Organizations like this are the future of work. Please, before showering me with contempt, go to Google and enter the words: equity investment firms, Silicon Valley.

Thus far, Elon Musk has taken on the insurmountable task of paving the way for an urgent need to transform our world to electric mobility.

10 Years folks. The tipping point of the impossible is taking place right now. Every auto manufacturer is converting to electric, and in its wake, the petrochemical cartel is, shall we say, “acting out?”

The world doesn’t need more armchair critics.

The world needs new workers. Problem solvers. Artisans of their own lives. The roles are infinite. Solutions and beauty. Lest there be any doubt about the urgency at hand, consider the fact that one of the first applications of the technology revolution is cleaning up after the filthy industrial revolution before it.

This helplessness thing does not suit us. Nor does responding to someone’s success with cynicism and contempt.

As for Elon Musk, I study him. Here is a man who didn’t “buy” Twitter. His success as an innovator is so thorough that his name alone financed that purchase.

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One of the few things I know for sure is that when we believe there isn’t enough for all of us, we turn on each other. The purpose of democracy is to provide relevance to every citizen. The purpose of democracy is to provide relevance to every citizen. For many of us, that relevance begins with our work.

As the world undergoes the most extensive restructuring of work in 300 years, not one political leader has told the American people how to remain relevant in this new world of work.

Over 50 years ago, advertising companies introduced focus groups that gave politicians the messages we most wanted to hear. When was the last time you heard a politician tell us what to do? The last President that did this inspired young people to give back to the world with the Peace Corps. He told us we were out of shape and brought physical education into our schools.

Today, instead of guidance, we hear promises. We have also come to know most of these promises will not flourish. More profoundly, when we are afraid and uncomfortable with change, promises encourage people to wait, all at a time when action is the only way forward.

Before the pandemic, we celebrated a 3.8% unemployment rate. But, about half of our nation’s workers characterized themselves as “underemployed.”

Who are these people?

They are the mothers that hold 2-3 cheap jobs to keep a roof over their family. They are the mothers getting home at 2 in the morning exhausted. But, before they go to bed, they make lunch for their children.

Underemployment is deeply influenced by the quality of our schools. Most continue to prepare our children for the Industrial Revolution. Young adults have invested in graduate degrees only to find themselves serving coffee and picking people for Uber. We have yet to find one school that requires sales training, presentation skills, the ability to build a customized support system that matches their vision, mission, or purpose. Yes, learning these life skills requires courage. In an ideal world, you would be consistently telling them why personal change is worth the effort.

Our world changes so quickly that today’s college graduates will change careers, not jobs, four to six times. Within this frenzy, we need to be building the ability to graciously and fluidly connect with the right people. Without these skills, no one will know they are here.

Of course, many of us are frightened we will not change in time. People cannot change if they are isolated. Millions of our citizens need to work, but without help, they look to the future and lose confidence there is a place for them. Of course, we have turmoil.

Our nation is in deep trouble because of our neglect in guiding all-American workers. But, we are also in jeopardy on a global scale. China, Germany, Japan, Canada, and South Korea have sophisticated strategies to build rather than ignore the strength of their talent. We belly-ache about technology taking away rote and mind-numbing jobs. These countries use technology to free the mind for new and essential work. German automakers are well-known examples of investing in cutting-edge technology and training their workers to move into new roles. Like many of the other nations that are ahead of us, Germany developed partnerships with employers and educational institutions to keep their workers employed and competitive.

We would probably call that socialism. Actually, it is good business.

At the very least, being given freedom from rote and monotonous work allows us to return to using work as a platform for our lives, abundance, and meaning. Today, we can live wherever we want to. I no longer have to grab a flight to New York or Europe to do business. I just turn on my computer.

Technology also offers us the opportunity to design careers and businesses that we love. I have been facilitating that outcome for 30 years. Letting go of mediocrity and developing work that matches our career DNA is one of the greatest opportunities in life.

One of the most important lessons I have learned from my work is that when we find our true purpose, there is always a solution to make that work sustainable.

So, while other countries are showing their workers the way, we shower our people with bad ideas. One candidate implied that technology companies had exploited and victimized.

We are about to launch a new company designed to help end underemployment without financial barriers. As a social entrepreneur, I believe that making our solutions available to everyone who works that right and the best thing to do with my life. But, the scope of this problem is so big that doing it alone would feel like trying to put out a forest fire with a tablespoon.

We need your guidance.

We need a consistent voice of why changing ourselves is so very important for our economy, health, joy, fulfillment, and families.

You know the words by heart, “Ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country.”

Our country needs an awakening.

There are millions of problems that need to be solved.

There are millions of people that want to help.

What could happen to the spirit of our country if we become a nation of mentors?

Hard to visualize?

We live in a country that exists because of imagination.

The post Dear Mr. President, What About Our Work? appeared first on Inspired Work Services.

– John F. Kennedy

I grew up in a little dirtbag town with adoptive violent and evangelical parents. In that environment, I remember watching JFK get elected and introduce a form of optimism and eloquence, unlike any president since. In my childhood, the most significant impact of Television was to see our President and his wife demonstrate that while civility and eloquence were not in my home, it was alive and well in our country. I was too young to fully understand politics and the global challenges he wrestled with. But, I was mesmerized with the beauty of that family and his poetic speeches. Perhaps it was the music in his voice that connected with me at the deepest level. I wanted to be part of whatever he was selling.

I remember the day it all came to an end. I was in first or second grade when our principal came into my schoolroom and announced that someone had just murdered the President. My father pulled up in his new Pontiac Bonneville. As my sister and I approached it, the door locks popped up. We got into the car. Everyone was wordless. When we walked into the living room our mother was sitting in front of the TV sobbing.

For the next decade, optimism took a back seat to cynicism and contempt. Baby boomers engaged or revolted in a pointless war. After Watergate, they traded in their protests for credit cards.

