Forums: Discussions for entrepreneurs and small business.

Should a leader identify and meet the needs of their people (the employee) and serve them  or should they identify and meet the wants of their people (the employee) or both?  I ask that because of the way large corporations down sizes staff and treatment of customes in this country.

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Here goes my maiden post, let`s see if I`m helpful....

It`s a question of a company being able to provide appropriate value to employees commensurate with the value they bring to the company.  The job market is a free market just like open commerce between companies and their customers.  There needs to be an exchange where both parties experience a perceived value received at or above that which they provide.  All the same issues of retention, etc. come into play.

As far as the difference between wants and needs, you could categorize the various aspects of the employee-employer relationship into these buckets, but either way it`s important to note that most employees are looking at their situation from their own point of view, not that of the company and it`s well-being.  It`s leadership`s job to think about things like sustainability and what current actions will translate into 5, 10, and 20 years down the road.  Company pensions are a good example.  I don`t believe in them.  They create ongoing financial burden on a company which only increases as time goes on.  Companies should be as lean as possible, and compensation beyond the basic benefit structure should be performance based.  If your salary is tied to good metrics that accurately measure your performance, you can contribute more to your 401K plan.  Now that`s a retirement benefit that encourages performance and doesn`t create incentives for "getting by" for so many years until a pension kicks in.  Plus, most of the time people who perform can create a much larger nest egg for themselves than they otherwise could in a company pension plan.

I think it`s important to help all employees see the relationship between their benefits and their impact on the company.  A high-level view of the books should be open to them as much as is prudent in your particular situation.  Then they can see the chunk that every aspect of expenses takes out of the company`s ability to reinvest profits into growing, including benefits and other overhead costs.

As far as lay-offs are concerned, while these are sometimes necessary due to market down-turns, etc.  many of these actions spawn from a cost-world school of thought on they part of management.  I`m an avid student of the Theory of Constraints by Eli Goldratt and all it`s implications in business.  I think this school of thought guides the way towards alternative approaches to dealing with market downturns in lieu of layoffs.  I would not have space to expound sufficiently here, but I would suggest reading "The Goal" if you want some insight into the concepts.  A broader and more in-depth description as it applies to general business practices is available in the book "What is this thing called the Theory of Constraints?"
Another aspect that I think doesn`t get enough thought by companies are the costs of recruiting new high-value employees and the impact to morale.  Quantifying turnover cost is easy, but sometimes short-sighted executives would rather take a long-term hit for a short-term gain.  I haven`t researched methods of quantifying impact on morale, but this seems to be a much more difficult thing to estimate accurately. 
The more value an individual employee can bring in your industry and their job role, the more impact on these two factors.  In a fast-food environment for example, there`s a limit on how much value an individual employee can deliver to your business.  In a software company on the other hand, a good programmer can be worth 5 so-so programmers.


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ThePMStudent.blogspot.com

Tycal,

Or you suggesting a good leader (company owner, I guess you are implying) would never downsize? And what "treatment" of customers are you talking about? You are very vague. I`m not sure what answers or comments you are seeking. Please try to be more specific.

Thanks - R@

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Richard Arnold · Key Concept Writers · Business Communication: The "Key" To Success· Law of Attraction Blog · Life Ain`t Brain Surgery Blog

If you are trying to evaluate serving as part of leading, then you might enjoy reading the December 26, 2007 Holiday Leadership Lessons on: http://www.danmulhern.com/wordpress/

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Nicole Champagne
Email: influencialexpectations@gmail.com
Cell: (734) 262-3730
Soar With Influencial Expectations!

Um...let`s consider that in a capitalist society, employees have NO say in what`s going on in the company! That is unless they have equity ownership of some kind, like stock options or it`s an employee-owned company.

There`s a fundamental difference between a "leader" and a business owner. In large enterprises, the owners are the stockholders. Then there`s the executive board who "serve" the whims and demands of the stockholders...not the employees.

An employee is someone who voluntarily exchanges their work for a payment of some type....salary, wages, etc.

No leader ever "serves" the people being led. A good leader listens to the populace, takes advice into consideration, and also considers the human aspects of life, incentives, and so forth. But ultimately, the leader serves a mission, ideal, concept, or plan.

I see your point but on some aspects I disagree.  Here is why I disagree: call me idealistic but I believe that leaders lead regardless of positional power.  For example, Rosa Parks wasn`t the first African American person to refuse to give up her seat on a bus but her actions were an effective catalyst for change.  She didn`t hold the position of a US President but none the less her actions impacted a nation.  My point is leaders imerge from all walks of life and often in call to a need of service.  It doesn`t matter if the call to service is for the public good, service to help a neighbor, or service to hold those within business/corporate "leadership", aka positional powers, accountable to be ethical and/or walk their talk.

