Category: Leadership

Keeping the Spark Alive

It’s well established that burnout happens in high-demand, high-stress environments. Wellness techniques such as exercise, mindfulness, meditation, deep breathing, and/or positive psychology can increase resiliency and fight burnout.  This is universally true throughout the neurodiversity spectrum, applying to both neurotypical and neurodivergent individuals.  

Motivational Needs Conflict 

Yet, corporate wellness programs are not being used.  Programs that are meant to strengthen employees are failing to do just that.  The reason:  They are generally top-down, generated corporate programs that were conceived without employee motivations in mind.  Sure, it’s great that you have yoga classes or a meditation room, but if your people are purely motivated by Survival, they won’t have the time or inclination to participate.  They are too busy spending their efforts on not losing their jobs.  They would be better served with some time off to recover and regroup so they can come back to the job with more energy and a fresher perspective.  That doesn’t mean that wellness programs are inherently wrong; they just need to be well thought-through to best serve all employees instead of the few who want to have company-subsidized yoga classes.  

 

Planning Wellness For All by Motivational Need

To approach Wellness effectively, start with the motivational needs of your employees.  Where are they on the motivational pyramid?  How can you best set up your team for success over the long term and fight burnout?  Let’s take each motivational level and discuss how to best support employees at each level.  

Survival

When you are in Survival mode, you are worried about how you are going to continue to live.  This could be the standard of living at which you are currently, or from where your next meal is coming.  Depending on the level of survival, various wellness programs can be appreciated.  Let’s start with the most extreme and then move from there.

  • Temporary Housing for Homeless Employees:  Housing can be expensive, and many employees may find themselves, hopefully temporarily, without a place to call home.  Providing them with a place to live, showering options, and food can be a temporary alternative.  Some companies find that allowing employees to sleep on the premises overnight, providing showers, and keeping healthy food and drink options can allow their otherwise homeless employees a place to stay while they work out options.  Is this ideal?  No, and possibly illegal in some states or cities (consult your corporate Counsel before setting a program in place).  A better solution is to pay a living wage for your employees so they can sustain their housing. 
  • No Judgement PTO:  Now for the more common, more often abused solution:  respecting time off.  Don’t require a reason for PTO to be taken; allow employees to take their PTO without feeling it needs to be justified.  They have earned that time off, so let them use it however they need.  If you are worried about projects or tasks falling by the wayside, you should
    • Have a solid way to track all tasks that need to be done (basic project and task management tools will take care of this)
    • Have a plan in place for maintenance mode: If a valuable employee is out of the office, have a plan to cover the basics of that role while they are out so they don’t come back to a massive backlog
  • Support Life-Changing Events:  There are times when employees will have an event that will turn their lives upside down.  A new baby is expected, a family member passes, or even a massive accident that can dibilitate an employee for some time.  Have support plans in place to let them know that their jobs are NOT in jeopardy, and plan for coverage if they need time away.  These events can be sudden and take any employee from a higher level of motivation instantly to Survival mode.  Rally around them and give them all the support you can.  Work through how the change in their life will impact their career and how you can help them grow through the change.  

Safety

If your employees are looking for safety, they need some level of stability and reassurance in their future.  The best way to help build their resilience is to reinforce their levels of safety and security within their career, and encourage wellness practices.  For those in the Safety level this means allowing PTO without judgement, and flex time (where possible).  

  • Flex Time: Now, we should take a minute to define what I mean by flex time:  Flex time means working when the person is most productive, and allowing them to balance out that work with their general life.  
  • Work-Life Balance (For Real):  We hear alot about work-life balance, but that generally means “be available at all times.”  That’s not what we are talking about here.  To have proper balance, you need to make time for your life.  Employees are contracted for 40 hours of work a week, and any more than that is a gift (unless they are hourly, in which case it’s overtime).  Allowing employees to work when it’s most convenient for them means they can do the best possible job for you.  This also means if they are working over their usual hours one week, let them take that time off the next (or a subsequent week).  Give them time to focus on self-care, while you focus on the real Key Productivity Indicators (i.e., the work getting done).  
  • Respect Boundaries:  Set and respect boundaries for your employees, and they will feel safe in their role.  Only contact them during working hours.  Respect their Slack status (in meeting, unavailable, offline) and don’t expect immediate responses.  Emails that can wait until Monday should be sent on Monday (you can schedule your email delivery, did you know that?).  If someone is on PTO, respect that they are on PTO and don’t try to contact them.  
  • Plan for Time Off:  If you don’t have a back-up plan for someone who is on vacation/sick, then start planning for one.  You aren’t planning for a replacement, but have a plan for someone to pick up the slack or make the key decisions if a person is out of the office.  
  • Encourage Safety in Groups Through ERGs:  Employee Resource Groups, which allow like-minded employees to build relationships with each other, provides an anchor in an organization when social relationships are still being formed.  Employee Resource Groups cost nothing to make (it’s just a group in Slack), provide an opportunity for folks and allies of a similar race, sex, belief, culture, sexual orientation, or neurodivergence to build a strong network.  You could also build similar groups for beer-brewing enthusiasts, role-playing gamers, sailers, surfers, etc.  By encouraging employees to bond within their existing social connections will help them feel more safe within the organization as a whole. 

Social

Social needs and motivation is a level where teams start to gel, folks want to work because they like hanging out with their teammates, and social acceptance has been achieved.  What starts with ERGs can move into more general acceptance within a group.  Wellness at this level means group events that are not work outings or team-building off-sites, but rather opportunities for shared interests to be enjoyed.  

