberg reports that emails presented by the New York attorney general at a press conference seem to confirm earlier reports that the board members and senior management already had in-depth knowledge about the company’s emissions cheating practices.
A 2013 email from Frank Tuch, VW’s head of quality management, told Winterkorn, “A thorough explanation… cannot be given to authorities”.
In August 2014, Oliver Schmidt, ex-head of VW’s environmental and engineering office told a US spokesman: “[Audi’s] V6 has exactly the same issue, but… they have not been caught.”
Yes, I can see how “getting caught” would be a bad thing. Maybe, then, you should have considered “not doing it??”
This one is too easy… Volkswagen is again our Leadership Laggard, a threepeat in August.
Training is essential for success—always has been, always will be. But like everything else, not all training is created equally. Nor is there a one-size fits all when it comes to teaching employees. And that’s true for leadership – technical, interpersonal or whatever it may be. But there are tried and true strategies for success that can lead to more effective employees, a happier workforce and a better organization. Here are 3 key strategies for training employees that can make the process more endearing for all those involved. (more…)
The usual place for a CEO who was fired for ethical reasons is in the Leadership Laggard section. We’ve made an exception this month to give a tip of our hat to the Board of Directors at Lending Club Corporation for the firing.
Renaud Laplanche, Lending Club’s founder, is now the former Chairman and CEO after an internal probe into loan sales that violated company business rules revealed Laplanche wasn’t exactly forthcoming about what he knew and when he knew it.
Turns out full disclosure isn’t one of Laplanche’s strong suits, since he also failed to disclose his personal interest in a fund that Lending Club was considering as an investment.
The board quickly showed Laplanche and three senior managers the door for the “unacceptable” behavior, disclosed the wrongdoing, and pledged to investors to strengthen internal controls.
Scott Sunburn, Lending Club’s president and acting CEO summed it up nicely, saying, “Our business depends on trust. The problems identified this quarter run counter to our values and will never be tolerated.”
Even though the bad loan sales represented a tiny fraction of the company’s transactions, by proving himself untrustworthy, Laplanche may have completely ruined a business model that relied on the trust and confidence of his customers.
Unfortunately for Lending Club, the board’s actions may not have been enough. Since the early May disclosure, the Securities and Exchange Commission and the Justice Department have launched their own investigations, and the lawyers jumped on a class action lawsuit like a duck on a June bug. Needless to say, their stock is in the toilet right now.
Lending Club’s board took the correct four steps required after a mistake: they acted quickly, they didn’t cover it up; they owned it; and, they took the necessary steps to make it right. For doing it right, we congratulate them and wish them well as this month’s Leadership Leader.
Leadership Milquetoast
Speaking of the right thing to do when you make a mistake, VA Secretary Robert McDonald joins us again this month — this time as our Leadership Milquetoast — with an all-to-familiar leadership tap dance that we call an “apology that’s not”.
McDonald had the opportunity to correct his gaff comparing waiting for treatment at VA facilities to waiting for a ride at Disneyland… and he blew it. In ‘falling short’ of apologizing, McDonald showed he’s still completely out of touch with those he’s charged to care for.
Instead, he said, “If I was misunderstood, if I said the wrong thing, I’m glad that I have the opportunity to correct it.” Who wrote that lame equivocation, Goofy or Dopey?
We didn’t misunderstand, and he did say the wrong thing. But given the opportunity to correct it, he cavalierly let it pass by.
My guess is that Secretary McDonald hasn’t had a long wait for treatment since he left active duty service in 1980. He certainly never waited in a VA facility (P&G always had good benefits), and I guaran-damn-tee you I never looked forward to what was in store for me after the soul-sucking hours I spent in a waiting room full of vets during every visit to the VA hospital after I left the military.
Not that I was shot in the ass with my experiences in the Disney parks when my kids were little either, but to compare the two is beyond imagination.
Come on, Bob! If you want us to believe that you’re solely focused on better care for veterans, here’s a simple equation: trust = integrity + competence + compassion. So far, your misstatement about your service in special forces, doling out over $140M in bonuses for crappy 2014 performance by VA executives, and making light of our fantasy vacations in VA waiting rooms aren’t giving us warm fuzzies.Your decades of military and corporate success don’t give you leave to rest on your laurels at the VA. We don’t need your kind of Milquetoast leadership in such an important post.
Leadership Laggard
Being fired sucks. Being fired by email… now that sucks so bad it might take anger management classes to get over.
What the hell was Matt Clark, co-founder and CEO of Amazing Academy LLC, thinking when he let Amazing.com notify 24 out of the 46 workers at the company via email that their jobs had been eliminated – effective immediately?
