Who is ultimately in charge of your job satisfaction? Your options are your supervisor, human resources, or top management. Got your answer?
It’s actually a trick question. The answer is “you.” The days of assuming that top management will push down a directive to human resources, who will then push down a system to be executed by a manager, is not only idealistic, it’s outdated.
Organization-level, one-size-fits-all solutions don’t work. You are in charge of ensuring that you are fulfilled, challenged, and happy, and the key to doing so is job crafting—proactive, employee-driven customization of tasks and relationships with others.
The idea of job crafting is as old as the idea of work itself. Only recently have scholars and practitioners alike begun to realize that it increases job satisfaction and work engagement while reducing boredom and burnout.
But job crafting is not for the faint of heart. It takes self- and other-awareness and a willingness to stimulate change, which in some cases creates conflict. Make sure you are thinking through the possibilities and potential implications. Ready to ensure that you’re thinking through the possibilities and potential implications? Read more about job crafting.
Cloverleaf can help your team to have meaningful conversations around differences in role expectations. Learn how to use Cloverleaf for role alignment.
Download the Cloverleaf Assessment Guide
- A comprehensive list of the assessments that Cloverleaf offers
- Summary of each assessment and what insights you get
- Anticipated time commitments for each assessment
As a co-founder and executive at a company in the coaching industry, I find it exceptional that there are so many different perspectives and misunderstandings on what effective coaching is. Our work focuses on creating a coaching culture that intersects with assessments, coaches, and the businesses that companies serve. Therefore, this gives us a unique perspective on the industry.
The word coaching is loaded and often connected to sports in a non-business context. That professional football coach you see screaming at their players often comes to mind. This is not what we are talking about at all. Sure there may be some great analogies in sports, but in a work context, a good coach is a sherpa or a wise sage.
I recently even had a Sales Executive at a large HR tech company ask me what the difference was between Coaching, Mentoring, and Performance Management (this is a topic for a post on a different day) – needless to say, these all serve very other purposes but the result can often be the same… personal and professional development.
Learn more about the differences between coaching, mentoring, and consulting here.
TYPES OF COACHING IN HISTORY
Historically, coaching in a business context has been seen as something negative. Ask someone over 55 what they think of workplace coaching and they likely will talk about how they or someone they know was “coached out” of a previous job. This is a relic of corporate America in the ’80s, the Jack Welch era focused on reducing the “bottom 20%” of workers that were under-performers.
This mindset has rightfully shifted and will continue to shift significantly as our workforce gets younger and younger. Millennials and Gen-Z expect the same level of support in their work (especially in that first job) that they experienced throughout school. Their formative years were full of coaching from sports (often even AAU or travel teams) and career development that were there for every step of the journey. But then they graduated college, started their first job, were handed a piece of technology, and told “good luck”. This support vacuum has led to an increased demand for life coaching, personal development coaching, professional coaching, business coaching, and leadership coaching to fill the void.
Download the Cloverleaf Assessment Guide
- A comprehensive list of the assessments that Cloverleaf offers
- Summary of each assessment and what insights you get
- Anticipated time commitments for each assessment
INVEST SMARTLY IN COACHING PROCESSES
Coaching has also typically been the exclusive domain of top executives (C-Suite or the next level down) in organizations. Typically only about 5% of an organization was “eligible” for such a perk. This is mainly because of the cost. Executive coaching can be expensive and often charge an hourly rate. Paying that cost for frontline workers was hard to justify to CFOs. Today’s tight labor market and changing distributed or remote workforce means employee engagement is key and perhaps we are at least willing to consider expanding access to coaching to the top 10% today.
As I pitch to investors I often get the question, ‘what is coaching trying to solve?’ Put another way, ‘who is paying for coaching conversations and why would someone engage a coach?’ Typically coaching hasn’t been purchased in any centralized way. Managers and leaders (especially in larger, more global companies) often find people they trust in their local regions and start working with them, paying for it directly from their cost center budgets or out of their pocket. There are currently 65,000 of these independent coaches in the US, which could be closer to 135,000 globally. Cloverleaf provides Automated Coaching™ to the entire organization for less than the cost of providing coaching to the top 5-10%.
