The eWorld Radar

Are you worth it?

Do you know what you are worth? That is do you know what the market is willing to pay to secure your services?

And do you know what steps you might take to increase your worth?

Rather than consume brain power fretting about job security and scheming how to side step the boot, why not focus on enhancing your economic worth.

As long as your worth commands a return that meets your financial expectations and your worth is based on objective analysis, then you should have no trouble remaining employed.

If an honest appraisal of your worth suggests you are currently overpaid then be prepared to be 'right-paid' or to invest in your own development.

Deadwood has nowhere to float in the digital economy.

Ade McCormack

Time to be productive

Mankind from a consumer perspective has generally benefited from the Industrial era; more choice and lower prices.

But from a work perspective the benefits have been less obvious. Prior to the Industrial revolution (approximately a quarter of a million years) we were paid on what we produced, eg. caught rabbit, reared cow, built cart.

Then all of a sudden the model changed. A movement from the workshop / farm to the factory saw a transition in the way we were paid. Now we were selling our time rather than our productivity. So the skill of the typical worker became ‘how do I do as little as possible for a given unit of labour time?’.

This in turn created the management industry focused on how to counter this mindset.

The time-oriented approach still permeates both the traditional factory (conveyor belt) and modern factory (desk). Admittedly some roles are paid bonuses based on productivity, most notably sales, and so have a sense of ‘eat what you kill’.

Over time more and more of us are going to see a more direct correlation between our economic survival and our output. You are encouraged to embrace this model even if your employer doesn’t. Think of it as your insurance policy for the digital era.

Ade McCormack

Worker as athlete

The new normal dictates that we in the West will need to work harder to maintain our quality of life. Improving worker performance will be an ongoing exercise; much like athletes continually striving to improve their PB (Personal Best).

And what the workers will be judged on is changing as well. Intellectual capital and relationship capital will become increasingly important in the digital economy.

Thus the role of HR moves from ensuring people are sufficiently trained to be competent enough to fulfil their role to performance coaches focused on driving the work force to world class mastery.

Engagement will be a major theme. Keeping staff engaged won’t be the issue. Disengaged athletes will just be left behind and if they don’t step off the track they will get run down eventually. So that is self managing.

The challenge is how the HR function will improve its engagement with the workforce to create the intimacy needed for a coaching role and to have the influencing and technical skills to drive the ‘athletes’ towards mastery.

Sooner than you expect, you will be managing a stable of top flight athletes. All of whom are high maintenance. And given their new found discipline, when they come looking for tea and sympathy, biscuits will definitely not be an option.

Ade McCormack

Clients or relationships?

Most people think of marketing as the pre-funnel opportunity creation specialists. All initiatives lead to the sales funnel. It makes a lot of sense given that businesses need sales to survive.

Or does it?

Certainly this model of marketing worked well in the industrial era when the name of the game was to automate where possible. Seeing consumers as homogeneous, give or take a few socio-economic variables, helped in the formulation of big marketing initiatives.

But we are no longer in the industrial era. And clients, whether they are business or consumer in nature have choices and power. Thus the marketing game has changed into one that needs to be highly personalised.

The goal now is not to create an opportunity but to secure the relationship. The understanding is that sales will follow in due course. And assuming the relationship is good, ie trust and relevance are in place, the sales will keep coming and coming.

So whilst the creation of broad brush value adding marketing assets (eg. white papers, social media and events) are important, the measurement and improvement of the organisation’s relationship capital needs to be the number one priority.

Would you prefer to enter the next recession with 1,000 relationship-free transactional clients or with 100 influential individuals who personally care about your economic survival?

Ade McCormack

Performance – Perceived Emotional Cost

Most sales people know that the value they deliver is proportional to the perceived benefits. In most cases a bigger price has a value dampening effect. But most importantly, the greater the perceived emotional cost the less associated value the customer will perceive.

To be a successful worker in the industrial economy, you need to be compliant / low maintenance from a management perspective.

However in the digital economy, creativity trumps compliancy.

So it is expected that workers will be a management nightmare. This in turn means that the perceived benefits associated with you must shoot through the roof to offset this.

Mastery of your skills will of course help, but brand management is more important.

Ade McCormack

Meaningful work

Malcolm Gladwell in his book Outliers talks of meaningful work, ie work that motivates the worker. Such work has three elements:

• There is a clear link between work and rewards.
• The work is challenging.
• The worker has autonomy over how the work is done.

If we apply this to the IT department:

• There is rarely a link between work and rewards. In fact there is often no link between work and its business impact.
• IT work is often challenging and so draws people who are creative and enjoy problem solving. But the following point is diminishing this.
• IT workers may get some autonomy over how they code a module but increasingly IT workers are being shoe horned into service management frameworks that leave no room for creativity.

Thus it is highly likely that many IT staff feel unmotivated. The issues of work/reward/business impact and autonomy need to be addressed.

 

Towards a 21st Century Business

Check out my promotional video. The guys at Performance Films have done a great job.

Ade McCormack