Have you ever wondered how your work environment impacts your well being and prosperity? Is your office environment meeting your core human needs? How do the mysteries of work and life connect to how and where we work?

Every once in a while I meet someone really interesting in my travels.  Someone who is dong fantastic work that makes me stop and rethink the way I look at the world.

Herman Miller’s Director of Human Dynamics and Work, Tracy Brower is one of those people.  Tracy is the author of Bring Work to Life by Bringing Life to Work. In addition, Tracy’s role within her organization is to create Herman Miller’s point of view about the impact of work on life, and of life on work; to link what we know about people to Herman Miller’s product design, solutions, and customers.

For those of you who are unfamiliar with the Herman Miller story, they’ve been around for over a century, taking an innovative approach to business and work environments.  They’ve been recognized year after year as a leader in corporate sustainability and workplace solutions.  Herman Miller is known for human-centered, problem-solving design and Tracy was kind enough to spend some time with me describing the work that she and her team have been doing to really understand the human condition.

The Science of Human Dynamics and Work

“Our efforts really started with a deep desire to understand people and to develop a clear sense of why and how people work,” Brower shared. “We are interested in the sociology of work- how we impact our work environments and how our work environments, in turn, impact us.”

With these fundamental questions at the core of their work, Herman Miller launched The Living Office, which is based on what is fundamental to all humans and evolves continuously in response to change. This Living Office is aimed at creating connection, creativity, productivity, and ultimately, greater prosperity for all.

In order to inform their thinking of human dynamics and work, the team looked at the last 80 years of research in the fields of psychology, sociology and anthropology as they set out on their mission.

The Human Dynamics + Work team has not stopped with the scientific research.  They have cast a wide net by developing relationships with various thought leaders around the globe to help them ask (and hopefully answer!) the tough questions that will deepen their understanding of how to create a total experience of work that expresses and enables shared purpose and character.

And what did they come up with through their exhaustive search? The team boiled down the greatest thinking of the twentieth century into six core needs that all people, regardless of gender, ethnicity, socio-economic status, etc. have.  These include:

• Security – We desire health, safety, familiarity, and competence.
• Status – We seek recognition of our contributions.
• Achievement – We strive for excellence and take pride in our accomplishments.
• Autonomy – We seek freedom in our actions and decisions.
• Purpose – We want to make a meaningful difference.
• Belonging – We want a meaningful connection to others.

 The Living Office In the Modern Workplace

Understanding these needs begs the question: What are the connectors that link the six fundamental human needs to the workplace? Herman Miller’s research finds there are three: They all have massive implications on the way we lead and manage, on the technology and tools that we provide our people, and on the places that support work. Herman Miller is using this knowledge to customize insights and solutions for customers.

What’s Next?

So what’s next for Brower and team and they endeavor to unwrap the mysteries of work and life?

For now, they have an aggressive plan that includes continuing to conduct a wide variety of empirical research of their own to better understand human needs and the implications for the workplace and the work experience.  They are also continuing to develop a network of key relationships with diverse talent and thought leaders to collaborate in these efforts.

The team is also focusing on longitudinal studies, attempting to understand human needs from the perspective of people ranging from middle school through retirees in order to help them develop a firm understanding that will inform the way in which the company does business for years to come.

By leveraging the thinking of those external to Herman Miller, Brower is hopeful that they will be, “… both broad and holistic in [their] thinking” and that through diversity of thought and a common interest in understanding the mysteries of the human condition in an effort to drive better design, Herman Miller will continue to lead the way in creating work/life experiences that drive success for everyone involved.

Perhaps that is not so mysterious after all.

This article originally appeared on Forbes

Creating just the right team can be difficult. And once you create one, get all the nuances just right – it’s near impossible to sustain. Yet sustaining teams is a foundational element to any successful effort, program, organization and company. Small businesses. Large businesses. All industries, around the globe.

What makes sustaining an effective team so difficult? In my experience, there are three challenges a team must be able to overcome in order to be effective. Trust is absolutely a factor. Ensuring everyone is pointed towards – and bought into(!) – a common purpose. And, staying steadfast in the face of constant change.