  • Expand ERGs:  Your Employee Resource Groups continue to play a role as they expand in building connections:  Sharing experiences and perspectives through team presentations in a safe place.  I had a conversation with someone in the Biotech industry, and she explained their approach.  Many of their researchers were neurodivergent, and felt uncomfortable socializing in a traditional “drinks after work” setting.  They did, however, enjoy role-playing games, so the company sponsored a role-playing social event to bring folks from multiple teams together in a comfortable setting for their researchers.  The result was phenomenal:  researchers could now relate to other team members because of their role-playing experiences, which built stronger social relationships across teams.  Their researcher retention went up significantly as a result.  
  • Plan Social Events With Everyone’s Feedback:  Not everyone wants a pizza party and alcohol.  As a non-drinker myself, I always felt awkward around co-workers who were drinking.  If you had ever been a non-smoker in a smoking section (perhaps I’m aging myself here), you would know the feeling.  Social events can be dinners, or group service projects, or even team radio shows.  The thing is, everyone needs to be on board with the idea.  If folks aren’t, and are forced to participate, they feel excluded while participating.  Also know that everyone will not be one hundred percent on board with every idea, so cycle through ideas that engage as many people as possible.  For those who generally don’t participate, find out how you can help them feel more engaged with the events.  
  • Team Empathy:  When folks are struggling, the last thing they want to worry about is whether or not they brought the cups for the social that night.  Encourage the team to be empathetic to those around them and recognize that, should someone not want to participate, it’s OK.  Invite them, welcome them, and let them know they are always welcomed in future.  Rejecting a social event isn’t a personal slight, so don’t take offense.  

Recognition/Esteem

It might sound odd to include this option as folks who are motivated at this level already have solid foundational needs met.  Yet, burnout can still happen if you are trying incredibly hard to be recognized.  Employees at this level are more likely to ignore their work/life balance in favor of work, put in long hours on projects, or take a lot on their plate in order to stand out.  Wellness programs at this level may take champions in leadership to encourage folks to find the time to decompress and relax.  

  • Encourage PTO:  Encourage folks to take their time off to relax and unwind, even if it’s one day in the middle of the week.  Time off, unplugged from projects and work, can do wonders.  It’s also important to note that it takes time to unplug and decompress.  Travel, family, last-minute worries, etc. can all impact the ability to relax.  If one day isn’t going to do it, encourage longer breaks.  Be a champion, and lead by example.  When you are on PTO, do not be available, and let people know you are not available.  If you are outside the United States, this probably sounds obvious, but in the US there is an expectation of availability and an “always on” mentality.  Stop it, break that cycle, and you will build a more resilient culture.  
  • Be Mindful of Recognition:  Now, you might think this is a plea to recognize everyone for something, but that’s not really that valuable.  Instead, be aware of which behaviors you recognize.  Is it more often folks who work longer or cut PTO short for a project?  Perhaps you tend to recognize folks for their willingness to take on multiple projects at once, more than would normally be expected.  The reasons and trends behind those recognitions are very visible to your team, and will dictate their behavior if they are motivated by recognition.  Either they will mimic the long hours and no PTO to their detriment to meet your recognition threshold, or they will stop being motivated by recognition all together, and therefore stop progressing through their journey.  Why you recognize folks matters, so try to make sure it’s for something real, rather than something that will impact their health.  

Purpose

When someone is driven by purpose, their whole perspective changes.  All of a sudden, they are focused on how they can contribute to the goals and values of the company.  That doesn’t mean, however, that they are all hunky-dory and don’t need wellness opportunities.  It does mean that their definition of wellness will change:  They will have a focus more on benefiting others rather than themselves.  Therefore, your wellness options would need to shift.  

  • Charitable Giving:  Making the lives of others better becomes a foundational need for those who are looking to de-stress at the purpose level, and charitable giving is an excellent outlet.  Charitable giving can be as simple as providing charity donation options as part of Payroll or providing match programs for a person’s favorite charity.  How it’s done isn’t as important as providing the opportunity.  
  • Volunteer Work:  Much like charitable giving, volunteer work gives employees the opportunity to share their unique talents with those who most need it.  They could be teaching for after-school programs, working in non-profit aid offices, or cleaning the beach with friends.  How they do it doesn’t matter, and even whether or not they are recognized shouldn’t matter, it’s the fact that they have a chance to give back to others that builds resilience.  
  • Respect Anonymity:  Some people love being recognized for their charitable giving or volunteer work, and can’t wait to post about it on social media. These folks would love being recognized for their works within the company as well, often tying their events to their work personas.  There are others who do not like being recognized and prefer to give and volunteer without accolades.  Respect the desire for anonymity, and do not require people to record their volunteer hours or charitable giving amounts for corporate recognition. 

Survival

Non-judgemental PTO and well-established support for work projects.

Let people take time off so they can recover without making them feel like their jobs are on the line and have maintenance plans in place.

Safety

PTO, Flex time, and Employee Resource Groups (ERGs)

Time off should not feel punitive, meaning they shouldn’t be made to feel guilty.  Employee Resource Groups can provide social support for anyone in their group who feels overwhelmed by working through existing community ties.

Social

Expand ERGs and encourage social events with the team

ERGs are a great way to establish a social outlet for all employees and drive social motivation.  Providing social events that are sponsored by ERGs can help build social connections within the company. 

Recognition /Esteem

Become a champion of wellness programs

Encourage your employees to share their wellness practices during work recognition to emphasize that success can include self-care.

Purpose

Volunteer work and/or charitable giving

Your employees driven by purpose will be best served by giving of themselves outside of work, either through volunteer or charitable work.  Recognize their work when appropriate, though respect their choice for anonymity.

Final Thoughts

Wellness has many different definitions to different people, and can often be impacted by culture, needs, and health in general.  As a leader, you want your team to contribute to the best of their ability to the success of the company.  That means you need to be mindful of their stress levels, motivational needs, and ways to mitigate their stress so they can be as productive as possible.  Recognizing their levels of need and having a playbook for those differing levels means they will have the support they need when they need it, and they will become more resilient.  