Learn about Automated Coaching™ for a thriving workplace here.
IMPORTANCE OF SUCCESSFUL COACHING
But back to the original question – ‘what is coaching trying to solve?’ In short, all of the soft skill development and interpersonal challenges arise in a business context. This can look like a lot of things depending on the person, team, or organization. Some examples include conflict (either conflict between team members or conflict between a manager and their direct report), poor cross-functional collaboration (us vs them mentality between departments or divisions), and ineffective communication.
There are no silver bullets for these types of business challenges. No simple SaaS tool (at least before Cloverleaf) could help solve these often more complex and personal challenges. This leads us back to a business coach. Finding an advisor was the only or simplest problem-solving for effective communication and employee well-being. Coaching relationships could be independent of these interpersonal challenges and provide possible solutions for difficult work relationships.
Businesses in the United States typically spend more than $13 billion per year on coaching sessions with these people to bring solutions. Which brings us to the next point – how are we certain they are bringing solutions or as a CFO might ask – ‘what is the ROI on coaching?’ Most studies demonstrate a return of 4-7 times the cost of coaching. While it can be hard to calculate a return on investment in people, we know that good leaders translate into measurable growth in employee performance.
Learn more about the importance of coaching in the workplace here.
In short, the benefits of coaching bring a positive impact on your company culture. These competencies generate a significant ROI by improving leadership development and overall work performance. Are you ready to get your team started with Automated Coaching™?
If you’re only doing team building once a year, that’s not enough, and you should re-evaluate.
That might be direct, but your people are your greatest asset, and it is so important for engagement, team bonding, and mental health to connect and focus on something other than work every once in a while.
While it’s easy to get caught up in the projects and numbers, your people are still human, and in a world that is moving increasingly online, it’s more important than ever to connect in meaningful and intentional ways.
There is so much value in employees connecting in a “non-work” atmosphere, whether it be in-person or remote. Employees can feel a sense of belonging, build relationships, gain trust, feel camaraderie, and share a common mission.
Why We’re Doing It
When I began planning the implementation of a regular team-building schedule, I was initially hesitant about how others would feel about time being taken out of their schedule. As I planned more, I realized that if the effort is put in, these sessions are valuable, and using that time in this way matters. It helps us focus on our internal team, and creates a company culture of promoting connectedness.
When presenting this whole idea to the team, I came up with a list of reasons why we should definitely make team-building activities part of our culture and something we do, rather than just checking a box. Here was my list of reasons:
Greater company engagement in and knowledge of our platform.
Intentional application of our assessment results and those we work with = higher performing Cloverleaf, it’s what we’re made for.
More passion and drive behind our company mission; help everyone see why Cloverleaf is so great; a greater sense of belonging in Cloverleaf.
Higher employee engagement and team bonding = happier employees; contribute to our awesome leaders’ OKR of investing in employees.
I know everyone is busy, but this will approximately take up only 12-24 hours a year.
Employees are the greatest asset to a company, and it isn’t all about working…mental health is important, let’s laugh together and grow our relationships, after all, we only spend approximately 2,000 working hours at Cloverleaf together every year, so let’s enjoy that time together.
Zoom fatigue is real, let’s have some fun team-building exercises and blocks of time where we can relax and just talk. It might just lead to more productivity during tough weeks when we’re in ruts.
Friday rather than other days to send us into the weekend on a positive note, and usually a less packed/stressful day. We want this to be something fun, not just a checked box.
Please don’t schedule meetings over this.
Having a purpose or goal behind new initiatives is a great way to get the whole team on board!
How We’re Doing It
At Cloverleaf, we usually have 2-3 off-sites a year. We decided that for 2021, we would start a new rhythm of doing additional team-building activities every month in between those offsites, so we have some point of team connection every month of the year. We decided to have a dedicated, 2-hour time slot one Friday a month for the team-building exercises. We scheduled these on everyone’s calendar before the beginning of the year.
