Articles
What Makes Employees Mad - Part II | What Makes Employees Mad - Part III
Workplace Wrath: Using Anger to Build | All Praise to the Supervisor | Listen First
Feedback: The Breakfast of Champions | The Emperor’s New Clothes - Providing Negative Feedback
Practicing Safe Stress | The Pied-Piper of Employee Retention Part V – Recognition
The Pied-Piper of Employee Retention Part V – Recognition
The Pied-Piper of Employee Retention
The Pied-Piper of Employee Retention Part IV – Employer Expectation
The Pied-Piper of Employee Retention Employee Opinions
The Pied Piper of Employee Retention Part II – Tools and Equipment
The Pied-Piper of Employee Retention Caring Supervisor

The Pied-Piper of Employee Retention
Part V – Opportunity to Do My Best

Why wouldn’t an employer provide an opportunity for an employee to do their best? Doesn’t it seem natural that a supervisor would want their employee to perform at peek capacity? As strange as this phenomenon seems, many supervisors do not allow employees the opportunity to do their best!

In the book entitled First Break All the Rules, the authors, Marcus Buckingham and Curt Coffman, write about a survey conducted by the Gallup Poll using the responses of over 100,000 employees. With the expertise of this world-famous polling organization they were able to establish a list of questions which directly related to employee retention. One of these questions is: “At work, do I have the opportunity to do what I do best every day?”

On a baseball team the first baseman must be left-handed and the third baseman must be right-handed. You reserve the outfielder with the strongest arm for right field and place your best athlete at shortstop. When I coached a little league team I was fortunate to have a number of adults who wanted to help coach. I asked each one how they best could help the team. One wanted to coach the outfield, one wanted the infield, one became our batting coach, and one said he was good at moving dirt. He became our grounds keeper and that left Bill. “What would you like to do, Bill, I asked? “I’m good at arguing” – so he handled our “umpire relations”.

Why are employees sometimes not allowed to do what they do best? Do supervisors know what assignment each employee performs best or which job function the employee actually prefers? No knowing, in the best scenario, may be simply a matter of ignorance on the supervisor’s part or in the worse case, is the attitude “I’m the boss and who cares what they like or do not like … it all pays the same!” (Translated – I’m in control!) This supervisory ignorance can occur with new employees, with those who simply are not aware, or worse – do not care what roles their employees are capable of performing. Knowing the various strengths and desires of each employee should be a paramount supervisory function. Sadly, it is not.
According to the Gallup Poll, it has been proven that this question holds a direct relationship with employee retention and if that is so, then a logical conclusion must be that employees really want to do good work! For what other reason would this phenomenon be a retention-related question?

Job-site communication has always been a problem but when increased production is required, it is critical. Has the employer ever discussed what the employee would like to do, what strength each has, and how the supervisor can assist them to achieve employment goals? When asked that question, management would respond with an emphatic yes! “Why, yes, our supervisors know all about their employees. At this company we have an annual review – a performance appraisal”. Future articles in this column will feature discussions concerning performance appraisals but the reality is; this critical type of information is seldom exchanged. The result is that the company is deprived of the best production, the most content workers, and the Pipe-Piper parade of discontented workers continues, and we wonder why.

What happens if the supervisor thinks the employee has more ability, more skills than he – does employee-excellence pose a threat? Fear is a powerful emotion that can cause strange reactions and for self-protection reasons may cause the supervisor not to want the employee to perform at her best. Could this be a deep-seated reason for not allowing employee to excel?

Another reason is that the employee and the supervisor have never discussed how the employee’s talents would best serve the team. What does the employee do best, what work is available, and how they can best help the team? Isn’t it natural for employees to want to be in their most comfortable position?

If employers do not allow employees to do what they do best, then the Pied-Piper of Employee Retention will play a melodious melody on his flute taking trusted and valuable employees away with his song to another company; to supervisor’s who will allow them to excel. However, when a team member is working in their best position, is it a leap of faith to think they may be more efficient and more productive?