It should also be worth noting that resilience training wasn’t mentioned once, and there’s a reason:  It’s been found that resilience training actually has a detrimental impact on employee’s overall resilience (ironically).  Perhaps it’s because people don’t want to hear about how they can breathe differently to melt away their stress when they are afraid they can’t pay the bills, or that yoga can fix their problems when they don’t feel part of the team.  Resilience, true resilience, comes from understanding where you are, and how you can be helped.  It’s an active task expected by leadership, not an afterthought that can be fixed with training about ways some folks have found it successful.  Now, I know the irony of me sharing the fact that resilience training doesn’t work as a way of educating someone on how to be resilient, but it’s important to note:  the key to resilience is understanding what you need at the moment and how to avoid completely burning out.  That’s personal, and a good leader can facilitate by providing options, showing compassion, and being supportive.  

Looking For Guidance?

Looking to build resilience on your team, but not sure where to start?  Let us help!  We can guide your team through the fundamentals of motivational needs, leadership approaches, business conversations, and cultural change management that will increase trust, productivity, and engagement with your teams.  Ask us how!  

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Building Your L&D Team

As I become more familiar with the landscape of business organizations, particularly those who are still in start-up mode, I find that Learning and Development is often an afterthought, something that becomes a necessity because 

  • The Support team is getting overwhelmed by customers who have simple requests they, the customer, could do themselves.
  • The Customer Success team has customers that don’t know how their product or service works, or how to utilize it.
  • The Professional Services/Deployment/Implementation teams spend a lot of time giving introductory walkthroughs of the product as “training”
  • Angry CEOs are contacting the CEO of your company to ask why you don’t have training.
  • Industry comparison publications outline the lack of training as a “con” for using your product/service.

Ultimately, for whatever reason, the decision is to build a training program. So leadership with little or no experience in Learning and Development starts to hire folks similar to their teams and use them as “trainers” because their product/service is intuitive, right? Training can’t be that hard. 

Here’s the thing:  Training isn’t Engineering, it’s not Sales, and it’s not PowerPoint slides.  There are whole disciplines dedicated to analyzing, creating, and delivering training.  Advanced degrees are dedicated to best-communicating information in such a way that it sticks.  You need a team that knows how to organize, deploy, and manage all phases of the training organization to be successful.  You need a Learning and Development organization.  So let’s talk about each role within that organization, so there’s a better understanding of how that works.  

For context, I will be talking about the fundamental structure of a Director, Managers, and Independent Contributors in a scaled-down organization expected for a reasonably successful, mature organization.  You could have more directors, more managers, VPs, etc. as your reach expands and the scope of learning expands, all the way up to a Chief Learning Officer who directs the development of internal and external learning.  Though, if you are reading this, you are likely not looking for a CLO, but rather an idea of where to start with your training organization.  So, let’s start with the basics.  

Except that training isn’t PowerPoints, but skills that take skilled professionals.

Image of woman with hat

Curriculum Development

Curriculum development is the process of analyzing the jobs, tasks, subtasks, skills, etc. necessary to be successful and compiling that information in a narrative form that layers skills from foundational to knowledgeable.  Curriculum developers know how to work with Engineering, Product Management, Product Marketing, Marketing, Sales, and Support to do their analysis.  They design the course based on the Jobs, Tasks, Subtasks, Skills, Knowledge, and Approaches necessary to be successful.  They develop the training in the medium(s) necessary for delivery.  They implement by using alpha runs to get a feel of the content, betas to get the feel of the delivery, and then go live and evaluate the results.  

Role KPIs

A good curriculum developer will have the following KPIs:

  • Customer Satisfaction:  Is the learner happy with the content and what they have learned?
  • Net Promoter Score:  Would the learner recommend the course to friends and colleagues? 
  • Course Completion:  Are learners who register to complete the course?
  • Exam Pass Rate:  If there is an associated exam, are people passing the exam At a minimum 70% of the time?
  • Customer Success:  Are learners more confident in their role after taking the training?

A curriculum development team will, ideally, own one product or suite at a time, so they can maintain expertise in that content.  Additional roles that can sub-divide Curriculum Development would be eLearning specialists and media production specialists. 

Image of man with hat

Trainers

Trainers, be they technical or not, deliver the training as created by the curriculum developers, placing the content within the context of the learners.  Their job is to assess the capabilities of their learners and help them best understand the content through related experiences and a certain amount of showmanship (some “dad jokes” thrown in can be helpful, too!).  It’s all about reading the room, getting a sense of the levels of understanding, and helping everyone feel confident in the content they have learned.  Where curriculum developers are writing their curriculum for everyone with a foundational knowledge level, trainers tailor that content to Bob and Charlene in class, helping Bob with some missing foundational knowledge while drawing on Charlene’s advanced experience to help explain more complex concepts.  

Role KPIs

A good trainer will have the following KPIs:

  • Customer Satisfaction:  Is the learner happy with the content and what they have learned?
  • Net Promoter Score:  Would the learner recommend the course to friends and colleagues?
  • Utilization:  How many classes does the trainer deliver in a week/month/quarter?
  • Scope:  How many courses can the trainer deliver?
  • Innovation: In what ways has the delivery of the content gotten better over time?
  • Customer Success: Are learners more confident in their role after taking the training?

The Training team can be further subdivided into varying levels, depending on experience, competency, and increased scope.  

Image of man with glasses drinking coffee

Exam Writers

Exam writers will use their understanding of the job tasks to build exams that test the ability to accomplish a particular job.  While this is somewhat similar to curriculum development, it is a completely different skill.  Curriculum development focuses on teaching the skills necessary to complete a job.  Exams test whether or not someone, at their level of understanding, is capable of completing a job.  Exams can be completely independent of training, and training can be conducted without requiring exams.  

It should also be noted that exams are different than review questions or class assessments (quizzes) to test understanding.  Those two methods are used by Trainers to evaluate how well the course is going and to determine if there needs to be a course correction during the class to make sure all content is fully understood and learned.  Exams, however, focus entirely on whether or not someone has the necessary competence to complete a task or job.  

Role KPIs

A good exam writer would have the following KPIs:

  • Exam Completion:  What percentage of learners completed the exam after starting it?
  • Exam Pass Rate:  How many learners passed the exam, with a pass rate target of around 70%?
  • Writing Errors:  How many errors does the exam contain?
  •  Exam Relevance:  How relevant is the exam to the role against which the exam is testing?