For every company, the sessions will look different. You might be in-person, remote teams, or a mix of both. You also might want to keep them more serious and do a coaching session for your team, or you might want them light-hearted and play board games, do a scavenger hunt, or trivia. You can even switch how they are every month.
Something else we’re trying to focus on more this year is living out our company values. At the beginning of each session, we give an introduction of the values we will be focusing on during that session.
For our January session, Peggy Murriner, our Content Manager, used her coaching background to guide us through our dashboard and give an overview of the purpose of each assessment. She also led us through a fun mad-lib, poem activity that left us feeling like poets and knowing more about each other- it was a hit!
The values we focused on during that session were curiosity and candor. When running through the dashboard, curiosity was flowing as there were so many awesome questions and insightful answers given. Everyone also got the chance to be curious and ask each other more personal questions during the poem activity. It allowed everyone to be candid: open, honest, vulnerable, and put as much on the table as they felt comfortable with. Our team members walked away knowing things about each other we haven’t known the past couple of years we’ve worked together.
However, you may choose to team build, and have a purpose in mind, even if it’s a short brain break. Team building will help your team grow stronger and more engaged, and it makes working with your teammates so much more fun.
What will your first team-building session be?
NO MORE TIME MANAGEMENT HACKS. INSTEAD, IMPLEMENT THESE FOUR BEST PRACTICES.
Everyone has different skills and abilities, but everyone gets the exact same amount of hours in a day. That’s why time has been dubbed “the ultimate equalizer.” So if you really want to get ahead, focusing on time management best practices will be hours well spent.
There are time management “hacks” galore. But I’m not interested in a specific system—everyone is unique and needs something different to avoid procrastination and minimize multitasking. Instead, offered below is my interpretation of what the social science research suggests are the four overarching, universal best practices in building time management skills.
Before outlining the four practices, it’s important to first understand the end goal of good time management. Meta-analytic evidence (based on an aggregated study of studies) suggests that the impact of time management on performance is weak at best. So why do it? Because time management is strongly associated with a host of well-being indicators such as stress levels, job satisfaction, and work-life balance. Effective time management can help us to remain productive without unnecessary strain.
Filtering Comes First
Ironically, the most important thing you should do with respect to time management skills has nothing to do with managing your time. No matter how amazing your time management techniques or how disciplined you are, if you let too many things in on the front end, you’ll never have enough time to get everything done on the back end. That’s why the most important thing you can do is filter out what you will not put on your task list or calendar.
Ask For Details. Never commit to a task, project, or partnership outright. How much time will it take? Is there a firm end date or deliverable or is this an ongoing ordeal? Thinking through these questions will ensure that this a worthwhile investment of your time.
Say No. Evaluate whether initiatives align with your goals. If you’re not sure, make a calendar item for a later date to re-evaluate. If the task or event involves others, be honest; there’s nothing wrong with a professional “no thank you.” It’s better than a relationship gone sour.
Availability. Be transparent with others about the amount of time you have available and how much time you are willing to commit. Also, try to uncover whether you are aligned on work pace. Do you have the same sense of urgency? How often will you need to check in?
Stay Inside the System
The majority of time management tips revolve around having specific systems in place. Keep in mind that it’s not the system that helps, but the habits that the system reinforces.
Don’t Let Anything Fall Through the Cracks. Having a system of important tasks and calendar items is fine, but it isn’t enough. Anything and everything that enters your mind—ideas, notes, feedback, etc.—needs to go into one system. These miscellaneous items tend to be random and messy. Spend time translating and organizing them so that they can be incorporated into your task list and schedule.
Regularly Scheduled Reconciliations. Once you have a system, the next step is to regularly reconcile everything in your system. Most people do this daily, but it’s also helpful to do this weekly, monthly, and annually to make sure you’re reprioritizing based on how things have developed. When you do, be sure to scrutinize everything. Refresh important tasks so that they are more relevant, and don’t mindlessly push tasks to a later date.
