Are you bringing your real-self to work?

In the book Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, Sir Robert Louis Stevenson writes:

“... man is not truly one, but truly two … I hazard the guess that man will be ultimately known for a mere polity of multifarious, incongruous and independent denizens.”

Stevenson’s thought about personality has remained in my mind for a long time. And the reason is very simple. It awakes in me the curiosity to ask some very simple, yet transcendental questions for any organization and any employee.

Can people be their real-self at work? Can they really be who they are, without “faking it” and hiding their internal “denizens”? Or, on the contrary, does the work environment force people to pretend and behave in certain way and become an “ideal corporate persona”?

Research says

In the book “An Everyone Culture”, authors Robert Kegan, Lisa Laskow Lahey, Matthew L. Miller and Andy Fleming sustain that employees don’t come to the office to perform one job, but two.

The first is to do the things they are supposed to do. That is, to perform their actual work. The second is to hide their failures and weaknesses for fear of punishment and retaliation… and to keep the appearances that they know how to do the things that they are supposed to do.

The second job is extremely costly for any organization and individual. It’s basically a sacrifice to showing who they really are, with their strengths and opportunities. Many people invest more time in the second job, because they think that their “weaknesses” can make them an easy target of their coworkers and leaders ambitions.

Thus, the answer to the question “can people be their real-self at work?” is, very often, NO. Unless those people are the Mr. Hyde in Stevenson's novel, hiding the real-self is a terrible and unproductive thing. And I'm going to explain why.

In most organizations, people can’t be who they really. You see, it’s not surprising that  workforce disengagement is a whopping 70% and frustration in a typical company is 20% or more.

Most employees are intangibly forced to be someone they don’t want to be!

Being someone one is not creates unnecessary stress. Not only do people have to perform well in their first job, but they invest energy in hiding part of who they intrinsically are!

Hiding the real-self from the organization and colleagues is detrimental. This is true not only because “appearing to be someone you are not” creates a frustrated workforce. But it’s also true because of the losses in organization’s productivity and creative output.

So, why would corporations force someone to behave in certain way? Don’t they know it is counterproductive and ineffective?

The reason for that is evident: most workplaces exist with the sole purpose of maximizing output production in a standardized environment of zero chaos and total control. But the concept of “zero chaos and total control” doesn’t exist anymore.

In our revolutionary times, nothing is controllable anymore and chaos is prevalent. There’s too much pressure from a hypercompetitive environment. And employee engagement is fundamental for organizations to remain relevant. Fortunately, staying relevant will only happen when employees can be who they are and they are able to unleash their full potential.

What’s interesting is that “maximization of output production” and “allowing people to be who they really are” are not opposite concepts. Actually, their alignment brings levels of engagement and productivity that are just unimaginable. 

Bringing the real-self to work is letting people unleash their full potential

People want to unleash their full creative potential. They want to experiment with new ideas. They want to dismantle the status quo and existing assumptions. They want to be curious and ask impertinent questions (the ones that lead to innovation!). They want to show their rebellious side, not against the company, but to strengthen it.

This doesn’t mean that employees don’t commit to their job. On the contrary, it shows that their level of commitment goes higher than expected. They want to add extreme value. And they want to do it in their own way, not in the “standard” way.

For example, today, employees don’t consider “salary” as their most important corporate incentive. The correlation between salary and job satisfaction is very low. Alas, people spend more than half of their awaken time at work. It’s just na?ve to think that money is a strong sustainable incentive.

What employees are looking for is much more than just a paycheck. Finding a way to realize one’s potential and unleash the full personal creative power while at work is more transcendental and satisfactory than just money. However, this can’t happen in organizations that don’t let people be who they really are.

Unfortunately, many workplaces still operate in the old ways.

Those workplaces want to put people in a box. And they want people to behave in the same way. They have heavy and rigid rules that standardize things that can’t be standard anymore. That, by definition, is forcing employees to behave and become certain kind of “ideal corporate persona”. And that “ideal persona” is usually not the one people really want to be.

The organizations of the past don’t deal with this complicated situation. They are happy with the outcomes their people produce. These organizations don’t even realize the potential opportunities they are losing when their people have to “fake it” and put more energy in the “second job”, as described in An Everyone Culture.

On the contrary, the organizations of the future are redefining themselves in order to tackle the complex problems related to employee disengagement, stress at work and job frustration.

For such futuristic organizations, it is unacceptable that people are put in a box. One way they use to solve the problems is allowing employees to own the “how” to maximize output production. That lets the organization accomplish its goals, without compromising people’s creative power.

In summary

The present and the future will continue to be extremely chaotic. No more controllable environment anymore. So, organizations will have to deal with a lot of complex problems to remain relevant and profitable. Undoubtedly, keeping an engaged and committed workforce is one of them.

I believe that the road to build futuristic organizations begins by removing the obstacles that prevent their people from unleashing their full capacities. For that to happen, employees need to be themselves. They need to know that bringing their real-self to work is appreciated and encouraged.

Any organization can reap incredible benefits if its people, instead of spending energy in hiding who they are, they invest it in creativity, innovation and productivity. It's the same energy, but better invested!

Such an approach requires many other cultural and corporate transformations. However, it can begin with small steps to build the necessary trust among colleagues. They need to be reassured that they’ll be accepted for who they are. Small steps include letting people experiment with ideas of their own, be curious and ask intriguing questions, coach them when they make mistakes, avoiding unnecessary punishments, among other things.

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