Exam writers can fall within a whole category that works with Operations, depending on how the exams are delivered and results are recorded.  Industry-standard exams need to be legally defensible in court, meaning if any discrepancy in the results due to incorrect answers, overly ambiguous questions or answers, or out-of-date questions that are no longer relevant to the job, companies can be liable.  In some small organizations, the curriculum developer can also be an exam writer, though this is not ideal.  

Group of people working in the office

Training Operations

Training Operations is an umbrella term that includes a lot of different folks, and I place them together because their roles are specialized and are often combined into one or two people.  These roles include 

  • Training Coordinators:  These unsung heroes schedule training, assign instructors, bill learners, and answer all questions learners may have that are not topic-specific, like whether or not a service dog is allowed in class.  Whether or not you have live only, a mix of live and on-demand, or on-demand-only training, you will need someone to manage this part of the business.  It can be the training manager or a coordinator hired specifically for the role. 
  • LMS Admins:  Your Learning Management System administrator is your rock.  Nothing can happen without this person managing the environment through which you schedule and/or deliver your training.  Without your administrator, you would be running all training through Excel and Outlook, which is a recipe for disaster.  If you don’t have a Learning Management system, get one.  If you have one, make sure your admin is well taken care of.  
  • Training Marketing:  Once you have training out there, you need it marketed.  Whether you use the company Marketing team or you have a dedicated team/person in charge of marketing for your courses, if you don’t get the word out, you don’t get sign-ups.  
  • Training Sales:  If you are a P&L (Profit and Loss) department, you need to have dedicated sales teams.  Now, I know what you are thinking, “but I can just have our existing Sales team sell training, and that will work!”  No, it won’t.  This is why:  Training is an “add-on” that main Sales teams will cut in a heartbeat to get a bigger deal through and make it look like a discount.  No remorse, no second thought to the lack of training available for the customer and the inability to an effective implementation of the product/service.  Salesfolks don’t care about the customer’s implementation, they care about the deal and their commission from that deal.  If approvals are required, they will try to get around the approvals.  If Training Management approvals are required, they will go to senior executives.  I’ve seen it time and time again:  Every time a Training Sales team is rolled into the main Sales organization, Training revenues take a nose-dive.  Have dedicated sales teams for your Training, if you are selling training.  Period.  
  • Custom Enablement Training:  Large-scale training courses for user-level training may be required for your product/service if your product/service changes the way people work.  This is part of change management and should be regarded as necessary because it’s very likely that your customer is not going to provide this level of product enablement for their customers. 

There are probably several other roles I could add here, but they all become more valuable as your teams get bigger, and that’s a discussion for another post.  ^_^

Man with beanie

Management LEvel

Management of your training organization depends on the number of people on the team.  You could have one manager/director who is in charge of a few curriculum developers and trainers.  You could have a hierarchy of leadership from the CLO to SVPs to VPs to Senior Directors to Directors to Senior Managers to Managers, each managing several directs that make sense for your command structure.  My leadership design starts with two levels:  The Director, and the Independent Contributor.  

The Director

The L&D Director outlines the direction of the training program and the expectations of each role. If the team is less than 10 people altogether, then the Director can manage everyone effectively, even if they break them up into teams (Curriculum, Training, etc).  The Director can then outline their expectations to the teams, and manage any requirements for that team as necessary.  

The Independent Contributor

Independent Contributors are all the roles above (curriculum, training, etc) that have tasks to do and generally work directly with their customers.  They create the content and scope as directed by the Director, and execute the vision.  

Expanding the Leadership Team: Managers

If the team becomes larger than can be effectively managed (the general threshold is 10 ICs to one Leader), then the Director may want to hire Managers for their ICs.  Managers follow the direction as set by the Director, and manage the needs of their ICs by removing barriers that get in the way of their work.  As their teams grow (again, more than 10 ICs per leader) or different regions require more specialized knowledge, additional Managers can be hired.

Expanding Up:  More Directors

Additional Directors may be needed once the growth of the team becomes so large that each group and vision need to be addressed separately.  This usually happens once a company moves from Mid-sized to Corporate levels, with larger teams.  It also happens when Learning and Development teams start to consolidate around single visions and leaders, (i.e., a Chief Learning Officer), in which case each specialized learning area needs direction and execution (think Sales Enablement vs. New Hire vs. Customer vs. Partner enablement).  At this point, you may have Senior Directors, VPs, Senior VPs, etc. that execute the vision, scope, and direction based on specific needs.  

Now, if you are reading this, you likely are not at this point, so why bring it up?  Because you might be someday, and you want to be ready.  You will want to know how to scale your organization effectively or have someone who can scale it for you, and what that will entail.  

 

Structuring Your First Training Organization

The first step you need to make is to hire a good Director that knows how to build a training organization, because, likely, your existing leadership isn’t aware of how to do that.  They may be excellent Sales folks, know Customer Success well, or know how Engineering works, but they are going to look for Sales, Customer Success, or Engineering leaders.  You need to find someone who knows how Training and Development work, has had experience with the process, and has, ideally, built a training program at one point or another in the past.  

Once you know you have someone who can do the job, you need to let them do the job.  Don’t short-change them on people, resources, software, etc.  Good training can be created in PowerPoint, that’s true, but it limits engagement compared to a strong LMS, excellent social learning platforms, and AI-driven learning paths.  Don’t break the budget, but make sure you have the key roles in place for the scope of your need: 

  • One curriculum developer for each product/service family
  • One trainer per 4 training days a week
  • A coordinator to maintain a lot of the operational stuff
  • An LMS Admin (could be the Director/Manager) to keep the lights on.

Additional roles can be added, negotiated, etc. as necessary.  

