You Can Make Your Organization the “Best Place to Work”(You Don’t Have to be a Google or Hubspot to Make That Happen!)

Some time ago, Glassdoor, the reputable job site released its annual Best 100 Place To Work 2022. ?Names like NVIDIA, a US graphic chip maker topped the list followed by Hubspot, the marketing technology (Martech) company, and Bain? & Company, global marketing and consulting company.?

eXp Realty was number four, Box, a technology company, number five, Boston Consulting sat at number six, Google settled for number seven and Salesforce was number ten.?

According to Christain Sutherland-Wong, the organizations in the top ten had some ideals that distinguished them from the pack -? a clear mission, strong and transparent leadership as well as investment in the career development of employees.

Similarly, bestplacestoworkfor.org released its annual list of the top 20 Best Places to Work in Africa for 2022. To make the list, a company must be recognized as an exceptional employer at least in one African country.?

The survey which covered an average of 500 companies found that successful companies that invested in creating a highly engaging work environment scored an average engagement of 81% compared to 69%, the industry average.? Also, 92 % of the outliers invested heavily in tech-driven HR platforms to rev up productivity.??

The top three best workplaces in Africa are (1)Lundbeck, a global pharmaceutical company involved in the research, development, manufacturing, marketing and sales of pharmaceutical products. ( 2) Teleperformance, a global service provider in customer interaction and process management. (3) Zoetis, a global animal health company.

That said, you might be thinking in your mind, making the list globally or even in Africa can be a long shot. This is my thought on that. To answer that question, I’d draw my inspiration from Bruce Henderson’s article, The Origin of Strategy.?

The highlight of the article was the description of Professor Gause’s principle: Competitors that make their living the same way cannot coexist. In other words, two companies creating customer value this same way will not last. One of them would have to “die” for the other to live.

That is, for both to live, each of the competitors should have its unique advantage. The article piggybacked on this principle to debunk the myth of market share. Said differently, companies rather than be driven by a penchant to grow market share, should actually be more concerned with creating their own “share of the market” since they have created a unique market based on their unique advantages.

So, my point is rather than be jostling for a spot in the Best Place To Work ranking or index whether globally or regionally, you can create your own Best Place To Work based on your uniqueness - your business model, brand, resources, business environment and whatnot.

Let me explain,??

A few days ago, I visited with one of my aunties. She wanted me to develop a Business Model/Communication strategy for her company. She leads a boutique physiotherapy clinic in a highbrow locale in Lagos, Nigeria.?

source: pexels.com

It was my first time at the office, but I was so impressed with the energy and enthusiasm in the room (clinic)- coming from the young physios. Knowing her personally, I wasn’t really surprised, she’s a good person. That’s even beside the point.?

Perhaps she pays them well. Well, I wouldn’t know.?

Let’s face it, good pay doesn’t always translate to employee engagement. My wife worked in the banking industry for close to a decade, she was well-paid. But for the most part of her time, she was very unhappy. I know a couple of her colleagues who just go to work because they have to. With other choices on the table, they won’t hesitate to JAPA (japa is slang for emigrating to another country).?

Even at that, research has shown that there is little correlation between pay and pay satisfaction, as a matter of fact, it’s just 5%. The corollary is that no matter how much you pay people, they will still want more.??

Edward Deci and Richard Ryan further drove this point home. Their work, known as Self-Determination Theory (STD) is planked on three key ideas: competence, relatedness and autonomy.??

Competence:? Employees want to be in charge of their own development and gain mastery of their tasks.

Relatedness: employees love to relate and not function like robots.

Autonomy: They want to be in charge of their own destinies. They seek some level of independence as opposed to the way some employers micromanage their employees. In other words, your people want to use their initiative and not have you tell them what to do.

Back to my meeting with my client, as the meeting wore on, I was able to sift and ink at least four ideas that have been informally instituted in the organization. Incidentally, the ideas gave credence to the validity of the Deci-Ryan STD?

1. Collective leadership.?

The company has a council comprising the founder and chief executive and other members of staff, physios and administrative officers. They meet every week, Mondays. They discuss just everything about especially patient management, staff welfare, new discoveries in the field of physiotherapy, content creation, etc.?

This gives an opportunity to every staff member to weigh in on any issue and share their thoughts without any fear of being muscled or intimidated.??

It's a powerful platform where everyone is brought up to speed with what’s happening at the clinic and a medium to close ranks with other colleagues.

It also affords the staff the chance to share their challenges with others, as well as get healthy feedback that might help to tackle them.

2. Group evaluation.

They do what I'd refer to as 360-degree evaluation. That is, each staff member is graded by their colleagues openly and fairly.?

The criteria or metrics are well spelt out. For instance, they use factors such as how employees talk about the brand on social media and elsewhere and promptness to duty and assignment (how quickly the staff submit reports, process feedback from patients etc)

The evaluation metrics are well known and so there is no reason for anyone to believe any staff is being favoured or has fallen out of favour with the management.

3. Employees' ownership of roles.

The founder allows every team member to take ownership of tasks assigned to them.?

For instance, when I asked who was in charge of content creation, she wasn't really sure (not out of negligence but rather she's demonstrating that she trusts that the employees would do the right thing).

While I am not suggesting that you slip into reckless negligence, you don't have to be in charge of every process just because you are the boss.

Things don't work like that. Learn to delegate, once you do, make sure you let go of the leash. The problem with many startups is that they often feel that the person they delegated to won't be able to do things the way they want them done.?

That's insecurity. As Deci-Ryan noted, employees want a scenario where they are in control, make their own mistakes and learn through the process as against being told what to do and not using their own initiative.

4. Skew towards the carrot more than the stick.

Unfortunately, some people think being tough means that you have to scare the hell out of people. Nah! You can be firm and still be very gentle and kind.?

For instance, she told me the story of their ex-staff, who didn't live up to the brand. They had to let her go.?

According to her, left to the other staff, she wouldn't have spent more than one month. But she persuaded the team to let her stay a little longer.?

When it was apparent, she was a round peg in a square hole, she has to call her, explain to her and even gave her referrals to organizations where her skillsets are required. The employee was so glad to go knowing that she didn't fit in the organization but would get another opportunity that syncs with her configuration.

NVIDIA, Hubspot, Lundbeck, Teleforma etc are some of the best places to work in the world including Africa. True. But it's your choice to make your company the Best Place to Work for your employees. As you can see from the example of my client, you don't have to rob a bank to make it happen. It's just building your organization around human-centred ideas which money might play a very limited role in pulling off.

I wish you luck.