Significance Principle

In the 20th century, a French engineer, Henri Fayol, developed 14 principles of management. These principles sharply affected management and leadership approaches. Division of work, remuneration and esprit de corps are part of the principles Fayol developed.

I am quite fascinated by Esprit de corps. It is teamwork at its highest level: Synergy. Esprit de corps, in a nutshell, is a feeling of pride or loyalty in an organization.

My focus is creating synergy between colleagues: a free-flow of resources and ideas. Giving your very best without being compelled or persuaded. To take the company’s success and vision personally.

Building this kind of synergy requires intentional efforts. Like an engineer building a house.

99.1% of employees want to be part of an organization that nourishes synergy. And effective synergy amounts to a 29% increase in profit. Yet, 39% of employees in a Survey believed that people in their organization don’t collaborate enough.

With such a need and benefit for teamwork, why is there a lack of it? Could it be that we approach synergy wrongly? Statistically, we are. To test this theory, ask ten people in your office these two questions.

1. Do you feel valued at work?

2. Do you trust 80% of your colleagues?

Use this indicator to measure the results.

8/10: High

6/10: Good

4/10: Poor

1/10: Run!

We stated earlier that building synergy is like building a house. It requires intentional action and the foundation of Synergy is: The Significance Principle.

Everyone in your organization craves significance. Regardless of their job title, they hunger for recognition. Make them feel significant, and they will treasure you. Deny them that, and they will resent you.

When a janitor does their job, they want recognition. When an employee completes a task, they want recognition. We all want someone to look at what we’ve done and recognize our efforts.

The problem comes in not understanding where each of your employees crave significance. Yes, we all desire to feel significant. But, misplaced recognition is useless.

To illustrate;

Bob struggled for weeks to land a new client. As the new sales person for a pharmaceutical company, he was eager to make a good impression. After four weeks of calls, Bob was finally able to add a new client to the company’s roster.

Bob walked into work the next day with a spring in his step. He excitedly went to see his manager. He was confident Ted was going to shower him with praises. Walking into Ted’s office, Bob said;

“Boss guess what?!”

Looking up from his desk, Ted gave Bob a once over and smiled,

“Nice suit Bob! It looks good on you mate.”

Deflating a bit, Bob said,

“Uh thanks, but that’s not what I was going to say. I landed my first client!”

“Oh okay, keep it up” replied Ted before going back to his computer.

Bob wasn’t interested in getting recognition for his new suit. He wanted recognition for his hard work. 64% of people in Bob’s position will never show that level of drive for the company again.

To build synergy, first make your employees feel significant. Study them to know where they get their feeling of importance from. When you know that, appreciate them for it.

Do they love wearing new clothes? Appreciate their sense of fashion. Do they love talking about sports facts? Appreciate their memory. Do they talk about their children regularly? Appreciate their parenting skills and kids.

Word of warning: do not this unless you are sincere. In fact, if you can’t sincerely do this, do not do it. There are very few things as damaging as insincere praise.

Back to our original question, what is the best way to build synergy in an organization? Start by making your employees feel significant. Through intentional action, show them that they are valued and important.

This is just the foundation. If you want to know more about building Synergy in your organization, reach out to me. Remember, leaders can not expect results they did not intentionally create. Leadership is Intentionality.

With that said, thank you for your time. Please share and subscribe. And I will see you on the next update.