Common Pitfall

Now, the common pitfall I see small companies make when they want to start training but don’t want to invest too much is to hire one person to do everything.  There’s the problem with it: 

  • Direction then has to come from people who don’t understand training or how it’s developed:  they don’t have the experience, and they fail to understand why the training team just doesn’t “create a PowerPoint” for training.  
  • Curriculum Development is time-consuming:  With full analysis time, it takes 40 hours of development time per 1 hour of delivery.  One full week to have content ready for one hours-worth of training.  Even if you have analysis taken care of, it can take one day to create the content for one hour.  That means the curriculum developer isn’t able to deliver the training while they are developing the next course.  They will get behind in their development, and the courses will quickly become outdated. 
  • Burnout:  That one person will burn out very quickly if they have to run everything because they can’t scale.  Even with on-demand training, there’s no way to scale the content creation, maintenance, delivery, and exam writing necessary to make a successful training program.  You have crippled your training program before it’s had a chance to grow.  

Take it from someone who has been in this position as their peers were released for various reasons and I became the last man standing:  It doesn’t work, and it makes the training guy look like an idiot that can’t do the work, regardless of their credentials.  It’s poor management, so don’t be caught in that trap.  

Final Comments

Designing a good, solid training program that can scale can be daunting if you don’t have the experience, so hopefully this guide has given you an idea of what that structure should look like. If you have any questions or are looking for help in building out your training program, don’t hesitate to reach out so we can help! 

Success in Navigating your Motivational Pyramid

  • Identify what motivates you
  • Do your best to fulfill that need
  • Develop the necessary skills to do your part in navigating the next motivational need
  • Enjoy the journey, instead of focusing on the destination

Computer on the desk

How Does Training Relate to Motivation?

You Know What Motivates You, What Now?

There have been several jobs in my life that were taken because of survival: I needed a new role and I needed to get a paycheck that would fit my needs. Many I took because I was excited to learn something new, and others I took reluctantly because I needed the paycheck. In all cases, I still did my best in the role. After all, I needed the paycheck.

All Motivation is Still Motivation

I have pointed out the values of moving up the motivational pyramid toward Purpose, and I can understand it might cast each lower level of motivation as slightly negative:  you want to move to Purpose because it’s the most productive and valuable motivator.  The thing is, if you are just working to survive, that is a valid and good motivation!  If you are motivated by the good camaraderie of your peers, do it for them!  What motivates you is clearly what you need to get through the daily grind. 

Use that same motivation to get to the next level.  For instance:

  • If you are in survival mode, work to keep what you have and move to that feeling of safety
  • If you are feeling secure, do what you can to feel part of the team
  • If you work for your social connections, build your value, and earn recognition for your unique contributions
  • If you and your work are valued, find the connection between your values and the value your work brings to others

At every level of motivation, you have a desire to do well, at least to satisfy that level of need.  If you are motivated by survival, you will look for the best chances of survival.  If the work you are doing is your best chance, you will invest your time and effort into satisfying that need.  This means you will tolerate everything and anything to remain employed.  This isn’t necessarily a bad situation, though it might not be ideal.  There are several scenarios where this would be the case:  

  • If your company had gone through a cycle of lay-offs, you might feel like you are in survival mode  
  • You might be new to a company and want to show you are valuable as quickly as possible
  • Current economic conditions make it difficult to find a job, so you are looking for and working any role available, even if it is not your ideal position

In all three scenarios above, you are in a legitimate survival mode.  What makes the difference is how quickly you can move into a more stable mode of safety, which will reduce the amount of stress you are experiencing, and therefore improve the quality of work you can produce.  Each level of need will come with its own goals, situations, and reasons for succeeding, and it’s not wrong to be at whatever level of need you have.  The important thing is to realize where you are with your needs, you are getting what you need with as little stress as possible, and you can progress along your levels of need.  Skill development can assist with each method of motivation.

 

Leonardo da Vinci's diagram of a supporting bridge

Skills Development To Improve Motivation

While in survival mode, I moved my family over a thousand miles to the sunny coast of Southern California.  My boys needed better services for their disability, and I wanted to be able to provide them with the best possible options in life.  So, I took a Survival-type job, even as defined by leadership at the organization.  It was an entry-level position that was meant to leap-frog into another role.  I took that role seriously, did everything I could to make a positive, lasting impact, and took advantage of the skills training made available to all employees through Skillsoft training.  I quickly became the most active person on the platform in a 100,000+ person organization, learning everything I could so I could move to my next level of motivation:  Safety.  

Skills development training provides the tools necessary to navigate the motivational pyramid.  

  • Survival needs are met by providing the skills to land and retain positions that satisfy that need.  Perhaps you are moving into a new role or new industry and skills training is necessary, or you just need to complete your New Hire Training paths that will prepare you for the new position you just landed.  Either way, skills development training satisfies your needs. 
  • Safety needs are met by refining skills, learning soft skills, or utilizing parallel skill sets to increase productivity and value.  You could be preparing to move into a more secure role, or landing a new position within the firm that provides more stability. 
  • Social needs are benefited by additional soft-skills training, helping everyone help others feel more inclusive.  It’s often believed that others are responsible for your inclusion, and while that’s true at a high level, you need to start with what you can control:  your social interactions with the group.  If you struggle to feel part of the team, look for opportunities to contribute.  Social soft-skills training can be valuable here.  
    NOTE: I need to point out that everyone is responsible for social inclusion, not just the person on the outside.  While you as the outside person can learn soft skills and inclusion methods, everyone else needs to learn how to be inclusive as well.  Don’t think that through this list I’m laying the burden on the one on the outside.  That would be unfair, unrealistic, and very much the status quo that has broken many a corporate culture.  
  • Esteem/Recognition needs can be met by learning how to be more visible in your role.  New skills, mastery of skills, and new ways of approaching problems will draw attention to your work.  Striving for excellence in your day-to-day is a journey that will benefit you with a curious mind that explores new and better ways of doing things.  
  • Purpose needs can be met by learning about the industry, customer problems, customer needs, and how the company meets those needs.  Skills development in this area ranges from better industry understanding, customer issue awareness, and better communication skills.
Skills Development:  Build Your Bridge

I love the visuals that Leonardo da Vinci’s inventions give, particularly his bridge (pictured above).  The bridge is built of multiple logs, each notched in such a way that it can rest on another, and by the power of compression, these logs do not move.  The result is a bridge that can be carried, built, used, and disassembled without a single nail or piece of rope.  I have a small model replica sitting in my office as a reminder of the importance of pieces as a whole. 

