Understanding Your Employees: Getting to the Heart of Change

You can have the best product in the world, but the only way to evoke true passion is with people.  When you make a proactive decision about how you relate to one another, your culture starts to shift.

Lisa Earle McLeod

Technology is purported to help turn around companies, create efficiencies, and give an edge over the competition.   However, it’s not always the panacea that organizational leaders hope for.  I recently had the opportunity to sit in on a roundtable where organizational leaders where brought together to share best practices in implementing sustainability plans, and more specifically green building efforts.  The leaders were from universities, health care institutions and governmental agencies.  Each grappled with the fact that while they were deploying “smart technologies” to improve building performance, launch new energy programs and improve resource utilization; they weren’t able to meet their established goals.  One presenter indicated that her organization had seen a 10% increase in energy usage even with enhanced technology, new monitoring systems and established metrics.  Presenter after presenter stated that she struggled with changing human behaviors in their organizations.  One presenter indicated that she had started to implement a community program so that the facility managers implementing the programs could start connecting more and sharing practices.

While creating this type of community program is great in concept, it doesn’t really get to the core of the matter.   You have to get to the heart of change and dig down a level deeper.  It takes a commitment to take the time to really understand your employees, across all levels, and determine what will evoke the true passion within them to participate in achieving the goals established.  As the old adage goes “A leader is only as good as the people he leads.”  Understanding your employees requires that you ask questions that help you relate better to their needs and wants.  So, if you want to create behavioral changes organizationally start by looking at the answers to these questions:

• Do your goals have the employee feeling like he is constantly reaching for the stars?  With that – stretch goals are wonderful.  However, do they have your workforce feeling frustrated and deflated?  Do they seem off in some other world having them ask themselves “Why even bother?”
• Do your employees understand how to use the technology?  Many organizations purchase wonderful tools without properly training the employee using it.  Other areas to focus on are:  does the employee see the technology as a threat to her job or is the technology just adding to her workload?
• Are you drowning your employees in initiatives that make them feel ADD?  A lot of companies have great intentions when rolling out new programs.  What they lack though is focus and simplicity.  Provide your employees with one simple initiative to follow, gain success and then roll out the next initiative.
• Have you burdened your team with reporting requirements?  Employees may just go through the motion because they’re complying with heavy reporting requirements instead of feeling emotionally attached to the initiative.  Keep the reporting requirements simple so that they can spend time on implementing.
• Are your employees feeling like this is just another fad?   How often do you introduce new programs that you abandon once the latest trends indicate that there is something else that companies need to implement?   Your employees may suffer from fad fatigue and cautiously sit back awaiting the new program to be rolled out.
• Have you truly set an example for your organization?  Meaning – are you walking your talk?  Too many times, employees encounter “Do as I say not as I do.”  Model the behavior you want your employees to display.  Then they will follow.

One of the presenters indicated that she’s attended various conferences at which was indicated that behavioral change accounts for a minimum of 20% achievement of implementing green building programs.  I would venture to guess that that percentage should actually be 50%.  Technology is only as good as those individuals deploying it.  Plus, without your team truly feeling inclined to shift behaviors, your technology will waste away.  So, first learn to understand your employees and then focus on bringing about change through your initiatives.

I would love to hear how you’ve successfully brought about behavioral change in your own organization.  What worked for you?  Please just comment below.

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