But, we lost far more. John F. Kennedy was the last President before our political system was taken over by focus groups. Instead, he told us to take action. Kennedy inspired us to take responsibility for our lives, to give and contribute to the less fortunate. Here was a President that told Americans how to build upon our postwar optimism. Whether they liked him or not, American people joined hands in making the world a better place. He brought poetry into our politics by using words that soared. He spoke with such credibility that we listened.

Today, politicians promise they are going to fix things. They promise to give us jobs, cut taxes, put more in our pockets, save us from climate change or bring back coal and cashiers in malls. But, they never tell us we are responsible for how things have turned out.

Today, we can recite, “Ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country.” But how many of us are living the words?

This Friday will mark the 56th year since his passing.

The motorcade carrying the President and his wife, the Governor of Texas, and his wife was on its way to the Dallas Trade Mart. The transcript of the speech he never delivered portrays ideals, and a way of being our country would do well to remember.

 On Leadership

“This link between leadership and learning is not only essential at the community level. It is even more indispensable in world affairs. Ignorance and misinformation can handicap the progress of a city or a company, but they can, if allowed to prevail in foreign policy, handicap this country’s security. In a world of complex and continuing problems, in a world full of frustrations and irritations, America’s leadership must be guided by the lights of learning and reason – – or else those who confuse rhetoric with reality and the plausible with the possible will gain the popular ascendancy with the seeming swift and simple solutions to every world problem.”

On Partisanship

“There will always be dissident voices heard in the land, expressing opposition without alternatives, finding fault but never favor, perceiving gloom on every side and seeking influence without responsibility. Those voices are inevitable. 

But today other voices are heard in the land – – voices preaching doctrines wholly unrelated to reality, wholly unsuited to the sixties, doctrines which apparently assume that words will suffice without weapons, that vituperation is as good as victory and that peace is a sign of weakness. At a time when the national debt is steadily being reduced in terms of its burden on our economy, they see that debt as the greatest single threat to our security. At a time when we are steadily reducing the number of Federal employees serving every thousand citizens, they fear those supposed hordes of civil servants far more than the actual hordes of opposing armies.

We cannot expect that everyone, to use the phrase of a decade ago, will “talk sense to the American people.” But we can hope that fewer people will listen to nonsense. And the notion that this Nation is headed for defeat through deficit or that strength is but a matter of slogans, is nothing but just plain nonsense.”

On the Nation’s Future

“Almost everywhere we look, the story is the same. In Latin America, in Asia, in the councils of the world and in the jungles of far-off nations, there is now renewed confidence in our country and our convictions.

For this country is moving and it must not stop. It cannot stop. For this is a time for courage and a time for the challenge. Neither conformity nor complacency will do. Neither the fanatics nor the faint-hearted are needed. And our duty as a party is not to our party alone, but to the Nation, and, indeed…to all mankind. Our duty is not merely the preservation of political power but the preservation of peace and freedom.

So let us not be petty when our cause is so great. Let us not quarrel amongst ourselves when our Nation’s future is at stake. Let us stand together with renewed confidence in our cause – – united in our heritage of the past and our hopes for the future – – and determined that this land we love shall lead all mankind into new frontiers of peace and abundance.”

When we embrace his message, We are not a Democrat or Republican.

John F Kennedy’s presidency didn’t happen because of what he was going to do for us.

It happened because of what he would ask of us.

Brought to you by David Harder, President – Inspired Work, Inc.

Schedule 15-Minutes to Discuss Your Workplace or Career with David (Here)

(C) Copyright, 2019, Inspired Work, Inc. – (All Rights Reserved)

The post The Speech John F Kennedy Was About to Give on the Day He Died appeared first on Inspired Work Services.

The message was simple:

“If you are mentally or emotionally unwell, you ought to see a therapist. But, if you are intention is to become more successful, than you will realize far more value by seeing a coach.”

There are many great Psychology departments in our universities. These schools provide remarkable education in the techniques of facilitating emotional, physical, and behavioral breakthroughs. But, they offer nothing in teaching therapists and psychologists how to make a good living from the endeavor. Right now, the coaching industry is doing a far better job of teaching them life skills that build an affluent practice.

Years ago, I was asked to become a founding board member of the Professional Coaches and Mentors Association. In that environment, I became troubled by the fact that most coaches take a quick course and then develop their skills on the job. A psychologist is required to develop comprehensive technical skills before they connect with a client. On the other hand, the schools fall flat in helping graduates understand the world of commerce, of making a living or starting a business. This is why so many healthcare professionals partner with our company. But, their schools offered nothing to speak of in becoming proficient with sales, business development, digital marketing, and branding.

At Inspired Work, while I participated in the coaching industry, I have never viewed myself as a coach. Much of my education emerged from leading thousands of people through dynamic group programs. Many of our graduates have come back to us with the desire to help launch their first business, provide successful career marketing campaigns, and become more effective with their existing job or business.

I have never viewed myself as a coach. My role is as an orchestrator. Our two-day program moves clients into results that could take months in a one-on-one coaching process. Instead of spending gobs of time to define their ideal role, they have clarity in all they want to accomplish. In other words, rather than continuing with any form of aimlessness, they are directive, perhaps even bossy. As a result, we can go straight to designing a business plan, build necessary skills, make introductions to key hiring managers, or engage in marketing their career. Every client is a blank canvas that has been painted with their aspirations, needs, expectations, and shortcomings. Many coaches would find that too directive.

Today, I believe the coaching and psychology professions would have a great deal to gain by studying each other. Instead of spending so much time addressing each other’s shortcomings, consider their success. Psychologists tend to have far more comprehensive skills in dealing with emotional wounds, behavior, and self-actualization. But, they are given a minimal understanding of how to build a productive career, deal with a transition, or launch a new business. Our graduate schools offer nothing in terms of building the skills that can make us wealthy, nothing in how to construct a business platform that enhances our personal lives, and nothing in developing and marketing a brand.

On the other hand, the coaching profession could use a big dose of understanding of how to capture the complexities of human development. When there is a deficit in this area, a critical turning point can be missed by directly not paying attention. In the absence of an answer, how many tell the client, they don’t have an answer but will get one?