It’s important to build your bridge to each level carefully.  Find the training that provides you with the necessary skillset you need to thrive in your current needs level and will help you along your journey to the next.  Remember that your needs journey will always be in flux, and your motivation will change.  New roles bring new challenges, changes in economies will make life a little less certain, and feeling comfortable and unchallenged in a role will bring a desire for new challenges and new growth.  Your career is a journey, your development will be part of that journey.  Sit back, take a deep breath, and enjoy the scenery! 

“Skill development can assist with each method of motivation.”

 

  • Fix the tribal knowledge problem by documenting the job. 
  • Fix your disjointed processes by documenting set processes for everyone to follow.  
  • Unify your learning and knowledge platforms to reduce technical debt

Employers:  Facilitate your team’s Motivational Growth

To this point, I’ve only talked to those going through their journey.  Now, let’s talk about the job of the Employer.  As an employment entity, you have a goal to accomplish.  You might be trying to end world hunger or make it easier to take pictures of cats and post them to social media.  Whatever your end goal, you have hired folks to help you meet and maintain that goal.  As part of the employment contract, you provide an environment that best supports your employees, so they in turn can provide your company with their best work.  Together, you move the organization forward and meet your goal.  

Here’s the thing, particularly with start-ups:  the hiring trend is to try and find people who have done the job in a similar role and convince them to come over and do the same thing, structuring the department and team along the way.  If it’s a new role, new company, or new growth, this makes sense!  The new role and department need to be defined, and scaled, with roles, training, etc. all developed and documented as the department grows.  Here’s where it all breaks down:  because only people are hired who have done the job before, nothing gets documented, training isn’t developed, HR doesn’t know the necessary skills for which to hire, and everything becomes the wild West as folks from different companies and different process plans try to do their thing and make everyone else comply with their process.  Warring processes require a lot of substructure to make it work, and heavy technical debt, and only those folks can do the job because no one else will know what to do.  Tribal knowledge rules, and is lost as folks move on in their careers.  

Fix the Tribe: Write It Down!

I’m going to highlight this scenario by pulling from Ancient Athens.  For generations, they relied on a tribunal of judges that would “remember” the law and rule for or against citizens, and their rulings were final.  This period had no written law and no defined punishments.  It was left to the judges.  As I’m sure you could imagine, the common people were ready to revolt, feeling that the wealthy would be favored due to connections and gifts, while the same rulings were denied to everyone else.  It wasn’t until 621 BC when Draco was commissioned by the leaders of Athens to create their legal system that laws were finally written in stone, literally!  Laws and punishments were all clearly written for all to see, with the associated punishment.  We know these as Draconian Laws, because Draco made them, and they are considered harsh as death was the result of just about every infraction.  The people loved it because the laws were applied equally to everyone.  

Take this to your organization:  It’s difficult to feel safe and motivated if there’s no right way to do things and you are judging performance with subjective measures.  You can’t say, “Be more like Wilson” because Wilson doesn’t share, or have time to share, his processes.  Mentorships are great, but only work when the mentor is willing and able to share their knowledge.  This is why documentation of processes is so important in every organization as soon as possible.  

Unify your Knowledge:  Make Learning Accessible! 

As your teams grow and develop, new processes will be necessary.  To simplify your life, the lives of your team, and the technical debt the IT team needs to manage, unify your knowledge platforms.  So many companies will have more than 3 LMS platforms that are specific to teams, with their own licensing and configuration demands.  Additionally, the teams will have an equal number of Knowledge platforms to share information, all of which have their own licensing and configuration demands.  The result is a strange, Frankenstein-esque technical infrastructure that is so difficult that roles alone cannot maintain the complexity.  

Simplify.  Use one LMS platform, ideally with an integrated Knowledge platform that combines written and engaging training.  Don’t listen to the “need for specialist platforms” because knowledge is knowledge, skills are skills, and an LMS is an LMS, regardless of the bells and whistles they sport to cater to a particular demographic.  If you can’t use the LMS for onboarding, sales, employee development, and customer training, find another LMS.  

Have Questions?

Not sure where to go next?  Why not contact us and find out!  

Still wary and want to see what we are about?  Check out our free training courses or follow The Training Guy on YouTube!  

Jeremy Robb

Jeremy Robb

CLO and Consultant

 

Pilgrims and Native Americans at the first Thanksgiving.

Why Is Gratitude So Important?

From Pilgrims to Union soldiers, Thanksgiving is a day when we all can be united in showing gratitude.  

It’s time for Thanksgiving in the United States, a time when we as a nation take stock and express our gratitude for what we have.  We look into our lives, values, freedoms, relationships, goals, and situations to identify the positive.   In a world of criticism, cancel-culture, anger, distrust, and polarizing politics, we as a nation can sit together at a massive table, carve a turkey, dish out some stuffing, cranberry sauce, candied yams (sweet potatoes), and massive slices of pie and be thankful for what we have.  

The origins shared in American schools about the pilgrims, Plymouth Rock, and salvation from kind Native Americans make a great story (particularly if you have ancestors from the Mayflower), but national days of Thanksgiving were announced regularly before it was formally established by President Abraham Lincoln after the battle of Gettysburg.  The key value of each declaration was the same:  be grateful for what we have.  Unique to every other holiday, this day is dedicated to the idea that we all have something for which to be grateful.  

Co-workers expressing gratitude at work.

Gratitude Builds Positive Relationships

The highest valued connections we have as a society are our social relationships.  It’s through our social relationships that work gets done, businesses are built, cities are run, countries thrive, and the global economy hums.  Positive social relationships increase overall health and well-being, decreasing deaths from smoking, alcohol consumption, and obesity.  The reliable method of building and fostering positive social relationships is expressing gratitude. 

