High Trust = High Performance
People do best when when trust is consistently demonstrated
”If I have to keep track of when you work, I’ve got the wrong person”.
A previous CEO told me that shortly after I went to work for his company. Was it some kind of devious trick? Part of a hazing? A dedication test?
For a while, I looked over my back to see if “they” were watching me, somehow secretly keeping track. Technically, since I was salaried it didn’t matter.
Turns out he was telling the truth and he was right.
Trusting people to be where they should be doing what they should do took a while to get used to, much less embrace. This was even harder as I had worked for a top-tier Fortune company that valued hours at work seemingly more than life itself. Some of my Japanese friends will understand that first hand.
My Previous Context
As a field manager for that Fortune company, one boss would call me right at 5 pm on the company’s landline any time I was at a distant location. It didn’t take long to get the message. Travel time, no matter how many hours, was on me. Since I had several facilities more than three hours from home this was quite an expectation. That was how the culture worked.
It didn’t matter if a location was a dumpster fire or a textbook example of how it should be done. I had to put in the time. In the latter example, it was often just that, time. In a well-run facility, a senior manager can become a distraction as much as an asset.
The problem with warm body syndrome is eventually that’s all a person is, a warm body. I put in multiple twelve-hour-plus days, week in and out for years. That doesn’t even count peak season. Looking back months and chunks of years of my life are just a blur.
To bleed the right color for the company I embraced that part of the culture for myself and those that worked for me. That included hundreds of people at any given time. To them, I sincerely apologize.
Over time did I accomplish more? Did the people that worked for me accomplish more?
No.
My Updated Context
Then there was this crazy new employer that told people to go home at the end of the day. PTO was real, people were expected to relax when they were off. I know! Who are these maniacs?
That CEO had turned a failing company into a success using just these types of high trust methods.
It wasn’t long before a very capable facility manager called to let me know (not so much ask) she would be taking the next couple of days off to care for a sick child. I took a deep breath and embraced the moment. We discussed her kid and his issue. It took all of my might to not ask how things would go in her absence.
The place did not miss a beat. She had embraced that philosophy for her staff, they all knew what needed to be done. Things got done because they trusted and took care of each other. Staff stepped up and worked extra because there was a reason. That was a real watershed moment for me.
On the other hand, managers that were failing were consistently MIA during normal work hours. In that environment people that didn’t want to be there found reasons to not be.
If someone doesn’t want to be at work will find reasons not to be.
One manager I hired had all the right stuff. He was smart, quick, and understood business. He failed to disclose that he was a partner in another company and had at least one other outside business interest. He didn’t really have time to work for us. It did not take long for his lack of engagement to show up. His own staff ratted him out as did his facilities performance. Long story short, he moved on.
He moved on not because of his hours, he moved on because he didn’t really want to be there. His staff helped him to that result.
There was a trust bonus for me from the staff at that location. They saw me take action on their concerns.
What I Learned Contrasting the Two
So I finally embraced this new culture. Turns out that people that are doing their job do better when they don’t feel someone is tracking their time, much less the details of how they go about doing their job.
That doesn’t mean work is a free-for-all. There are expectations, budgets, deadlines, limits to authority, and all of that.
Engaged managers that actually have a life outside of work make better decisions faster.
I can honestly say that I accomplished a lot more for employer number two than I ever did for the first one.
People that were not doing a good job didn’t work consistently either. They edit themselves out in other ways.
To Conclude:
Poor attendance is a symptom, not a disease. Some would say to monitor constantly for the symptom. I would argue there are other objective measures that are more appropriate. Demonstrating trust at this level is a far bigger win in the long run.
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