REQUISITE HR BOOK CLUB, JUNE 2016
Issue 2
2
Requisite HR Book Club June 2016 LEADERS EAT LAST BY SIMON SINEK
Welcome to the latest Requisite HR Book Club share. We will be continuing with Leaders Eat Last (Why some teams pull together and others don’t) by Simon Sinek (author of Start with Why)
CHAPTERS THREE AND FOUR
• In today’s terms the threats to business are both real and perceived: o
Part 1 – OUR NEED TO FEEL SAFE Chapter 3 - Belonging Tells a story of a Marine Boot Camp and the Circle of Safety. The key point made in this chapter are: • The Marine Boot Camp is a transformation process that creates a feeling of belonging, of shared values and a deep sense of empathy, dramatically enhancing trust, cooperation and problem solving. They become better equipped to confront external dangers/threats because they fear no danger from each other. • They operate in a strong Circle of Safety. The Circle of Safety – Aesop, 6th Century BC A Lion use to prowl about a field in which Four Oxen used to dwell. Many a time he tried to attack them; but whenever he came near they turned their tails to one another, so that whichever way he approached them he was met by the horns of one of them. At last, however, they fell a-quarrelling among themselves, and each went off to pasture alone in a separate corner of the field. Then the Lion attacked them one by one and soon made an end of all four.
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External Threats - New technology can render older technology or an entire business model obsolete overnight. Our competitors are trying to frustrated our success or steal our customers. There is urgency to meet expectations, strains on capacity, fluxing pressures hindering growth and profitability. If it not one thing it is something else, some of them are controllable and some of them are not, and this will not change, it is just the way that the world is. However, we can influence the organisation’s resilience and capacity to deal with these external threats. Internal Threats – Intimidation, humiliation, isolation, feeling dumb, feeling useless and rejection, etc. Internal threats are more controllable and it should be the goal of leadership to create a culture free from internal threats, by creating a sense of belonging. Create a strong culture based on a clear set of human values and beliefs, give people the power to make decisions, offer trust and empathy and create a Circle of Safety.
• The creation of a Circle of Safety reduces the threats felt from inside the group, the more we trust the people around us to have our backs, the better equipped we are plus the increased time and energy we have, to protect the group from external threats.
• The strength of a company does not come from products or services but from how people pull together. • The primary role of leadership is to look out for those inside their Circle of Safety and that circle must extend to encompass everyone within the organisation.
• The ability of a group of people to do remarkable things hinges on how well those people pull together as a team. And that doesn’t happen in a vacuum. Be considerate about who is in the team, only let in those people whose values are aligned with the team, who will add to the team’s sense of belonging and who are willing to pull together and contribute to the team, as they must share the responsibility of looking after the other members of the team. • A person will know that they are in the Circle when they feel valued by their colleagues and cared for by their leaders. We will feel confident that the leaders and all with whom we work are there for us and will do what they can to help us succeed. Then we feel like we belong. • Benefits from this feeling of belonging include: o Free exchange of information o Effective communication o Innovation o Resolution of problems prior to them becoming large issues o Increased ability to address external threat o Increased ability to seize opportunities
• We cannot tell people to trust us, or come up with big ideas or cooperate – these are actually results that come from being in an environment in which we feel safe and we trust the people with whom we work. When the Circle of Safety is strong, we naturally share ideas, intelligence and the burdens of stress. Every skills and strength we have is amplifies to the world outside.
• Whitehall Studies: o Worker stress is not caused by a higher level of responsibility and pressure associated by rank, but the degree of control people feel they have throughout their day. o Stress is caused by an imbalance between the effort we give and the reward that we feel.
• Don’t forgot that leaders are a member of this circle and do not sit outside it.
• 2013 Gallop Poll findings: o When bosses ignore us – 40% of us actively disengage from work o When bosses criticize us on a regular basis – 22 % of us actively disengage from work o So we are more engaged when we get criticized than ignored because we feel that at least someone is acknowledging that we exist. o If bosses recognize just one of our strengths and reward us for doing what we’re good at, only 1% of us actively disengage from the work we are expected to do. o Please who go to work unhappy actually do things, actively or passively, to make those around them unhappy too.
Your Chapter Challenge: Review how safe you feel at work. Do you feel valued? Do you trust all the members of your circle? Do you feel a sense of belonging? Chapter 4 – Yeah, but… Tells the story of Ken a midranking executive in a bank who stays put in a job that is ‘fine’ because he has bills to pay, a family to consider and the world outside his current job is unknown and therefore dangerous, so it is easier to stay put. It also discusses the reality of implementing all the things that are in books like this one.
The key point made in this chapter are: • The day-to-day reality of running a business makes it nearly impossible to implement all the things required to create a great and caring business that puts the well-being of people first. In a small business just finding enough client to keep the doors open is hard enough. Outside threats can be so great that leasers don’t have the time to worry about how people feel inside. So dealing with external threats tend to take preference over internal threats. • Australian research has found that the levels of depression and anxiety amongst people who are unhappy at work were the same or greater than those that were unemployed.
• Stress and anxiety at work have less to do with the work that we do and more to do with weal management and leadership. When we know that there are people who care how we feel, our stress levels decrease. However, when we feel that our team is only looking out for themselves or that leaders care more about numbers that people, our stress and anxiety go up. • We feel no loyalty to a company whose leaders offer us no sense of belonging to stay beyond money and benefits. • Another study found that people who don’t feel recognisied are more likely to suffer from heart disease. It has been surmised that this is largely due to feelings of contract – or lack thereof, which leads to stress and in turn the risk of heart disease.
• Uni College London 2004 o People lower on the hierarchy had an early death rate four time that of those at the top. o People with less work control were also linked to higher rates of mental illness. • A supportive well managed work environment is good for one’s health. • Our feelings of control, stress and our ability to perform at our best are all directly linked to how safe we feel in an organisation. • Mercer LLC in 2011 found that 1 in three employees seriously consider leaving their job. 1. These people would be rather be working somewhere else and 2. They see no option to improve how they feel about their job other than to quit. • Treat your employees well in a weak job market so that there is not a mass exodus when the market changes. • The solution is to build and maintain Circles of Safety Your Chapter Challenges: 1. Where within your organisation are there opportunities for you to provide your team members with a sense of control? 2. Make a list of your team members and write next to their name their main strength and how you can individually recognize and reward each person for that strength in the next 12 months.
• Harvard / Stanford study 2013 o Leaders have lower stress levels that those who work for them. o Being in charge of one’s own life more than makes up for the greater amount of responsibility.
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