Trust

Trust is a topic upon which much is written. My colleague, Chris Cancialosi just wrote about building leadership based on trust. My colleague, Andrea Howe, co-authored the Fieldbook on the topic. Those are great resources, and while I wouldn’t be able to improve upon their words, the importance of trust cannot be overstated.

I’ve seen first hand that the most effective teams are those where trust is established quickly. This allows people to get past concerns related to feeling awkward or self-conscious, and get to the work. How do leaders achieve that?

• Creating a work environment that is authentic and safe
• Encouraging people to bring an open mind, getting past their traditional practices and biases
• Providing people the opportunity to “get real” and enjoy each other as…people!

A Common Purpose

Aligning your team in the pursuit of a common purpose/goal/objective is a second factor. In the absence of that unified approach, the team could (most likely will) flail with no clear sense of direction, process or results. Alignment leads to effectiveness when:

• Team members are given an opportunity to contribute to determination of the objectives and process
• Individuals are values for their creativity and innovation
• Collaboration is encouraged and nurtured

Adapting to Change

Every team will face change. Just as individuals do, teams struggle with handling it effectively. Those teams (and by extension the leaders and individuals within) that are resilient as they meet those changes will be best equipped to handle them. The most resilient teams (and therefore the most sustainable ones):

• Recognize behavioral patterns and work to disrupt them
• Tap into the viral nature of ideas and emotions in the workplace
• Ensure individuals and teams are innovative in thinking and flexible in action

And one of the tools we bring to leaders to help create sustainable teams: improvisational comedy. Not watching it, but rather bringing teams through a series of exercises that generate trust, encourage collaboration and alignment, and develop resilience.

The best practices of improv comedy can be applied to day-to-day business situations.  Team members arm themselves with a style of thinking, listening, communicating, and collaborating that is authentic, inclusive, adaptive, and sustainable.

Cary (@thecarypaul) is a Senior Associate at gothamCulture, and the Chief Improv Officer at The Get Real Project.  Sustaining Teams is a passion of Cary’s, and he’ll be using improv comedy to support those efforts at CBODN, April 24 and 25.

 

You’ve heard by now that Walmart recently raised their minimum wage to at least $9/hr, and starting this time next year, that number will jump to $10/hr.

There are a lot of responses out there discussing this $1 raise. The discussion ranges from the fact that it’s still not enough to live on, to how great it is for Walmart to take this step in the right direction with other retailers following their lead.

Despite all of the PR, the real reasons behind Walmart’s move are still in question. According to the this article by Paul Krugman, the retail giant is banking on the idea that “paying workers better will lead to reduced turnover, better morale and higher productivity.”

This made us think: Can a dollar an hour buy employee engagement?

We asked our team to offer their thoughts on the matter. Here’s what they had to say:

Arthur Kim, Engagement Manager

While raising wages has an immediate increase in morale, it rarely has a lasting effect. To reduce turnover and discontent among the staff, it’s more important to create a strong corporate culture that improves everyday work life.

Chelsea Weber, OD Intern

The kind of financial stability that an extra dollar an hour might provide speaks to needs at the core of Maslow’s famous hierarchy: comfort and safety.  In other words, a wage hike speaks to a basic modern human need. Without stability, can you even think about asking employees to engage?

Yet while better pay may increase morale, simply raising wages will not produce a sustained workforce of engaged, motivated employees. Wal-Mart will have to look further.  Employees are liable to stick around if they feel motivated, satisfied, and effective at work, but those feelings rely on the development of intrinsic motivation to be sustainable.

Wal-Mart needs to ask itself: What’s going to make employees excited to come into work each day?  How will they help team members feel like they are contributing to the wider organization, like their voices are heard? How do employees see the results of their work? And how will Wal-Mart connect these answers to strategy and brand to create a feeling of authenticity for team members?

Mark Emerson, General Manager

I don’t think at the end of the day it will change things for Walmart. This is really a macro-economic move on their part. It’s employee retention, plain and simple.

As the largest retail employer in the country, they were forced by competitive pressures to follow other retailers (Gap, etc.) that recently announced wage increases.  The increase next year to $10/hr on average will simply keep them in line with wage pressures as the economy continues to improve.

