Winning Workplaces

I was cycling through the updated blogs in my Google Reader yesterday and I almost spit out my coffee when I got to Mike Michalowicz's Toilet Paper Entrepreneur blog and saw this headline:

How To Motivate Employees (Hint: You Can’t)

Mike and (as of this morning) several commentors make the case that, basically, because no one will ever have the same level of passion and commitment to growing the business as the company's owner or leader, you shouldn't invest time, energy, and money to motivate employees.

Now, long-time readers know I have a lot of respect for Mike.  I referenced him and his blog here, here, and here.  And even in his latest post on employee engagement that I am refuting, I agree with him that fear is a poor, short-term-at-best motivator.

But that doesn't mean you should abandon employee engagement activities for motivation altogether.  I can find at least 80 companies that would argue that their ROI is greater productivity, innovation, and retention and lower turnover – the Best Boss- and Top Small Workplace-award-winning firms we've honored since 2003.

Here, then, are some employee engagement best practices these organizations use to bring out the best from their people – and keep their doors open in tough times and even maintain revenue growth:

1. Start with recruitment: PrintingForLess.com uses a team-based interviewing process to identify candidates that meet their key criteria of being "smart, hungry and nice."
2. Also from PrintingForLess.com: Be a sounding board for your managers, especially younger and/or more inexperienced ones, but also let them have some breathing room to make and execute decisions.
3. Set the tone with your leadership.  Merkle CEO, and 2006 Best Boss, David Williams told us that spending a lot of time thinking about their barriers and how to overcome them serves as a huge motivating force for their leadership.  This mindset naturally trickles down to employees.
4. Offer flexible work arrangements.  This has enabled Communispace to reap more productive hours from its 200 or so employees because they set their schedules.  This is especially helpful in managing Baby Boomer and Generation Y workers, who report a strong desire for work/life balance in various workplace studies.
5. Use technology to be present to all staff.  CEO Diane Hessan at the aforementioned Communispace leaves weekly voicemails for employees that range from motivational missives to industry news.  Other companies, such as Point B, make good use of email and intranets.
6. Use open-book management.  While this practice of sharing financials with employees is not for every firm, it has helped companies from manufacturer IRMCO to business consultancy Jump connect the dots between employees' duties and how the business makes money.
7. Encourage on-the-spot decision making.  Our Board Member Michael Mulqueen, former CEO of the Greater Chicago Food Depository, says this practice not only empowers people, it saves time (and thus money).
8. Be in the business of customer service.  Have this be what your firm is really about, with your products or services as a means to this end.  Southwest Airlines, Rackspace Hosting, and Gentle Giant Moving have found great success from this focus, especially when it comes to recruitment (see #1).
9. Ditch the time clock.  I'm not in HR, but I have seen firsthand the amount of overhead and processes (read: headaches) that come into play with both paper-based and electronic tracking of employee hours.  You can be in an industry that is very much about the numbers and at the same time trust and respect your people to come to work when they're slated to.  Just ask John Rogers of Ariel Capital Management.
10. Use workplace design to your advantage.  We had a workplace architect explain how this is possible at our annual conference a few years ago.  2008 Top Small Workplaces Jump and Resource Interactive exemplify this.

Where do you stand in this debate?  And what do you think of this list?

Photo credit: Women's Post