Another area in which both professions could use improvements is in expressing the actual value of their work. Far too many coaching professionals and therapists gloss over the return on investment. Here is an example. One of my close friends has been recognized as one of the best executive development coaches in the world. This masterful coach earns well over a million dollars per year. She accepts about eight clients per year. She is paid because of the results. When a client organization promotes a new executive into taking a significant role, they call her. If the net profits in that group are 40 million, by the end of that year, the gains are 2 or even 3 times that amount.

One of our clients recently encountered a big staffing challenge. One of the business units had almost 40 openings. We designed a solution for the executive, and each role was filled within 30 days. This saved over $300 in external fees and helped retain existing employees.

To summarize, the therapeutic profession needs to develop what we call “courage skills.” Conversely, many business people dismissively call them “soft skills.” These include learning how to sell one’s services, developing strong consultative sales abilities, being able to make effective presentations, and, most importantly learn how to improve the kinds of support systems that generate your business, intellectual growth, and standing in the community.

As for the coaching world, there really are no shortcuts to becoming a master. If you want to work with organizations, get mentors who are hugely successful in this area. Find coaches that can help you understand how to access and speak to the needs and expectations of an organization’s buying influences. Instead of focusing on making an individual feel better, help them understand how to build their self worth by hitting and even sailing past the business targets.

In all cases, the consumers must follow their gut and look for professionals with the skills and the emotional sobriety to help them achieve what they want and need. My most prominent personal bias in this area is that I will not work with a therapist on my long and beautiful, soon-to-be-married relationship if she or he is not in a successful marriage as well. I will not work with someone who is struggling with money to advise us on how to generate more revenue.

We learn nothing of value by studying dysfunction. Study the best.

Perhaps 20 years ago, a highly respected industrial psychologist came through our Inspired Work Program. As a result, he launched an executive and entrepreneur coaching business. Through the grapevine, I heard that he had become rather wealthy. This news irritated me. So, I took him out for a lovely dinner. Both of us are hard workers who don’t cut corners. I told him how irritated I was with the news that his economic worth was in the stratosphere and asked if he could tell me how to do that. He had become an instructor in a highly regarded business school where he worked with budding entrepreneurs. Whenever he worked with a start-up that he believed would become successful, he offered to replace monetary compensation for stock. Three of those businesses snowballed and became successful publicly traded companies.

From my vantage point, the number one reason people fail is through isolation. That is an outcome of fear. So many of us are frightened of getting attention because it might hurt us. At the very least, that hurt in history. Many coaches could become more effective in helping their clients learn from their past. But, an equally large number of therapists could look to coaches as a resource for looking into the future.

Personally, I believe it is time for the coaching industry to be subject to the same type of licensing that takes place with healthcare providers. To enter someone’s life and influence their minds and their outcomes is a sacred contract. But, I also believe that it is time for therapists, psychologists, and psychiatrists to become far more versed in helping high-functioning, educated, and successful people attain even greater success and fulfillment.

Active learning, curious, joyful curiosity about becoming part of the cutting edge pushes away mediocrity. I don’t pay much attention to all of the vilifying directed towards 1%. Sure, there are some true pieholes in the wealth sector. But, there are just as many struggling to get by. Pay attention to the people that are changing the world. Learn from those who are growing every single day. Watch the people who are happy and effective, whether they are with their children at home or are standing in front of a board of directors.

I’ve been in the game of helping people love their work for almost 30 years. There have been countless times when someone asks if I can help them. My usual answer is an enthusiastic “yes.” But, there have been times where I’m clueless about how that will occur outside of the fact that when some of us say we will do it, we are willing to do whatever it takes to make it work.

Before launching our first program, I met with people who wanted to change their careers and their lives. One night, a young man came to my door. He looked a bit exhausted and scared. I asked what he wanted to accomplish. “I am dying from AIDS. I don’t want to stay home alone, waiting for the end. A friend of mine suggested that you might be able to help me get the most out of every day that I have left. Will you help me?”

I instantly responded, “Yes.” I was terrified. He died five months later. But, we worked together in helping him give to others and live with his definition of fulfillment. He told me of looking in the mirror at night only to realize he was not defeated. His demeanor surprised him because he was using all that was left to honor himself and others.

When he passed, his parents whisked away with his remains. When we met, he felt betrayed by their shame. Instead, we worked together in identifying what he most wanted to accomplish. I never saw him again, but he gave me the awareness of just how precious life is.

In a recent appearance on Saturday Night Live, Adam Sandler did a piece as the owner of Romano Travel, telling the audience of their beautiful tours of Europe. But, he warned the viewer, “If you are miserable where you are today, you will probably be miserable when we take you to these beautiful places, filled with art and culture. You will probably be miserable when you sit down to a magnificent meal in Roma. So, if you are miserable, please stay home.”

The world today is filled with choices for all of us. The world is also changing so quickly that we need everyone with capabilities to help the rest of us learn how to change and become active contributors to the future.

Whether you are a coach or a therapist, a banker or investor, a billionaire or someone homeless, every single day offers a choice for us to use our time to become the best that we can be. Generously give yourself to others and the results might outstrip your wildest ambitions.

Brought to you by David Harder, President – Inspired Work, Inc.

Schedule 15-Minutes to Discuss Your Workplace or Career with David (Here)

(C) Copyright, 2019, Inspired Work, Inc. – (All Rights Reserved)

The post Coach or Therapist? appeared first on Inspired Work Services.

Then, everything changed. Academics and business authors suggest that we get rid of them. But, the need for mid-managers is stronger than ever. It is the role of the manager that must be changed, transformed, and reimagined. Just be prepared for the pushback when you suggest this to a mid-manager. Most likely, their response will be, “I’m too busy.”

“But, the very future of your workers depends on your reinvention.”

“I’ll pencil it in over lunch…at my desk.”