Prioritize First, Act Second
We’re pretty good at getting things into our system, but we’re really bad at prioritizing what’s in the system. Although many prioritization schemes are out there, perhaps the most timeless is the urgency-importance framework. This leads to four possible scenarios.
Not Urgent-Not Important. Don’t do it. It’s better to delete something off your task list and chip away at something important than to finish an unimportant task.
Urgent-Not Important. Try not to do it. Delegate to others or push back against those that are trying to get you to do it. Keep in mind that although it might not be important to you it might be important to them, so tread lightly.
Urgent-Important. Do it now. The key is to make sure that it is indeed important.
Not Urgent-Important. Make time to do it. More often than not, these are deep-thinking tasks that we never can find the time to tackle. Interestingly, these are also the tasks that are probably in our long-term best interest. Schedule time to make it happen.
Be Strategic About Being a Manager or a Maker
One way to ensure that you are using your time wisely is to pay attention to the differences between being a manager and a maker.
Manager. When you are in manager mode: (a) you are talking, problem-solving, and thinking quickly, (b) you are most productive when allocating time in units of 5 to 15 minutes, (c) your ideal state of consciousness is mindfulness (broad, present-moment attention), and (d) the cost of being in meetings is low.
Maker. When you are in maker mode: (a) you are alone, creating, and thinking slowly, (b) you are most productive when allocating time in units of 2 to 4 hours, (c) your ideal state of consciousness is flow (narrow, present-moment attention), and (d) the cost of being in meetings is high.
Unavailable. When carving out time to act as a maker, there are several mechanisms for making yourself unavailable. Out-of-office assistants, turning off text, social media, and Slack notifications, putting signs on closed doors, etc. Think strategically, experiment, and communicate with colleagues (or family) to explain why you don’t want to be distracted.
Be Careful With Online Scheduling Tools. When planning out time to be in manager mode, be strategic in how you set meetings. If time is money, scheduling meetings is a negotiation, and the goal is to win. Instead of giving out your schedule through Calendly, MixMax, or the like, tell other people when you want to meet. This will ensure that you manage your time and energy in ways that allow you to be more productive. A tool like Clockwise is great for teams.
Keep in mind that trying out different systems is fine, but the key is to develop good time management habits that allow you to stay on top of things over the long term. Focus on filtering on the front end, staying inside one system, regularly reprioritizing, and being strategic with your manager and maker time.
Consider taking my free, validated, and theoretically grounded assessment, “How Well Do You Manage Your Time.” This 12-question assessment will automatically generate your scores and a comparison to your peers.
References
- Claessens, B. J., Van Eerde, W., Rutte, C. G., & Roe, R. A. (2007). A review of the time management literature. Personnel Review.
- Gaskin, J. E., & Skousen, T. (2016). Time-chunking and hyper-refocusing in a digitally-enabled workplace: six forms of knowledge workers. Frontiers in Psychology, 7, 1627.
- Macan, T. H. (1994). Time management: Test of a process model. Journal of Applied Psychology, 79(3), 381.
Stress is at an all-time high around the globe. The time is right to reevaluate whether you are coping appropriately. This post will help you self-assess and self-reflect on whether you’re doing it right.
But first, consider taking my assessment, “What Is Your Coping Style?” This free, nine-question assessment will automatically generate your scores and a comparison to your peers.
Problem-Focused Coping
Problem-focused coping entails attempting to solve the source of the problem. The goal is to stop the stressor altogether.
The challenge, though, is that engaging in such behaviors can be hard, time-consuming, and even introduce new types of stress. Thus, problem-focused coping is a productive, long-term fix, but it takes effort.
Examples
Taking stock of the situation and coming up with a plan.
Focusing one’s efforts and attention on doing things that improve the situation.
Seeking out resources (e.g., people, processes, services) that can help solve the issue at hand.
Download the Cloverleaf Assessment Guide
- A comprehensive list of the assessments that Cloverleaf offers
- Summary of each assessment and what insights you get
- Anticipated time commitments for each assessment
Emotion-Focused Coping
Emotion-focused coping entails managing the emotions associated with the situation. The goal is to minimize the negative physiological and psychological reactions stemming from the stressor.
