Overcoming Organizational Cynicism

What do employees do when they believe they won’t be heard?

When they’re frustrated and believe nothing will ever change?

They give up — or worse, they root for failure.

Organizational cynicism is a common problem that is rarely diagnosed and even more rarely addressed. It has derailed improvement efforts for countless businesses. There are some leaders reading this who live in denial, not willing or able to see that cynicism has infected their culture, and even less able to consider the possibility that they may be partially to blame. There are others who will read this and recognize the signs of cynicism in their own organization, or even in their own thoughts. If you’re a leader who isn’t afraid to admit being wrong, who is willing to ask the deeper questions, then keep reading. Organizational cynicism isn’t part of your DNA — it’s merely a challenge to overcome, and hundreds of leaders like you have done it before.

It’s election day in the United States, and analysis of low voter turnout frequently points to a similar form of cynicism. Many people don’t vote because they don’t believe their vote will make a difference. They firmly believe that nothing will change — regardless of who wins. There are some people that DO vote and still believe that nothing is going to change. It’s a shame — and it’s a complex problem for the country to solve. But in organizations, we have a lot more control. With courageous leadership, you can rapidly unwind that cynicism and make lasting, positive change.

You’ve certainly heard the term “low-hanging fruit.” We hear it all the time. It starts with a Pareto chart and ends with a list full of boxes and checkmarks to celebrate your “quick wins.” So why — even after our quick wins — do we still have cynical people? The answer: we didn’t solve the real problem. Low-hanging fruit may look nice in a PowerPoint packaging your mediocre initiative as a victory, but it doesn’t make a big impact on the front line. Your top performers were frustrated before your improvement initiative. Afterward, they’re furious. Yet again, nothing changed for the better.

Those who know me know I’m passionate about the importance of building a fearless front line. Top performing organizations learn to remove frontline leaders’ frustrations, provide the support they need, and empower them to run the day-to-day business without management involvement. Those beliefs are at the foundation of the Run Improve Grow leadership system.

The Run Improve Grow approach to unwinding organizational cynicism is to design a “spark.” I’m going to share how and why the Run Improve Grow spark works. But first, let’s take a closer look at the problem we’re trying to solve.

Organizational cynicism is when people stop trusting. They lose hope that anyone will ever listen to them. They lose confidence that their senior leaders and managers have the courage or commitment to tackle the real problems. They might not trust that their managers even understand the real problems at all.

Rooting for failure is one symptom of a front line that doesn’t trust its managers. As ridiculous as this sounds, the front line is hopeful that if the poorly designed initiative fails, maybe, just maybe, senior managers will realize how incompetent their managers are and right this wrong.

When cynicism takes hold, all the messages that make it to the front line are heard through a filter of “Yeah, I don t believe you.” Maybe a new policy is established, an email is sent out, or a leadership retreat is planned. It doesn’t matter what you say or do. It all lands in the same place: “This is all just talk — you’re not actually going to fix anything.”

When employees give up and lose faith at that level, it is nearly always based on past experiences. Here are a few scenarios you might recognize:?

• The company conducted a survey and asked employees for input. The employees engaged, but never received insights. Or they received promises but no action. Or they were met with defensiveness, negation, or argument.?
• Employees see their leaders fail to practice what they preach. They see the gap between company value statements and how leaders actually behave, concluding that all they care about is money.?
• The leaders made bold promises to customers but failed to provide the support the front line needed to actually deliver on those promises.

Sound familiar?

So how do you start to unravel this mess? When trust has been broken, the solution can’t start with more words — it starts with a Run Improve Grow spark.

The low-hanging fruit approach addresses minor issues and drives incremental change, but those are the same changes you’ve always made. They don’t solve the systemic problems that frustrate employees. The spark goes after the high-hanging fruit, tackling issues like interdepartmental breakdowns, broken management systems, or even unnecessary meetings. These are not just minor process changes, they get to the real frustrations that suck the soul out of a team.?

The spark isn’t a policy, or approach, or initiative — it is a designed experience. When employees don’t just hear it, but instead FEEL it, it cuts through the past and makes change possible.?Instead of the knee-jerk “I don’t believe you,” we instead get “Wow!” They become willing to suspend their prior cynical beliefs. They begin to actually believe that the organization is willing to follow through, to listen, and to overcome systemic problems.

So how do you start?

Designing the spark starts with sincere listening. The most frustrated employees in your organization are usually your top performers, and they deserve some attention anchored in positive assumptions. Those cynical beliefs are well-founded — based on their past experiences. In order to design an effective spark, we need to understand those experiences. We need to move beyond our logical approach to business improvement and bring in some high-EQ questions.

• “Why do you lack confidence in our organization to follow through?”
• “Why don’t you have confidence that we’re going to support you?”
• “What in the past has led you to believe the organization will not follow through?”
• “What frustrates you most on a daily basis?”
• “What have we done to try to solve it that hasn’t worked?”
• “What are the systemic problems that you don’t believe we’re willing to solve?”

These are the types of questions that have helped high performing leaders design many hundreds of sparks over the past 25 years, and helped hundreds of businesses break through to a new level.?

And while we’re asking questions, here are a few that those leaders asked themselves:?

• “Do I have the courage to validate my employees’ frustrations?”
• “Am I willing to acknowledge that the cynicism my team feels is justified because we haven’t followed through on our promises?”
• “Who in our organization gets blamed for our biggest challenges, and why?”
• “Are we failing to understand our deepest challenges, or failing to take courageous action to address them?”

The spark isn’t the full solution — it is just the beginning. The next step is changing the management systems to maintain those behaviors, beliefs, and values. But the critical first step is to deliver a memorable experience that helps people overcome their cynical beliefs.?

Positive change is possible, but you need to have the courage to make a choice and the belief that change is possible.

Low hanging fruit (and management patting themselves on the back) OR high hanging fruit (real systemic change)

Frustration OR engagement

Organizational cynicism OR hope and momentum

What’s your vote?