Advancing technology is like a tornado from Oz blowing task work away. In its aftermath, we find entire categories of workers who need to change. This is why our managers must change, transform and reimagine their careers. As for employers, this is the time to carefully question if laying off the very people who know the most about your frontline is such a good idea. In reality, the mid-managers ought to be the first target for learning how to change and learning how to show others how to change as well.

As technology accelerates it is giving us freedom. The most cynical or contempt-filled reader will respond, “What, freedom from having an income?” But, it is giving us freedom from monotonous tasks, quotas, and other forms of mind-numbing work. The kinds of new work that is coming towards us are more interesting, visionary, and impactful in the world. The greatest social entrepreneurs are using technology to change the world. For example, Peter Diamandis says, “The best way to become a billionaire is to help a billion people.” Consider how lame that statement would have been just 20 years ago.

As the value of task work and its workers plummet, the work to be done is radically different. Instead of tasks, an endless stream of new jobs and roles is emerging. The new workplace will reward those with any or a group of these skills: Creativity, narrative, accountability, empathy, engagement, solving problems, influencing others, sales, and managing the “big picture.”

Robotics and software have been game-changers with blue-collar work. De-monetized services such as LinkedIn and Facebook are impacting millions of white-collar workers. But, Artificial Intelligence will cause disruption as we have never witnessed before. Wealth managers will need to become curators. Medical research will exponentially find more cures for disease. Higher education will be available without paying a cent.

The most valued middle managers will be the ones that are only too happy to let go of tasks so they can develop their employer’s greatest asset, its people. They will be responsible for helping others to embrace active learning, develop new life skills, and to use new forms of technology that exponentially grow personal productivity.

Don’t trust the senior executives, the academics, and the authors of self-help books to propose a solution. Even the Harvard Business Review, characterizes mid-managers as the most disengaged of all workers. They are overworked, undervalued, and the most at-risk during layoffs.

The rock stars are quite different. We recently finished an executive development project with one of the most brilliant scientists in the world. Until we met, his value as an individual contributor had received global recognition. But, in one promotion, he was responsible for hundreds of his company’s best and brightest scientists.

During our first meeting, I said,

“Up until today, you have been judged and promoted because you are a brilliant scientist. But, from this moment forward, your value will be measured in how you inspire hundreds of brilliant scientists to change the world.”

His eyes lit up. The new mission became the centerpiece in how he wanted to grow. Now, he engages with his direct reports with the central mission of rewarding high personal performance with breakthroughs in their careers. He is teaching his direct reports to harness the needs and expectations of their workers with growth, progress and other forms of success.

The greatest managers know the needs and expectations of every person that reports to them. They take the time to harness those needs into energy and action. A great manager will conspire to create a culture that people love because love pushes us to perform way outside of our comfort zones. Great managers teach active learning, influence, and help their highest performers connect with game-changing mentors. They not only make it safe to ask for help, they often reward employees who do.

Unfortunately, frenzy breeds thoughtlessness. In so many organizations, the CEO doesn’t think of the impact that disengaged managers have on their profits and customers. Many don’t realize that disengaged managers are actually dooming the CEOs future.

How do we get started? We begin by elevating the value of our time. After we deliver an engagement program to an intact team, most everyone wants to sustain the transformation. That happens when they use small rituals that produce mindfulness.

One of them is to answer a few questions at the beginning of each morning. Instead of reading e-mails and listening to voicemails, they take 5-minutes to answer a few questions that organizes their priorities.

Here is an example:

• Who most needs my attention and inspiration?
• What is the most valuable problem to solve today?
• Describe today’s ideal blend of tactical and strategic work.
• How can I best sell our ideas and solutions?
• How can I best take care of myself?
• What can I do to create greater engagement and effectiveness with our team?
• Describe one really valuable action that might require your courage.

It takes five minutes.

What is the point?

In the years ahead, technology isn’t taking away our value. It is up to us to make the kind of practical and visionary changes that elevate our value, the allow us to change the world, and to help the people around us.

Brought to you by David Harder, President – Inspired Work, Inc.

Schedule 15-Minutes to Discuss Your Workplace or Career with David (Here)

(C) Copyright, 2019, Inspired Work, Inc. – (All Rights Reserved)

The post Mid-Managment, Engagements Final Frontier! appeared first on Inspired Work Services.

• United Airlines or Southwest Airlines?

• Google or Yahoo?

• Vons/Safeway or Trader Joe’s?

Odds are high that you have identified the better employer with each example simply through word-of-mouth or direct customer experience. Or, you might be seriously interested in working for one of these organizations and have read employee feedback at Glass Door and Indeed.

The war for talent is back but it bears little resemblance to the war employers were having just 12 years ago. According to Gallup’s latest global engagement survey, only 13% of the world’s workers are engaged. Today’s costliest and yet game-changing segment to recruit is the engaged worker. You know them. They are the ones who are awake, present, interested, actively learning, and able to change with the times.

Successfully reaching them requires a new mindset, especially around the weight and importance we give to brands.

• Consumer brands determine what we promise to our customers.

• Employer brands define what we become.

Here’s the rub. if we skimp on the second, the consumer brand becomes a lie.

True employer brands are not sanitized pitches. The best capture the very essence of a unique tribe with its mission, rituals, with expectations so clear that it is easy to define whether someone is a fit or not.

Here are a couple of examples:

During a leadership program at The Walt Disney Company, someone asked me to describe what I thought the company’s employer brand might be. I responded, “To produce magic at great profit in the midst of chaos.”

Disney has given far more thought to this topic. However, I have observed that if someone loves making magic at great profit in the midst of chaos at Disney, they will be there for decades. When someone isn’t cut out for that tribe, they will exit quickly and possibly become part of the naysayers towards the Disney culture. In any culture, there will be hires that don’t fit. A great employer brand helps identify that mistake quickly.

