How To Foster Loyalty And Stop Over-Complicating It

I’ve written about employee loyalty before, and then overnight I got an Ed Zitron newsletter about the same topic, which has a couple of strong lines in it. This is potentially the best:

This is at the core of the problems I have with the great resignation conversation — it is treating capital’s access to labor as something they are owed versus something that they must actively solicit and pay for. The reason that this is happening is because the pandemic showed people exactly how disloyal companies were to their workers. It was a garishly public display of greed, and, ironically, a time when companies really could’ve shown how loyal they were, cutting executive compensation to retain jobs or agreeing contractually to bring people back — and instead, they chose to make massive profits and treat workers as a row in an excel spreadsheet.

We consistently make this loyalty discussion more complicated than it needs to be. In short essence, treat people like you would expect to be treated — help them grow and advance, even if you’re fearful they’re coming for your job. That engenders loyalty. Maybe they leave to another company and, four years later, because you were a rabbi/sherpa to them, you get piped in a downturn at your company and they come calling to save you. That’s how loyalty works. It’s earned. You earn it from your dog, somewhat quickly. You earn it from your partner/spouse, over time. And you earn it at work too, especially as a leader — but instead of just saying “Don’t be a dick to those who work for and around you,” we gussy it up in lots of sidebar narratives about what loyalty means and how loyalty is developed and oh, woe is some huge company because they can’t find workers, etc, etc.

As Zitron notes, above, though … the “Great Resignation” is essentially (a) a fake narrative and (b) if it’s real at all, the real part is that people are fed up because we had this pandemic, where everyone should have banded together, and instead everyone ran in different circles. Companies doubled down and tried to make as much money as possible without human beings involved; executives demanded huge bumps and bonuses because they “weathered such a tough year.” Essential workers were treated like shit. Ideologically we went all over the map too, which is crazy. 9/11 I guess was a common enemy. Then in the 20th anniversary of 9/11, which happened during COVID, the parallel was striking. We just to band together, albeit briefly, and fight outward. Now we predominantly fight inward. It’s flawed.

Companies are one of the worst examples of this — CEOs, from their 8-bedroom homes, often report not knowing their employees are struggling — and that’s the modern moment. The problem becomes, at least in the USA, inflation is at a 39-year high. Stuff costs more. You need income to pay for that stuff and not everyone is some Reddit BitCoin hustler. A lot of people need jobs for income, and that means they have to tolerate the bullshit that companies push down on the workers because they need a check because everything they want to buy is 6–20% higher now. There’s no real “Resignation” so much as a broader “Realization,” and unfortunately that realization is that the system traps many of us. (This makes business journalism even more infuriating, because most biz journalism and books is written for privileged white people who could work a bit less, and want to feel better about various topics. It’s not written for reality.)

This isn’t necessarily a pitchforks moment — people need income, again — but it is a moment where, you’d hope, we can have frank and direct discussions about loyalty. Don’t be a dick. Engender respect and play the game that way. It’s unfortunate that so many companies have cultures so deeply rooted in fear and relevance-seeking that this is nearly impossible, but that’s the realization we need in this moment.