Who does that?
To add insult to injury, Clark was “out of the office” when the email went out, and “unavailable” for the next week, so he never had to see their faces again. Okay, maybe the layoffs were necessary (though keeping the staff chef is a stretch), but short of a singing telegram, I can’t think of a more calloused and unfeeling way to let people know.
On the upside, Clark has plenty of potential for leadership development… he’s obviously starting from scratch.
If we had an a-hole of the month award, we’d give it to you, Matt. Instead you’ll have to settle for being Triangle Performance’s Leadership Laggard of the Month.
So, let’s talk about references. Recently, I heard an HR generalist ask about references. They wanted to know:
a) If they were limited to the references provided by a candidate,
b) What to do if they could not contact someone because the candidate wouldn’t give permission…, and
c) What good were references anyway since past managers and HR shops can’t give out any info??
Hang on to your seats, my answers may get rough… I’m just doing some free-wheeling here, so stay with me.
Managers/HR won’t give out information? Sure they can, and from my experience, usually do. I sometimes have great conversations, and make long-term acquaintances through these calls. I have friends today whom I met as I was speaking to them about a reference. Can’t shut them up sometimes.
I do, however, ask candidates for references for 2 reasons:
1) To make my life easier in finding telephone numbers, and
2) To get an idea of whom they would prefer I call, versus not.
Neither of those reasons is to get permission. I will always talk to immediate supervisors for at least 5 years back. Always, whether listed as reference or not.
Did you get that part?? Whether they list as references or not.
I will honor a request — it IS a request — to not call a currently-employed candidate’s current employer, as long as they realize I must do so either before an offer is made, or after a “contingent” offer is made. 100% of the time. No matter what the impact may be — no current reference, no job.
Now, some opinionated rambling…
There is no legal requirement, per se, for giving/not giving references or even employment verification (for future employment).
Further, though I realize many in HR choose — on their own — to limit their reference responses, I believe that practice is both limiting and detrimental to both employers.
This whole “name, rank and serial number” thing began as HR managers became afraid (unjustifiably, in my mind) of saying something malicious that they could be held to later.
In playing this self-inflicted “don’t tell” game, we encourage people to circumvent HR in the reference process, making operational/functional managers the go-to for adequate references.
And make no mistake — regardless of policies, most managers WILL give references, good and bad.
I believe our organizations would be better served if we controlled the real reference information, instead of simply sticking our collective heads in the sand.
We speak so often about “the economy,” as if it’s this latent beast lurking about that no one can influence or control. And that beast, according to many, unilaterally influences success and failure in myriad ways through all walks of life and industry.
Balderdash.
Regardless of how you measure “the economy,” it doesn’t fundamentally
“cause” ANYTHING; it merely exists in the background, sort of like the
movie “Matrix.” It’s a backdrop for industry, a simple, somewhat undefined engine creating a lot of white noise. And sometimes, distractions.
We hear too often, from both colleagues and clients,” Man! I sure will be happy when ‘this economy’ turns around,” and in response to the ever-present question ‘How’s business?’ we hear ‘not bad, considering the economy.’”
Money is plentiful. Banks have it, private equity folks have it, and even venture capitalists have it. Lots of it. If they aren’t investing, it isn’t because of a lack of financial resources. Earnings are up, the Dow is up, unemployment is down, annual reports read like boom-time in the good ol’ U.S. of A.
Nearly every available economic indicator says “the economy” is doing pretty darned well. So, then, why are many still using “the economy” as a crutch for failure (or at least mediocre results)?
Now THAT’S a good question. In my opinion, many use it simply becauseit’s the easiest, most available, fully-understandable excuse for lackluster performance (never waste a good crisis, eh?). Everyone continues to nod their head in reverence when discussing “the economy,” as if a demonstrated lack of respect would unleash the fury of “the economy” on their worlds.
Which, of course, is simply more bunk.
Here comes a profound statement. I figured I would announce it, since much of what I write may be decidedly UN-profound. Here goes: “If anyone in your world is succeeding today, and you are not… IT’S NOT THE ECONOMY!”
Did you get that? If someone in your space, business, industry, market, locale, etc. is succeeding today, then any use of “the economy” for less than stellar performance is just another cop-out. So, in the immortal words of my doctor, when I tell him that it “hurts when I do this or that…” “Well, STOP DOING THAT.”
Using James Carville’s slogan during the Clinton election campaign (with just a slight modification), “It’s not the economy, stupid!”