Make no mistake. The CEO must be in charge of the culture. All too many CEOs walk down the hall to human resources and tell the CHRO to, “fix the engagement problem” or “redefine the culture.” It does not work! Human resources executives tell people they are fixing the culture. Immediately, the tribe looks to the CEO and witnesses business as usual. They take an employer survey. All this accomplishes is to make the managers feel even more inadequate. Managers are sent to retreat centers. They come back enthused and the employees think, “So what.” Then, they start over.

I have a wide variety of individual clients who are human capital executives. Some are launching their own businesses, others are working towards stronger performance, and many are looking for new roles. I tell all of them, “If the CEO isn’t leading the culture, keep your bags packed.”

When a CEO leads the employer brand, we remove confusion from the tribe. In cultures that are led by a visionary and balanced CEO, the results can be spectacular.

The average tenure of a Trader Joe’s cashier is 18 years. The company boasts some of the most enviable customer satisfaction, employee engagement, and profit figures in the industry. The late and great founder Joe Coulombe established a culture of democracy and equality. Successors uphold that culture. Dan Bane, the company’s current CEO continues to visit stores and actually take action on feedback. Recently, I asked a cashier of 26 years why she is so loyal to the company.

She responded,

“It’s like this. A couple of weeks ago, I was the second person in the door. The General Manager had arrived early. He was in the bathrooms scrubbing floors and taking out the trash. She didn’t come over and ask me to step in. No one pulls rank here. I have always felt respected. I have always looked forward to coming to work.”

Today’s strongest employer brands are built on:

Transparency

Technology has produced a revolution in transparency. It is no longer enough to make up a story to recruit people when it isn’t true and the company either doesn’t or can’t live up to the brand. Glass Door and many other platforms pulled the covers off employers. Today, a savvy candidate can learn more about a hiring manager than many direct reports.

Don’t make things up! Build a strong employer brand that is based on the truth. If the truth isn’t so hot, fix your culture. The Transparency Revolution has impacted our culture with such force, most organizations are only beginning to come to terms with the fact that we can no longer hide anything.

Consider how transparency is impacting wrongdoing in organizations that paid off victims of sexual assault. Many of them have become cultures where the most skilled and self-confident talent won’t even consider working there. Because, everyone is a journalist and everyone has access. Candidates can find out whether your culture is a dead end, a place to launch a new career, an environment that is fair, a place where realizing potential is greeted with career growth. Many will know if the green initiative is the real deal or just lip service. They will go onto social networking sites and gather information about virtually everyone working in a department.

Don’t like this development? It doesn’t matter. Whatever your employer brand is, it ought to hold up to all scrutiny. In other words, it is far easier to live with nothing to hide.

Equality

I’m not suggesting what most people are thinking.

In the 70s, American business was seduced into an ideology that made shareholders the king of business. The new model actually led to CEOs becoming softer rather than stronger. They no longer had to give equal attention to customers and employees. With businesses viewed as commodities, the organization began factoring in how much irritation a customer would absorb in return for low prices. Employees became assets during good times and liabilities the moment there was a downturn.

We have paid dearly for that blind turn. If we want optimum performance in all settings, we have to respect all segments of the business. Strong employer brands give customers, shareholders and employees equal importance.

We need more CEOs who apply this kind of vigor to their own roles.

A Defined Tribe

The CEO or owner must define the tribe because any other attempts will become corrupt with differences and turf.

Virtually every great employer brand contained in this article produces images of the type of people who work there and what it feels like to be there. The brand tells a story so clearly that the morals, values, ethics are clear. The contract between employee and customer is effortlessly envisioned. For example, if you have ever had to call Apple for service, you have probably encountered someone who is accountable, personable, interested, and committed to solving your problem. Try that with a big box cable company. Many of us would view Apple as an abusive environment simpy as an extension of Steve Jobs personality. But, Jobs expected the same performance standards that he practiced on a personal level. Warts and all, he wasn’t one of those CEOs who promised the masses perfection without the necessary action to fulfill that vision.

In an era where morality is becoming more precious every day, an employer brand states clearly, how it handles issues of gender equality, diversity, solving its internal problems, and how it responds to crisis.

A great employer brand defines how to build strong relationships with other workers, which becomes the glue, it seems, within our best employer brands.

There is much more about employer branding and the CEO’s role in building a culture in my latest book, The Workplace Engagement Solution (Career Press).

In the interim, I welcome your comments.

The post Why the Employer Brand is the Most Important Brand of All appeared first on Inspired Work Services.

• United Airlines or Southwest Airlines?
• Google or Yahoo?
• Vons/Safeway or Trader Joe’s?

Odds are high that you have identified the better employer with each example simply through word-of-mouth or direct customer experience. Or, you might be seriously interested in working for one of these organizations and have read employee feedback at Glass Door or Indeed.

The war for talent is back but it bears little resemblance to the war employers were having 12 years ago. According to Gallup’s latest global engagement survey, only 13% of the world’s workers are engaged. The real war is focused on attracting the 13%. Unfortunately, the world is also filled with disengaged CEOs who believe if their company provides a commodity, in other words, low prices, customer satisfaction and employee morale are the expected casualties. How much irritation will an airline customer absorb in order to get a cheap ticket? If a grocer is the only game for the next 3 miles, of course customers will put up with expired dates on food and Yelp reviews that include, “The employees need to be put on suicide watch.”

For every CEO that makes excuses for rotten cultures and irritated customers, we find another company occupying the same niche that makes the employee & customer experiences their #1 foundation for success. Time and time again, we can examine Southwest, Trader Joe’s or Google and find unique employer brands that clearly spell out the characteristics of the tribe, the people who will fit into that tribe, and the expectations in how the tribe responds to the customer’s needs and expectations. Great employer brands can be clearly articulated and followed. The best establish consistent behavior which leads to faith for the employees and the customers.

In the late 90s, an administrator in our company insisted that we convert from Apple to PC. Tears fell as she pulled my old Mac out of my trembling hands. For the first time, we had software crashses and viruses. But, the turning point happened when I reached out to customer service at Microsoft and tried to solve a problem so I could work through the weekend. Three hours and ten minutes later, I gave up. During that time, I had been transferred over and over. I was talked down to, instructed to go through the same ineffective procedures repetitively and questioned if I was following their directions.

