Poverty Mentality

About a few days ago, during a meeting with some mid-level experienced technical people of a certain company these were things I heard from them, about the place they worked for.

- There’s no leadership it’s only dictatorship

- Management believes employees must be coerced and directed all the time.

- Management tends to be strict, to the extent of feeling being stifled.

- Management tends control giving employees, offers very little window of freedom and punish

 them by firing them for poor performance.

- Leave alone being appreciated or rewarded, they are critical often giving a negative feedback.

- The Management tends see very little point in giving autonomy, because they think the  employees do not deserve it.

Impact of this on those employed there

- The workplace is depressing.

- Employees inherently dislike work, because they only get directions.

- Employees shriek responsibility because of fear of failure.

- Employees take no initiative, because they don't know how it will be received.

- Most employees place security above all factors associated with work and display no intent or ambition.

I was in utter disbelief, yet, when I shared what I heard with some entrepreneurial professionals running start ups and asked if this could be true of small companies. The response I got was, “Start-Up’s are not like that, but those who are not Start-Up’s any more because they’ve been around for ten or more years or may be some Corporates, could be as bad as narrated.” 

What I heard was unbelievable. When I quickly compared what I heard from them and with the woes I heard from the mid-level techies, I realised they were with a company that’s be around for a little over 10 years. Was also wondering why would they have to do things like this, because they aren’t doing any favour by offering employment and making the employees feel miserable. In fact, it is a great disservice to society.

 What would such managements need to do to turn things around.

 Trust Your People First. Placing the trust in your people first will usually work to get them engaged – it never happens the other way around.

Don’t Play Favourites. Leaders who ignore others, such as spending most of their time with the coolest or the people making the numbers happen, divide their teams silently and quickly. When people feel detached because they aren’t part of the “inner circle” they distrust leadership and many think you have to be unethical in order to get attention or feel valued.

Don’t Assume Fault. For some leaders the favourite response to any situation is “Who’s fault is that?” A question like this always placed people on the defensive, and assumed a failure on that person’s behalf. Moving away from a fault-finding mindset into a mindset of turning bad circumstances into opportunities to win long-term, change processes, or develop skills will have your people fighting for you when things go bad, instead of fleeing from you.

Know That They May Know More Than You. Just because they run the business some assume they know everything. That may not be true. Giving people the platform to showcase what they know and then stay out of their way is the best thing to do.

Don’t Assume Ill Intent. Many times when an employee has an issue the first thing certain leaders do is to assume that the person isn’t committed, or going rogue, or being a saboteur. When leaders know that performance issues usually stem from lack of trust in leadership, systems, or culture, then you can take steps to correct those external forces that negatively impact employee performance. It’s another aspect of trust that needs to be present in mind at all times.

Find Ways To Always Train Them Up.

Over the years I have noticed that the best leaders consistently exhibit all of these traits without wavering. Those that have swung on both ends of the spectrum in any of these behaviours showed a much higher degree of employee mistrust.

Changing the level of commitment from employees means changing the level of trust first. This can only be done by changing your leadership mindset in how you approach and view any and all of your people to begin with.