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A Carol I. Kallendorf, Ph.D./Jack Speer Publication |
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You Might Look Up and Find Them Gone. How Satisfied Are Your Top Performers? Here’s a Diagnostic Tool to Take a Realistic Look at Your Key People to See If Which Ones are Still on Board
Employees are beginning to not feel so much like indentured servants. They’re a little more secure about their jobs; they’re looking around a bit; and the headhunters are beginning to call. Now’s the time to ask yourself, who are the employees that would really set back my organization if they left? Depending on your industry and your location, the recession we are emerging from probably ranged anywhere from bad to horrific. But at the very moment when you would expect everyone to be celebrating an avalanche of business, we’re seeing a new and unsettling phenomenon—employees experiencing something like an economic Post- Traumatic Stress Syndrome as a result of the extended recession. A client called me the other day—someone who is recognized as a top performer in her organization and a pillar of stability there—someone who has been a “go-to” person in very tough times in that organization. Someone who put a calm and optimistic face on the bleakest days. “Carol,” she said. “I hate this job. I’m just now starting to realize how much I hate this job. Lately it’s all I can do to get out of bed in the morning and make it through another week.” Wow. Not what I expected to be hearing from the cheerful go-to person. If that conversation had been an isolated occurrence, it wouldn’t have hit me so hard. But, as it turns out, it was one of three very similar conversations and very similar scenarios in a single week: top performers, people relied upon by their organizations who suddenly—almost inexplicably to their organizations and even to themselves—either expressed an off-the-chart “misery index” about their jobs or just up and quit. Now, while no one is irreplaceable, these people are all, suffice it to say, hard to replace. And with their organizations now struggling to keep from drowning in a flood of new business, their departure—or even a slippage in their morale, productivity, or commitment—could have disastrous consequences. So what’s going on here? A lot of things are going on, as it turns out.
The burnout of two to three years of recession followed almost immediately by the extraordinary demands of waves of new business. They survived RIF after RIF, did more with less, worked smarter and harder—and the future seems to be more of the same—with no end in sight.The really chilling thing about the three individuals I mentioned is that they didn’t tell anyone. For all their managers probably knew, these folks were happy as clams. Was it the employees’ responsibility to make their discontent known? Probably. But is it worth losing their future contribution to make a stand for personal responsibility? I think not. So what to do? It’s time to have an honest conversation with your top performers. And you probably need to be the one to initiate it. So now’s the time to block out some time and schedule interviews with your key people. How are things working for them? What do they want? What are their dreams? If it’s new opportunities they want, how can you make that happen? It’s time, more than ever before, for you to be a coach and a mentor to them, to show them that the organization values them and will commit to their professional and career development. And, don’t delay. Or you might come to work someday soon and see some letters of resignation you can’t afford to get. You might just look up and find them gone. |
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