Today, we are an Apple proud company. The hardware works almost all of the time. But, when there is a problem, I have faith that a smart, humble, respectful, and above all, effective employer will help us.

Why are employer brands more important than consumer brands?

Because employees fulfill the promise of the consumer brand. If a customer’s actual experience differs from the consumer brand’s promise, they will leave because the organization has lied to them. A few years ago, we reached a tipping point with transparency. Every single consumer is a journalist and judge. Every employee has the option of revealing the truth around their employment experience. In fact, a savvy candidate can learn more about the hiring manager than many of the people reporting to her or to him.

Once the word gets out, the premium talent runs when they hear your name. As CEO of Yahoo, Marissa Mayer, in a now legendary act of desperation, spent over a billion dollars acquiring smart start-ups. But, she wasn’t pursuing unique technology or access to new markets. She couldn’t get the premium talent required to turn Yahoo around. Think of it. When Stanford’s best graduates hit the market they might be thinking, “Google, Apple, or entrepreneurship?” But Yahoo? Some of the world’s better candidates would view a stint at Yahoo as a career killer. They envision a tribe of stagnant stakeholders that torpedo change and go out of their way to fly under the radar. One client indicated getting anything done there was a bit like trying to get fresh bread in Russia.

For Yahoo as well as other employers, the employer brand determines what an organization becomes.

Getting personal, there is a supermarket within 300 yards of our home in Pacific Palisades. We only visit it when we have an emergency, such as needing an ingredient to finish a meal. Yelp reviews give feedback like, “The employees in this store ought to be placed on suicide watch.” We have encountered cashiers that hold conversations with other cashiers without ever looking a customer in the eye! As a result, for every dollar we spend at this store, we spend 20 at another store, which is five miles away and is a bit more expensive.

The nearest Trader Joes is 10 miles from our home. We drive in once-a-month to get supplies. The average tenure of the company’s cashiers is twenty-one years. While their prices compete with commodity oriented stores, the customer experience is as good as any luxury brand. A few months ago, I misplaced a pair of sunglasses at the store. I visited the manager’s desk who greeted me warmly and asked for my number. That afternoon, he called rather joyously. “We have your sunglasses Mr. Harder.” In thanking him, I brought up how wonderful every single employee I’ve ever met at Trader’s is a world-class person. He responded, “Thank you. We love our people and we love our customers.”

If you can’t attract the best talent in your industry, you will never achieve category leadership. Your employees will actively or passively practice disengagement. Customers will have lower rather than higher expectations.

Today’s savvy CEOs will not tell human resources to “fix the engagement problem” or “improve the quality of candidates.” They will answer basic questions like, “Who do we want to be?” “When people think of our employees, what comes to mind?” “If we want to attract the best talent in this category, what kind of culture do we need to build?” Ultimately, they will do whatever it takes to attract and grow the best talent.

I’ve seen the patterns so many times that when a human resource client discusses a job offer, my first question is, “Has the CEO taken ownership of the culture?” If not, they probably ought to keep their bags packed. Why? The usual pattern is the CEO will tell human resources to fix the culture. The CHRO starts telling employees everything is about to improve. The workers look past his or her shoulder to the CEO and see business as usual. They shrug. An employee survey is issued. The results make the managers feel more inadequate than ever. They are sent to a leadership and come back filled with enthusiasm. The employees respond, “So what?” The human capital executive is shown the door for failing the culture. How many of you have witnessed this sacrificial ritual?

Employer brands are not perfect. However, they are honest. For years, The Walt Disney Company generated mixed feedback in the talent market. When we designed new leadership programs for the company, I had the privilege of working with some of their best and brightest from all over the world. In the midst of a program, one executive asked, “What do you believe is Disney’s employer brand?” I thought about it for a moment and responded, “The employer brand is to attract the talent that creates magic at great profit in the midst of chaos.”

The room went silent for a moment, followed by a few gasps of recognition and then broke out into laughter. For someone who loves creating magic at great profit in chaos, they will fall in love with Disney and stay for years. If they don’t, they will find the environment insufferable.

This past year, United Airlines reminded millions of consumers of the cynicism and contempt that permeates their culture. Lost and dead pets, customers dragged out of their planes, unruly environments, and damaged baggage. Today, many travelers will only board a UA flight is there is no alternative. The company doesn’t have an equipment problem, it has a talent problem. But, one CEO after another places cost-cutting ahead of customer experience and employer brand. The results speak for themselves. Flight attendants ask pilots to raise the temperature in the cabin so more people will pass-out. Pilots purposely delay landings in order to get a bit of overtime without hitting the mark that produces a report with the FAA.

Uber might have been one of the country’s most successful start-ups in many years. But, their contempt towards female employees and drivers has led to perhaps the first time in business history where consumers are mindfully selecting Lyft because its spiritual and moral principles are superior. That said, Uber appears to be in a tremendous and costly drive to build a culture of high performance and integrity.

Bottom-line? There are no shortcuts in building a great organization. In the end, people will sustain your success. The best talent will make you a category leader.

Why has the employer brand become more important than the consumer brand?

• The consumer brand is what we sell.
• The employer brand is what we become.

Brought to you by David Harder, President – Inspired Work, Inc.

Schedule 15-Minutes to Discuss Your Workplace or Career with David (Here)

(C) Copyright, 2019, Inspired Work, Inc. – (All Rights Reserved)

The post Why the Employer Brand Became More Important Than the Consumer Brand appeared first on Inspired Work Services.

The consequences of running businesses with this mentality are on full display in retail where lowered standards around the customer experience and employee value fueled a seismic shift driven by Amazon.

In the airline industry, employees are often treated with such disdain that flight attendants will ask the pilots to raise the cabin temperature so passengers become more lethargic. Pilots often delay flights on purpose, just to get a bit more overtime.

