There are very few leadership transitions like being a newly commissioned officer in the military.
Typically, on graduation day from a military academy, ROTC program or Officer Candidate School program, young men and women in their twenties pin on second lieutenant bars and immediately find themselves in charge of huge teams and millions of dollars of equipment in one of the harshest working environments imaginable.
Feeling burned out at work is both frustrating and exhausting. Even if you enjoy some parts of your job, the continual stress can be overwhelming. If you feel overworked and under-appreciated, it’s easy to feel angry and resentful toward your team members or your boss.
Occupational burnout is characterized by exhaustion, lack of enthusiasm and motivation, feelings of ineffectiveness, frustration, and cynicism, and results in reduced efficacy (the ability to produce your desired results) within the workplace (Wikipedia).
If this sounds like you, you’re not alone. Nearly 70 percent of U.S. workers feel the same way, though this shouldn’t be too surprising. At its core, occupational burnout is caused by excessive and prolonged stress. And these days, the workplace is more stressful than ever.
Written by Alf Rehn
There are many ways to destroy a culture. It can be destroyed by arrogance, hypocrisy or hubris. It can be demolished through bad leadership, nepotism, unchecked misogyny or other unethical practices.
But, a pervasive lack of care might be the most effective way to destroy a culture. Whereas the list of sins above is obvious pathologies of an organization in decay, they are visible, and often manageable, vices. We tend to pay a lot of attention to these vices as they, by way of their visibility, draw our eye. And we tend to overestimate their importance as we underestimate the small things in our organizations.
With the start of the new year behind us, now is a great time to get your house in order from an operations viewpoint. You still need to do all the usual tasks (close the books, update payroll and 401K information, etc.), but should also have on your to-do list tasks like re-visit your employee handbook and take another look at your internal processes.
Technological innovation is continuing to accelerate on a hockey stick growth curve. Companies like IBM, Microsoft, Facebook, and Amazon are bringing cognitive computing capability to the masses. And it’s only a matter of time until nearly every aspect of our work and personal lives are impacted.
These advances are still relatively new. Time will tell when and how they change things, but it will happen and it will happen relatively quickly. In a recent article, Steve Denning reminds us that a repeating pattern of massive transformation has occurred regularly over the last 250 years.
With massive change at our doorstep, now is the time to begin a collective discussion to help leaders navigate this new age.
Most people in my life know I have a passion for running. However, most people in my life do not know that running is much more than just my cardio routine; it is a daily reminder that I am consistently setting and conquering new goals, which is especially important when other areas of my life feel dull.
My passion for running is not only apparent in my closet, stacked high with old running sneakers. It’s also reflected in my professional life.
Trust is a fickle thing. It takes time to build and can be destroyed in a heartbeat. In the workplace, trust is undeniably important. The level of trust an employee has for his or her peers and leadership often defines the line between a happy, engaged worker and an unproductive body filling a cubicle chair.
Yes, trust is a critical component of every successful workplace culture. So why is it so difficult to achieve?
What would happen if one of your senior leaders stepped down tomorrow? Is your organization prepared to fill his or her shoes quickly and efficiently? Do you have qualified, knowledgeable leadership talent on your bench, ready to take the reins?
If this isn’t a concern for your organization now, it soon will be. Research suggests an average employee tenure of five years these days, regardless of age or position within an organization. Baby Boomers are ready for retirement and the next generation of Gen X and Millennial leaders are poised to take their place, but only if you know where to find them.
I recently came across an excellent article in The New York Times from economist Adam Davidson (co-founder of NPR’s Planet Money). In it, he describes his experience working as a technical adviser on the film The Big Short and the unique group dynamics he saw while working on set (this is further expanded on in an interview with Russ Roberts on the podcast EconTalk).
It’s 2017, and your boss walks into your office and says, “We need to restructure four key departments: Finance, HR, Internal Communications and Information Technology into a centralized function to serve all the core business lines globally. The result of the restructuring is vital for our organization because it’s projected to increase our operating margins by as much as 5-6 percent over two years. I need you to lead this effort.”
It sounds like a good idea until you realize the change will involve 5,000 employees in those departments. Oy! Now that’s some way to bring in the New Year! In addition to a solid organization design strategy (hint-hint, stay tuned for my next article), you will also need a change management strategy and plan in order to transition the entire organization to a shared services model.