Sharing your gratitude for someone expresses the value you see they bring to your life.  Think about that for a minute.  You can express to someone the value you see in them.  Just how amazing is that!  In a world where we are so divisive and willing to see the worst in people when you choose to see the best in someone, it can change their life.  It’s a pity that people often undervalue the impact of expressing gratitude.  

What’s just as amazing is the personal impact of sharing gratitude with others.  Those who express gratitude are generally more happy, have an overall increased sense of well-being, and have an increased sense of life satisfaction.  Simply by sharing their gratitude, either verbally or written, one can change perspectives for a more positive outlook.  

I was amazed by the amount of research done on this subject and the impact gratitude can have on both the giver and the receiver.  It seems to be the most powerful method of building each other up.  It’s a small wonder that many companies attempt to build a culture of gratitude to create a better overall company culture.  It’s an easy, cost-effective, powerful cultural practice that can have a real impact if done sincerely.  It satisfies a person’s Social and Recognition needs, building a strong push toward motivating through Passion.  

 

“The reliable method of building and fostering positive social relationships is expressing gratitude.”

 

 

Journaling gratitude

Personal Challenge:  Express Your Gratitude to Someone

We are coming into the Holidays which encompasses the majority of December.  I challenge every one of you to express your gratitude to someone and then write down something for which you are grateful every day.  Keep a journal of your gratitude, and measure the change in your outlook throughout the month.  

Share your gratitude with others, and then journal your personal gratitude to make a change.

2.6x More Productive

Employees who trust their leaders are 2.6 times more productive on tasks, bringing more value to the team!

41% Lower Absenteeism

Employees who trust their leaders are more likely to show up, be engaged, and stay engaged.  

50% Less Likely to shop for another job

Employees who trust their leadership are more likely to stay where they are and grow in their roles, rather than shop around for other positions or companies. 

Safety Motivation: 

Does your Team trust You?

Why You Need To Build Trust

We have all been there at one point or another in our careers.  A leader comes into a new position, starts making changes, and the layoffs start.  I’ve seen this happen to other teams, and to my own team.  The results are painful to watch.  The remaining team members just keep their heads down, doing what they are told.  Feedback isn’t taken, feedback isn’t wanted, and no one wants to give the new boss a reason to let them go before they are ready.  Resumes are flying, and soon the team starts to lose members all over the place. 

In the case of really good, quality organizations, leaders that cause this type of disruption for the sake of disruption are let go (I’ve seen this happen twice).  For those organizations that are not quality, they let their best people go, hire new people, and start a cycle of high turnover.  It’s not pretty, and it could all be avoided if leadership took the time to build trust.  

Trust Makes Good Teams

Trusting employees are 260% more motivated to work, have 41% lower rates of absenteeism, and are 50% less likely to look for another job (Reichheld & Dunlop, 2023).  Teams that are able to trust their leadership build better relationships, and are free to create a social structure that is strong, inclusive, and supportive of each other.  Trust satisfies the Safety need in Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, and is itself a foundational need only superseded by the need for survival.  Without it, all other motivational methods are rendered useless.

Distrust Is More Rampant Than You Think

The numbers are grim: roughly 1 in 4 workers don’t trust their employer. At the same time, most employers overestimate their workforce’s trust level by almost 40% (Reichheld & Dunlop, 2023).  That’s right; in most organizations a full quarter of your workforce doesn’t trust you as leadership.  What’s more, you likely overestimate the amount of trust you have because, as an untrusting body, your employees are not going to tell you they don’t trust you for fear of retribution.  

Build Your Trust Now

It’s often been said, you build trust in drops, lose trust in buckets.  If you have a team that doesn’t trust you or your leadership, you have a long row to hoe.  You can either say a lot of words and hope they will believe you (spoiler alert:  they won’t), or you can get to work.  Here’s how you build trust. 

  • Be Empathetic: Know your team and listen to understand.  Your team is going to say things, even if they don’t trust you.  They will tell you there are problems, even if you don’t want to hear them.  Actively listen and try to understand the problem.  Don’t dismiss concerns, listen.  Don’t try to fix anything, listen.  Don’t try to second-guess their problem and come with a solution, LISTEN.  Once you fully understand the concern, circle back around with the team and discuss solutions AND GET THEIR INPUT.  
  • Be Compassionate:  Actively advocate for your team and alleviate their challenges.  Trust that people are basically good, and when given the chance will do all they can to be the best at what they do.  Work to remove obstacles, work round them, or build solutions with the team to make things better.
  • Be Honest:  Transparency and honesty are respected, even if the team doesn’t hear what they want to hear.  There will be bad times.  There may be some folks that will need to leave because of performance issues or attitude issues.  There may be lay-offs that are necessary because projects vary, come to an end, or economics mean demand has gone down.  Show that you understand their concerns, be straight-up honest about why people are being let go (when legally possible), and explain how a decision was trickled down to them.  
  • Be Honorable:  If you say you are going do to something, do it.  If you tell people that there will be no lay-offs, keep your word.  If you promise training and career development options, don’t exclude anyone.  The minute you break your word, you are no longer trustworthy.  

“A full quarter of your employees doesn’t trust you as leadership.”

  • Be Empathetic: Know your team and listen to understand
  • Be Compassionate:  Actively advocate for your team and alleviate their challenges
  • Be Honest:  Transparency and honesty are respected
  • Be Honorable:  If you say you are going do to something, do it

Learn More | Contact Us

 

Everyone is talking about AI, though they generally mean Generative AI.  While GenAI will likely have a huge impact on Learning and Development, I’d like to explore the impacts of Analytical, or Behavioral, AI.  Behavioral AI is the sleeping giant of Narrow AI applications, and will likely have a larger impact on our lives and business than Generative AI.  But how will it impact training? 