In a market filled with lowered expectations, Herb Kelleher turned Southwest Airlines into a cult hit. Even though the company offered some of the lowest fares, they treated employees and customers with respect and an initiative to make travel as fun as humanly possible. They hired upbeat people. They provided an environment that kept employees upbeat. Over the years, Kelleher eliminated unvalued services and introduced a variety of innovations that made travel far more efficient for the entire industry. A culture grew where employees took their jobs seriously and themselves not seriously at all. This past January, Mr. Kelleher passed away and many in the airline industry view him as one of their greatest leaders.

All business and talent strategies must grow if they are to remain fresh. When Gary Kelly took over Southwest in 2013, he introduced a new set of aspirations to all of their employees. He asked everyone to support a vision of becoming the most loved, most flown and most profitable airline in the world.

What did he do to grow the culture of the company?

He suggested that people who fly carry interesting and profound stories in their travels. He suggested that employees become part of their stories, to listen in why they were traveling. He suggested that listening was not only a wonderful way to elevate the passenger experience, it would also raise the tone of working at the company. As I researched the specifics, there were many anecdotes about family travel, important business journeys, and more. Over the last few years, there is a growing and living body of work that not only bonds employees to each other but to the passenger as well.

One story stood out in an unforgettable manner. A woman named Nancy sent the following letter to Mr. Kelly:

“Last night, my husband and I got the tragic news that our three-year-old grandson in Denver had been murdered by our daughter’s live-in boyfriend.”

Her husband had to get to his daughter as quickly as possible. He was on a business trip. In Los Angeles, the crowds were so backed up that he was going to miss the plane. TSA could have cared less. But, a flight attendant from the first leg of his journey had already called ahead to the pilot of the last plane. He ran to the gate expecting to see everyone gone.

The pilot of his plane and the ticketing agent were waiting for him.

They both said,

“Are you Mark? We held the plane for you and we’re so sorry about the loss of your grandson.”

Today’s greatest CEOs represent far more than a positive balance sheet. They build cultures that matter. They are never too busy to demonstrate heart. They instruct their employees to think and feel rather than yelling, “hurry!”

Lowering prices doesn’t equate to lowering interest and care. At a time when we witness passengers being dragged from planes and stories of routine misery, the companies that wait by the gate and listen regardless of whether the passengers story seems trivial, funny or profoundly sad, these are the organizations that we ought to study and emulate.

Brought to you by David Harder, President – Inspired Work, Inc.

Schedule 15-Minutes to Discuss Your Workplace or Career with David (Here)

(C) Copyright, 2019, Inspired Work, Inc. – (All Rights Reserved)

The post How Southwest Airlines Continues to Fly High appeared first on Inspired Work Services.

Someone once asked me, “Of all the industries you’ve worked with, which one has the worst employment practices?”

We did a great of work with media and entertainment. But, I responded, “Universities.” Higher education has shocking chaste systems that can perpetuate extreme delusions of power or powerlessness. Also, they thrive on lack of transparency and secrets. For example, I’ve worked with universities that have upwards of 20 separate human resource departments. Take a moment to let that sink in.

What happened yesterday is a very good thing.

Higher education is facing far bigger challenges than corruption in the admissions system. As high-quality education emerges on the Internet without charge, branded universities will have to offer a whole new form of value.

I believe the only way higher education as we have known it can survive is to develop full transparency. When I studied at USC, we were in awe of all that potentially existed behind the doors. Now, we have 44,000 reporters roaming the campus every single day.

Yes, it is time to wake-up.

To all chancellors and university presidents:

Clear out the secrets, throw open the doors and live with absolutely nothing to hide.

The post Stop Hiding. appeared first on Inspired Work Services.

For example:

• Task work became obsolete

• Transparency pulled the covers off of organizational cultures and the behavior of our leaders

• Active learning became far more important than a degree

Just as we began to grasp the changes in front of us, bigger and different waves arrive that simply tax our capacity to change ourselves. During this milieu, we are told the economy is booming as never before and that unemployment is at a historic low of 3.8%.

Why are we not celebrating?

Because it is a number that doesn’t tell the truth. The unemployment number doesn’t capture the people who gave up, or went part-time. The unemployment number is political and has nothing to do with reality.

Today, a wide variety of economists suggest that it is time to replace unemployment with underemployment. David Bell from the University of Stirling in the U.K. and David Blanchflower of Dartmouth in the U.S. indicate the underemployment, the phenomenon of working harder and making less, of taking jobs well below our capacity, or of holding 2-3 jobs to keep a roof over our heads, is the real drag on our economy as well as our collective confidence.

In a New York Time’s survey, 48% of the city’s workers characterized themselves as “underemployed.” This means that about half of our workers are getting kicked to the curb by change. Focus group-driven politics are not inspiring us to get back up. Promising to rescue us is only providing a kind of false hope that takes away the pressure of reinvention, as well as embracing the learning and action necessary to develop a renewed life.

Many of the very voices that give suggestions to the underemployed are so far removed from reality that they create more damage than good. Last year, one senator said, “We ought to get these coal miners into trucking.” Apparently, he had not read a well-known study. Daimler just finished a pilot program in Nevada that proves driverless trucks run 24-hours-a-day, are safer and more economical. Today, trucking is the #1 job for 5.2 million American men. In just seven years, that figure will be reduced to approximately 600,000 positions. Many of those leftover positions will also be part-time, which will continue to contribute to a low unemployment number while actually growing the malaise of underemployment.

Our great educational systems didn’t prepare us for today’s remarkable landscape. For example, the practice of law was one of those “go to” professions for developing security and predictability in one’s future. Every year, hundreds of thousands of new attorneys graduated from school and got positions with big firms. Associates worked superhuman hours but they were well-paid. The ones that had business development skills eventually became partners. The rest stayed in their offices finishing tasks. That is, until LegalZoom. Today, individual clients and organizations rely on technology to manage routine tasks that used be given to associates. Many associates make $50/hour working in modern-day sweatshops. Today, large law firms typically require that an associate brings $2million a year in business just to get through the door. I often use this particular case-study because it helps answer a question. Would you prefer to be frightened over learning how to get business or spending your life in a sweatshop?

