Three Demons haunting your business

Demons are real. You can't see them, touch them or measure them, but they are there and will do serious damage if they're not addressed. In Buddhism, Christianity and many other religions, demons represent the dark areas of human behaviour, those parts of our mind that betray our ethical and moral normalcy. 

In business, demons exist too. These are the happenings in our business that house the dark, immeasurable and often overlooked behaviours that sabotage and destroy performance. Think less about horns and pitchforks, and more about the whispered negativity and disengaged slouches in the gait of the incoming worker.

Here are three of the major demons that are feasting on your outcomes and blocking greater success that you need to be wary of.

1. The Not-my-job Goblin

The Goblin is a devilish fiend. He first appears in the discretionary spaces. His breeding ground is the little 1% jobs that don't seem all that important at the time. Here he gets his foothold. 

Quickly he spreads like a cancer. People don't empty their own bins, people don't give out others mail and people start throwing peers work under a bus so they can get their job done. When you hear "it's outside my PD" or "it's not in my KPIs", you know the Goblin has landed. People stop working for each other and start focusing on themselves.

I've seen this many times in my career. The goblin appeared as Executives declining meetings that they thought were too lowly for them. Teams hiring consultants because they didn't like doing the research work or claims managers refusing to check in with customers because they were too busy with paperwork. When people stop working for each other, you cease having a team and start leading a group of mercenaries.

All great businesses known that the one percents are how you turn customers into advocates. Well it's the same for employees. If you can ward off the goblins in your business and build an culture of inclusive support and service to each other, you have the chance to great amazing outcomes inside and outside your business.

2. The Ghost of the Golden Past

The second demon I've encountered in my career is that of the Ghost of the Golden Past. The Ghost may well wear a red cap and wear an orange tinge in his skin these days. He reminisces on how things were in the past and longs for its return.

For many big organisations, there have been amazing times in recent memory. In the near past we bathed in rivers of gold. Australia's boats were in relative sage harbour through the GFC and belt tightening remains seen by too many employees as a choice of out-of-touch executives rather than any necessary strategy.

In an incredibly uncertain and volatile world, one thing we can be very certain: all businesses need to relentlessly strive for more exceptional. The past is a reference point but no place for living and companies that hope for the good ol' days will struggle, later if lucky but more likely very soon. 

If your business hosts the ghosts of a past grandeur, it is your job as a leader, no matter your position, to expel the ghosts of the past and start painting the reality of the future. The future should be free of the romance of the past, but not just a boring and factual picture of tomorrow. It needs be full of the emotion, hopefully, exciting, challenging and fun, but it needs to direct people forward. Engaging emotions and inspiring action. Which leads us to the last demon.

3. The Ogre at the Turnstile 

Every day across Australia, hundreds of thousands of people shuffle themselves, heels dragging and dazed eyes ignoring direct contact with anyone else, into offices of business. 

It is both a common and deeply depressing sight. These smart, well educated women and men leaving their loved ones, commuting up to hours every morning to suffer through another day to earn a salary and pay bills. Hating every single minute!

You've seen them. They get to the turnstiles and swipe their card, seemingly stealing their soul for the next 7-10 hours. Maybe you've seen it or maybe it is you. Disengaged workers is one of the most costly and destructive parts of most businesses. Much like the Goblins and the Ghosts, the Ogre is contagious, ruthlessly jumping from employee to employee. 

If you are a leader seeing your people looking every day like they've had their spirits broken by the Ogre, you must act. Banishing the Ogre is hard work, but through inspiration, communication and empathy, leaders can release the Ogres grip over your people. 

Dealing with the demons is a leadership challenge that everyone must take up. A good way to identify the rising talent and future people leaders in a business is to find those who battle the demons through their actions. 

All businesses have the demons at times, they claw at your performance and destroy engagement, so seeing them and killing them is critical to create a high performance culture.