I am willing to bet that their finance team got together, ran the numbers, and realized that $2/hour was less than the cost of current turnover and this (not any other feel-good reason) was behind the move.  The fact that they got good PR and the unions temporarily off their back is an added bonus.

There is an upside and a downside (isn’t there always?).  The upside is that Walmart, in many cases, is the largest employer in many parts of the country and their employees tend to be stuck, in that their options are extremely limited by geography and, in many cases, education. For those employees stuck at Walmart, a raise is a raise and 20% over the next two years is pretty significant.

In addition, Walmart’s raises will have an even more positive effect as this decision will force other retailers and fast food restaurants to raise their wages to stay above them. After all, people actually do say, “well, I could always work at Walmart!”

The downside is that, for many folks, they didn’t like working at Walmart before the raise, and chances are they won’t like working there after the raise.  I doubt I will visit my local Walmart and find the employees noticeably more engaged.  And with the wages rising outside of Walmart, I expect that the impact will be muted.

I can’t help always comparing them to Costco. While there are many differences that don’t allow for fair comparisons, the fact is that Costco employees feel a part of a team and are treated like team members and not parts in a machine.  It is the culture of Walmart that impedes them in being even more successful.

‘Always low prices’ is a great slogan for customers, but the dehumanizing effect it has on employees is something that Walmart is still not getting right.

Pamela Farago, OD Intern

“Always low prices. Always.” does not need to translate into, “Always low wages. Always.”

Wal-Mart supported this idea with its recent wage increase for a half million workers. Paying workers better has, indeed, been shown to lead to reduced turnover, better morale, and higher productivity in the workplace. The money that a company spends on a wage increase comes back to more than pay for itself in the long run.

Wage increases in the long run, however, can be both a friend and a potential adversary. What happens when the novelty of the wage increase wears off? At this point, despite being paid more, workers may revert back to their old morale and productivity levels.

This leaves not only Wal-Mart, but also all other businesses, to contend with answering the more difficult question of: how can workers be continually motivated when their wages become stagnant? While there is no answer as of yet, potential solutions may lie in a system of rewards and bonuses that workers can continually strive for, rather than a base pay increase.

Always high incentives. Always.

What Do You Think?

Have you been reading all the news about this $1 pay hike and the slew of other retailers following Walmart’s footsteps? How do you think $1 an hour really affects employee engagement levels? We’d love to hear your thoughts!

“If you had to identify, in one word, the reason why the human race has not achieved, and never will achieve, its full potential, that word would be ‘meetings.” – Dave Barry

No one likes sitting through a pointless office meeting.

Poorly run meetings can be a ball and chain to many organizations. They take up time when there’s work to be done, they’re often unproductive, and in many cases, altogether pointless. In fact, Mattel’s former CEO recently blamed meetings as the major factor behind their lack of an innovative culture.

So, the question is: Why do organizations spend so much time in formal meetings? How do they affect the engagement levels of the team? And is there a better way?

We asked our team to share their ideas and experiences around corporate meetings, and whether they can really have such a negative effect on organizational culture and employee engagement.

Anton Rius, Digital Marketing Manager

I’ve been a part of some pretty terrible meetings. They would last for 2 or more hours, dragging on and on without ever coming to an actionable conclusion. Everyone shared ideas and participated, but no decisions were made and no tasks were assigned. I think being in a good meeting room such as conference rooms in new york, makes the ideas flow better, rather than being in a dingy old office!

That’s the big problem with meetings, in my opinion. They are often used as a way for people to discuss their goals while diffusing the ownership of the decision. Rather than empowering employees to make executive decisions about their work, meetings are used to gain collective approval from people who may not have a full understanding of the problem, or the expertise to make a good decision.

And if meetings are meant to bring people together to tackle problems quickly and collectively, then this behavior does the opposite: It slows business down to a snail’s pace.

The fact is; the average American office worker wastes a lot of time on everything other than work. Between shovels full of pointless email, office banter, the phone ringing, and all of the other distractions that happen at the office, it’s a wonder how any work actually gets done!

Adding additional, pointless meetings on top of that takes even more time away from your team members when they could be spending that time on more important tasks.