In a landscape like this, of course, there is turmoil! Time and time again, history has proven that all bets are off when humans develop the notion there isn’t enough for everyone. Today’s so-called leaders are not helping. In fact, by blaming the #1%, the Democrats, the Republicans, and the immigrants, all that we accomplish is to distract from ourselves from the more fearful debate of whether or not we will continue to make a living or simply become obsolete.

We live in the most abundant nation on earth and yet we worry about the future. The United States has the most powerful talent pool in the world. But, promises will never allay our fears, but they will give us temporary hope. Promises are making us soft. The single most important dynamic our leaders ought to develop in us is a new mindset, one that is truthful and fair.

It could sound a bit like this.

We are stepping into the most fundamental restructuring of work since the dawn of the Industrial Revolution. During that era, we were promised predictability and survival by taking jobs and completing the mounds of tasks. Now, technology is offering us freedom from such tasks and while it can be a frightening shift, we ought to be focused on what we most want to do with our lives and how we can make a good living doing the work that matters.

So our question is, how do you want to use your freedom?

At first, that question might seem patronizing but we could not be more deadly serious. Some of you will use your freedom to do work that is creative and filled with innovation. Others will use freedom to solve some of the world’s greatest problems. The new world of work is hatching and inventing new jobs every single day. It is also giving us the means to start businesses and to go after what we really want to do. In fact, the new work requires human traits like interest, empathy, kindness, storytelling, big-picture thinking and what technology will never be able to promise: Accountability.

The time for blaming others for our difficulties are over. Quite simply, we have run out of time to wait. Now, it is time to learn how to change ourselves.

Just how do we to that?

Define and Find the Work That You Love

Loving our work wasn’t necessary during the Industrial Revolution. Today, as technology offers us freedom, finding the work that we love, that matters, that is meaningful is not only the better for the world, your passion will offer the only reliable fuel for continuous improvement and self-change.

Develop a Healthy Outlook About Fear

Successful people are used to the experience of fear and when they encounter it they have no issues about getting help. After being a member of the human development community for years, it is clear to me that trying to eliminate fear is a ludicrous and time-consuming proposition. It is far better to practice courage, which gives us the willingness to take action no matter how we feel.

Perhaps the most important message of all is to stop seeking comfort before taking action.All that pattern accomplishes is for us to forget about doing what could have made life and the world around us better.

Get comfort after taking action (like a hug or a conversation with a mentor).

Become a Fierce Active Learner

Savvy employers will only hire active learners. Why? They develop far greater value and usually don’t become obsolete. If you believe you don’t have time to do this, it might be a good idea to install one of the Apps that indicate your daily screen time. I find resources like this are helpful in balancing how much time I’m giving towards creating value as well as mindless pleasure.

For many of us, becoming active learners requires that we give up some of our “check-out” time and open up that space to become students. Become scholars of success. In other words, look towards individuals in your career space who are thriving and leading innovative lives. Find out what they are doing that is different than you. Consume information about topics that interest you, especially ones that provide insight into loving and succeeding with work. Look at the technologies that could, once again, provide new forms of freedom for your work.

Shrinking or Growing / Profit or Overhead?

If you are working in an industry or company that is shrinking, leave.

Industries that are shrinking work their employees to the bone, offer less and less in return, amplify fear paralysis, and lower the kinds of enthusiasm and energy that can hep you change. Look for industries that are growing, that are doing something meaningful to you and that need what you have.

It is also wise to define if your current role is treated as a profit-center or an expense within your organization. Let’s face it. On a purely practical level, profit makers are treated quite differently than overhead. For some of us, simply changing the reporting mechanism can demonstrate far more value. Sometimes, it will make greater business sense to become an external vendor to shift the outlook. For example, one of our chief human resource executives launched a company that manages human capital during mergers & acquisitions. His income skyrocketed. He was offered a CHRO position with one of his clients to which he responded, “Thank you. I’m flattered. But, if I said yes, I would lose most of my value and power.”

Make Technology Work for You

Many Americans use technology for checking-out. Isn’t it ironic? Some demonize technology at work only to get in their cars and run over people because they are not looking at the road. Elevate technology to its best and highest use. For example, learn how to use digital platforms like LinkedIn to skillfully build relationships is nothing less than transformative. Simply by investing in a bit of education, we are now able to build entire communities around our changing roles and business needs.

As old assembly line jobs disappear, 3-D printing is already empowering whole new categories of business owners who manufacture products and goods from their homes.

Artificial Intelligence is giving us the power to actually change some of the world’s biggest problems. That shift offers us far more fulfillment than filing all of the tasks that could have changed our world.

If you are one of those associate attorneys, learn the skills that always made attorneys more valuable. Learn how to develop business, build communities, influence others, and grow the very relationships that turn you into a visible brand. Why will these skills give you freedom? Because you will have the confidence to align yourself with the opportunities that bring meaning to your professional life.

All that I suggest comes from deep personal experience. Before launching this company, my work was about making money. I didn’t really like my work. But, when we delivered the first Inspired Work Program, everyone in the program had the kind of breakthroughs that became turning points. I felt that I had just experienced the biggest one of all. Years later, my ex-boss rode into town and took me to lunch. Her first words were, “What is it like to wake up in the morning?”

I laughed and asked what she was getting at.

She smiled back and said, “I’ve read your articles and follow you online. What is it like to wake up in the morning and realize that what you do has changed thousands of lives?”

My tears beat my mouth to the punch.

I said, “It feels like redemption.”

If any of this resonates for you, perhaps it is time to learn more about us.

Brought to you by David Harder, President – Inspired Work, Inc.

Schedule 15-Minutes to Discuss Your Workplace or Career with David (Here)

(C) Copyright, 2019, Inspired Work, Inc. – (All Rights Reserved)

The post What If This Turmoil Isn’t Political? appeared first on Inspired Work Services.