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Nicole Champagne
Email: influencialexpectations@gmail.com
Cell: (734) 262-3730
Soar With Influencial Expectations!

CraigL, I`d have to say I disagree with some of your views as well.  It sounds like you lean toward theory X, and I`m theory Y.

"in a capitalist society, employees have NO say in what`s going on in the company!"

    Put the capitalism down slowly and back away!   I feel like you`ve smeared the good name of one of my best friends!  Let`s talk about management theories instead, this has nothing to do with capitalism!

    This could happen in a very, very theory X management environment.  But it`s just not prudent business practice to have ownership dictate everything and not listen to the people out there making things happen.  Ownership doesn`t always mean expertise.  In the case of layoffs in a fairly sizable company, a division head may be in the best position to make that decision even though they do not hold a majority position in the company.

    Your employees are your best source of ideas and energy for moving the company forward.  Companies that do not have strong leaders and instead put theory X dictators in power don`t tap into this resource very effectively.  When people say they got tired of working for "the man," these theory X people are who they are talking about.  The most valuable people in theory X companies quit and start their own businesses!  It kills these people to know they have tons of value that their employer doesn`t care enough to tap into.

"No leader ever "serves" the people being led."

    Personally, I think the only way to really lead is by serving people.  I`m not talking about slavery, I`m talking about voluntary service to others.  I`ve only managed people for about 5 years but found quickly that theory Y is definitely my style.  I believe that if you encourage the entrepreneurial spirit of your people, even inside a large organization, they will be motivated to innovate and work that much harder.  I`ve found that barking orders may get people to move, but usually grudgingly and with little long-term benefit. 

    I`m not saying a leader won`t have to take actions that don`t directly benefit their people, but they should always be looking out for their people`s best interested in balance with the rest of the business.  And guess what, sometimes firing a bad egg on your team is an act of serving your team and company as a whole.  Serving doesn`t mean you are a slave in any way, to the one or the many.

    RealtorNicole, I think your response is right-on.  Leaders always serve the people they lead, whether there`s a position of authority attached to it or not.  I think CraigL is describing a manager and decision-maker, not a leader.  Making decisions doesn`t make you a leader, even if you`ve got great strategic foresight.  People have to be excited to follow you, and the best way to achieve that environment is leadership through service to the people.





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ThePMStudent.blogspot.com

I think there is a hidden factor which differentiates between manager/decision maker and leaders.  It is a little thing called: EGO.  I have had the misfortune of working in a toxic environment which had a "top-down" management style; were the value of input was based on a person`s title not on the quality of concept/ideas; and where it was considered insubordination to ask questions or to raise questions on what appeared to be questionable conduct of superiors. 

How many times within business and/or corporate structures are voices disenfrancished because it is "not how we do business" or because the idea was generated by a front line worker.  Within toxic environments voices get squashed, ego`s run rampant, and innovation barely gets off the ground.  I happen to suspect this occurs because the foundations of trust, respect and commadarity are either never established or at best are very minimal.

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Nicole Champagne
Email: influencialexpectations@gmail.com
Cell: (734) 262-3730
Soar With Influencial Expectations!

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A leader is a decision-maker. The attribute of "leader" means the decisions they make usually are the decisions that go into implementation. It also means the leader takes responsibility (and the consequences) for those decisions. There`s a large difference between a leader and an "authority."

I`m familiar with modern management theories, along with many of the ways "leader" has been shifted into some ill-defined word. Where these kinds of discussions can wander or go off the track has much to do with the definition each person uses.

There`s a defined leader, then there are people who "end up" in a leadership position, many times by default, other times due to historical circumstances. People end up as leaders also because nobody else wants to take the responsibility. That`s fine, and Rosa Parks is an example of a combination of circumstances and her own character.

But to say that leadership is removed from the economic philosophy of a business doesn`t make any sense. That`s like trying to remove the concept of decisiveness from leadership.

To bring in how people other than the leader "feel" about decisions also makes little sense EXCEPTING when we move out of the initial theory and into practical reality. Leaders have the charisma and empathy to align decisions with how their followers accept those decisions.

An authority may or may not have an interest in how people feel about their decisions.

So is this discussion about those in a position of authority, or leaders? Is it about leaders across the board, or only about enterprise management executives?