Samantha Goldman, Associate

Oftentimes in organizations, meetings happen because of inertia; it’s the way it’s always been, and the people who realize they’re not productive don’t necessarily have the power to stop the meeting from happening.

In some organizations, the meetings are a remnant of the days when communication and decision-making only happened face-to-face. Today, due to technology and the faster pace of work and email/chat communication, most meetings are pointless.

But, before you decide to cancel all of your company’s meetings, take an inventory of what is actually happening in each meeting and whether some of that communication is repetitive. Maybe the communication would be better served through another channel, such as email.

Then, it’s critical to think about what actually could be happening in that face-to-face meeting instead, such as: group decision making, developing strategy, best practice sharing, highlighting work well done, gathering feedback, team trust building and/or professional development.

The key is to align the medium to the message: What do we absolutely need a meeting for, and then go from there. Make small experiments and gather feedback and see how these changes are affecting engagement levels. It’s more an art than a science, and should reflect the values of the organization and the team, the type of work you need to get done and your timeline for getting it done.

What works in one organization and department may not work in another, so be sure to constantly check in and see how it’s going.

Mark Emerson, General Manager

I was a consultant for a major telecom that will remain nameless, but in my opinion, the endless meetings were a complete waste of time and contributed to a total lack of execution on multiple fronts.

And the politics! Everyone and their mother had to be invited to these meetings, which meant that introductions alone took 10-15 minutes. The executives did almost all of the talking and the minions either took notes or pretended to listen while playing on their phones/laptops.

In almost all cases, these meetings involve far too many people, devolve into power plays and give a veneer to the idea that the organization is solving issues and moving forward, rather than just kaffeeklatsches.

Having said that, there have been well-organized meetings where there was a meeting coordinator. These meetings were on-topic, focused, short, and everyone walked away with actionable items with deadlines. This meant that no one was at the meeting just taking up space. In one case, the meeting organizer even dis-invited three people after the first organizational meeting because they were not given any actionable items. The following meetings were then just as productive as team members delivered and course corrections were made.

Even if these meetings were not in person, they were just as productive. In most cases there was a one-page agenda sent out beforehand, all electronics were banned, and PowerPoint presentations were limited to five slides. The coordinator captured everything and distributed the materials, making it a more free-flowing discussion that brought out great insights and ideas.

Cary Paul, Senior Associate

Often, organizations spend so much time in formal meetings because it is comfortable. People love structure and meetings are one of the last bastions of structure in American business.

Think about children. We are always hearing that children crave discipline and structure. We never grow out of that, and meetings give us that structure.

The intent of meetings is spot-on.  Really.  While the meeting may be unnecessary, too long, structured poorly, boring, or include the wrong people – the BASIC idea behind the meeting—every meeting—is sound and justifiable:  Sharing information. Making decisions. Keeping on track. Getting new ideas. All critical functions of a company, right there in a comfortable package that everyone knows how to behave in.

And because of our hardwired need for structure, everyone knows how to behave. Meetings are muscle memory for people; they play their roles and all is well.

A lot of criticism has circulated around the engagement levels of team members due to bad meetings. While they can turn people off, meetings can have a positive effect on engagement, if done correctly.

Engagement equals action, and meetings are held when we are getting ready to act.

Is there a better way to run meetings? Absolutely. Here are a few ideas for making your meetings more productive:

• Have everyone read their notes ahead of time, and the meeting becomes just a 20-minute decision making process. There’s less time sitting through presentations, and more time spent on productive, action-oriented activity.
• Find new and creative ways to engage people in your meetings. Involving all the members of your team amps up the participation level and gets ideas flowing.
• Remember: meeting planning comes from the outset. Two clear components must be determined. WHY are we having this meeting, and WHO should be there?  Every person should have a clear and distinctive role they play and a good reason to be involved, or not be there at all.

Your Turn

So, what do you think? Are meetings getting a bad rap based on a few peoples’ bad experiences? What advice can you share about creating a more engaging, actionable meeting? Remember that first impressions are a big thing, some companies may even go to the extreme and look into the Best limo service in Alexandria VA to impress potential clients! We’d love to hear your thoughts!