Strangely enough this is a post in response to my own question. If I wasn’t so opinionated I might feel as if I was being duped into this.
The question came from a longer Twiiter exchange with Gail Severini. The last several comments were thus:
Gail: Don’t we all dream of being engaged in an org that encourages us to think for ourselves and to think together?
Me: Spot on, Gail. So putting on my Theory of Constraints hat I ask, what’s the barrier to that happening?
Gail: Great question – I am going to have to reflect on that. What’s your answer?
Hmm. I probably wouldn’t have asked that if knew I had to answer it. Just kidding.
The short answer is: It’s the Incentives.
The long answer is:
We do what we are incented to do. Sometimes that’s good. Sometimes that’s very bad.
The problem is that we mostly incent things with the best intentions and don’t understand the unintended consequences of not quite getting that right.
And you see incentives aren’t always monetary. Or at least not blatantly so. You see my incentive might be to please my manager by prioritizing his pet projects. Or my incentive might be to avoid the wrath of my manager by prioritizing tasks or projects that really upset him if they are not done.
So in the case of being encouraged to think for ourselves and think collaboratively, we must ask if we are incented to behave that way. Are we rewarded for that behavior?
That’s not an easy question. Lots of organizations talk about it. Lots of organizations have suggestion boxes and collaborative meetings. And nothing comes of it, not diddly squat. Because it’s just talk.
There’s no incentive to make it happen. And without incentive there’s no priority. And without priority we are all too busy to get it done.
But once you have incentive, it gets prioritized. And once it’s prioritized you put a system in place to make it happen.
And what’s the incentive? You make your manager happy.
So all the way back to the beginning. You remove the barrier by training managers at all levels to show appreciation and approval and happiness for the signs of independent and collaborative thinking. If that’s what makes you happy, that’s what your people will do.
Or something like that.
Also, you can check out Gail’s great website here.
Once More Unto the Change 