You know you have a problem: users aren’t using the training you purchased, and Management wants to cut it. What can you do? How can you bridge the gap and show the value of training to Managers, while also encouraging your employees to use the courses available? Here are 5 ways:
1. Do your job task analyses
2. Centralize your learning in one place
3. Build job-based learning paths for every role
4. Include a budget for industry certifications
5. Have the Management Champion learning

You are a training professional, and your company has finally invested in a large learning library with curated content that covers just about every possible skill under the sun. You are thrilled because your co-workers in all departments can up-skill themselves and grow. And yet, it doesn’t get used, and management start asking why they even invested in the first place. Below we talk about why there’s a disconnect between management and employees regarding training.

The Training Disconnect: Why Isn't Your Learning Library Getting Used?
The Training Disconnect: Why Isn’t Your Learning Library Getting Used?

In my previous role, our company had invested in a large, curated online training library for use by our employees. It was amazing, massive, and a little difficult to use if you didn’t know what you needed. Still, it was an amazing investment in the growth of individuals: but no one knew it was there. I would like to say this was an exception to the rule, but at nearly every job I’ve ever had, this has been the standard. Companies will invest in training libraries and make them available to their employees, and yet they are rarely utilized. This has two impacts:

  1. Management feels that training is a waste of money
  2. Employees feel like they are on their own when it comes to advancing their career

Both are right, in a way, which is concerning, and yet it has management and employees at odds. Managers will point out that training isn’t being used when it’s available, and employees point out that they didn’t know it was there and couldn’t navigate the massive library.

Let’s talk about the Management position first, to understand their concerns. When they see an investment not being used, they see a waste of resources that could go to hiring another Sales executive or Engineer. Why are we paying for something that is standing idle? It’s not in the best interest of the business to have that program on the books when we can use those resources elsewhere to better grow the business. And, from a certain point of view, they are right. Any resource not used within a company is a wasted resource.

This prompts the first question from management: Why did we invest in this learning library in the first place? And any HR rep or L&D team member can quickly reply: to invest in up-skilling of our employee base and build a resilient organization. That should be obvious. But no one seems to ask the next question, or rather, don’t like the answer: Then why aren’t employees using it?

This goes to the Employee point of view. Employees want to grow in their careers, earn better pay, become more knowledgeable, and respected within their circles of influence. This comes from experience and learning. Training can help with this, and often a diverse, liberal training library can help fill gaps that otherwise are tough to pick up on the job. This is where those large, curated libraries of training topics are so valuable: they have such a diverse collection that employees can find just about any skill to learn and develop. It’s also their curse: there’s SO MUCH THERE that it’s tough to get started. Even if you have a general idea, often there are 5-10 difference courses on the same topic, which is right? Employees need guidance when navigating these large libraries to use them effectively.

So, why are the libraries not being used? Employees don’t know they are there, and/or they don’t know where to start. They need content to be organized in a logical manner that makes sense for their role.

We have all been there at some point in our lives; trying to do something that seems so pointless. It may be filling out a timecard with multiple activities, or answering phones only to redirect them to someone else. The tasks seem pointless in themselves, and regardless of the value the task has to someone else, it makes it less of a priority to get done. We often ask ourselves, what is the purpose?

A purpose is a powerful motivator. Nations have gone to war because of a sense of purpose, civilizations have been created and extinguished through purpose. A purpose will guide decisions, justify actions, and inform strategy. It has brought products to market, businesses rise and fall by it, and new technologies discovered every day come and go based on finding a purpose. It’s safe to say that humanity needs to find a purpose to have an impact. In the workplace, there are layers of purpose to be found, though I’d like to focus on three: enterprise purpose, team purpose, and personal purpose.

Enterprise Purpose

Enterprise purpose, at least by my definition, is the reason and driving force for the company’s existence. It can be as simple as, “Safeguard your Savings” for a bank, or “Streamline your Work” for process automation. Growing up in the ’80s the media often portrayed the purpose of many a faceless corporate giant as “making more money,” and often “making more money for executives.” Needless to say, it was easy to vilify these entities in various workplace comedies with the little guy having to fight against the big corporate money machine.

Around the 2000s there was a shift, starting with tech companies (at least then the global marketplace) and quickly spreading to other organizations: defining a positive, socially impactful purpose. Google began with “Don’t be evil” as their purpose, and though vague it resonated with employees. Other corporate entities began to see the benefits of sharing their purpose as well: both customers and employees could get behind them. It drove adoption, profits, hiring, and retention. I will honestly say that if I am ever reached out to by another company, I always ask about the company’s purpose. I need to know where they are and what drives them.

Team Purpose

The team purpose is very similar to corporate or enterprise purpose but at the team level. It’s all well and good to have a corporate purpose of “End Cyber Bullying,” but where does your accounting team fit into that purpose? Break it down further, how does your internal billing team relate to that purpose? By defining a purpose, decisions are informed by clear guidelines. Teams know what they are doing, and how it impacts the company and customers, and are empowered to make decisions based on that purpose.

Personal Purpose

It’s difficult to talk about personal purpose without talking about a moral compass. To me, they seem the same. A personal purpose is what you, and you alone, value and desire. It will impact the career you strive for, the length of time you are at a company, and the effort you put in while at a company. If you value titles over opportunity, that will impact job growth moving forward. If your values match well with a company, you are likely to remain longer than if your values are in direct contrast.

For instance, my purpose is to provide future security to my two boys with autism, while inclusively building career opportunities through training and development. I value the importance of family, and I value the importance of allowing everyone to be successful.

When the Stars Align (or Not)

In a perfect world, all three levels of purpose will align. When that happens you see happy customers and employees, successful teams and companies. Everyone is driven by the same goals because they know what they want, what the team wants, and what the company wants. It’s truly magical when that happens.

And when it doesn’t, that’s when you have issues. Employees without purpose or who lack the understanding of their purpose become frustrated. It’s much like being tested on unknown criteria and not knowing the expected results. If you feel that you do not have a purpose for your team or organization, sit down with your manager and work out that purpose. If your manager isn’t sure either, then it’s a good time for both of you to work out clear-cut expectations and how you can meet those expectations. Then you both will be more satisfied with the work and results!