The challenge here is that emotions can be hard to control. It’s worth the effort, though, because you’ll be more successful at problem-focused coping when you’re emotionally balanced.
Emotion-focused coping is not a long-term fix, because it doesn’t solve the source of the problem, but it’s an important part of the coping process.
Examples
Seeking out social support by finding someone to talk to about how you’re feeling.
Pinpointing, out loud or in writing, exactly what emotions you’re feeling.
Reminding yourself that you’ll be okay, things could be worse, or that you should be appreciative of what you have.
Reappraising the stressor as an opportunity to learn, grow, or develop.
Avoidance-Focused Coping
Avoidance-focused coping entails distancing oneself from the stressor or the feelings of stress. This is an unproductive form of coping. Unfortunately, people do it all the time.
Distracting ourselves from how we are feeling, or refusing to think through how to make things better, only delays the stressor. When it does resurface, it’s typically worse.
Examples
Distracting yourself with something pleasurable, like entertainment (e.g., social media), sleep, or substances (e.g., drugs, alcohol).
Convincing yourself that everything will be fine and work itself out.
Acting as though nothing really happened.
Telling yourself you’ll deal with it when the time is right.
The Right Way to Cope with Stress
Given what we know about stress and coping, here’s what you should or shouldn’t be doing:
Don’t avoid stress. If you’re experiencing stress, your brain and your body are trying to tell you something. Avoidance-focused coping doesn’t work.
Express your emotions. Seek out people or mechanisms (e.g., journaling, meditation) that allow you to acknowledge and accept your feelings. Emotion-focused coping is part of being human. Let it happen.
Start getting organized. Outline the problem, start brainstorming ideas, talk to others to get new perspectives, and then get to work. When it doesn’t work out as planned, iterate, and try again. Problem-focused coping is the primary solution to long-term stress reduction.
Visit www.scottdust.com for more free resources for human capital enthusiasts, including a free e-book titled “A Field Guide to Human Capital Assessments.”
HUMAN SKILL PROGRAMS ARE HITTING LIMITATIONS...
- Close the widening gap between learning and on-the-job application
- Overcome the tension of pausing productivity for development opportunities
- Integrate learning so it is actually in the flow of work
- The evolution of human skill development
- What Automated Coaching™ is and how it works.
To realize your goals in the New Year, focus on goal pursuit, not goal setting.
Researchers have conducted tens of thousands of experiments on goal setting, illustrating that things like difficulty and specificity are associated with better outcomes. Goal setting, however, is only half the battle. And arguably, it’s the easy half. Without proper “goal pursuit,” the well-set goal will never actually be achieved.
It’s that time of year to set the agenda for the upcoming year. To ensure your goals are actually achieved, consider self-reflecting on each of the goal pursuit dimensions described below.
But first, consider taking my free, validated, and theoretically grounded assessment, “The Right Way To Pursue Your Goals.” This 12-question assessment will automatically generate your scores and a comparison to your peers.
Before discussing goal pursuit, it’s important to clarify the first step—goal setting—of which there are two primary frameworks.
First is SMART goals, which stand for specific (S), measurable (M), actionable (A), realistic (R), and time-bound (T). The focus of the SMART framework is making goals clear, objective, and reasonable. The premise is that clarity is associated with action.
Second is FAST goals, which stands for frequently discussed (F), ambitious (A), specific (S), and transparent (T). The FAST framework is relatively new and builds upon the weakness of the SMART framework. Namely, that individuals are embedded within collective systems such as teams or organizations.
If goal setting is the beginning, goal pursuit is everything in-between the beginning and the end. Once a goal has been set, there are four behavioral approaches that should be pursued that increase the likelihood of goal achievement.
Recognize that Goal Pursuit Involve Dynamic Iteration
Frequent Reevaluation. Organizational change is inevitable. Sometimes it’s drastic and sudden (e.g., the pandemic) and sometimes it’s subtle and incremental (e.g., small mistakes over time). It’s also possible that personal circumstances or interests change over time. While it’s important to stick with your goals, it’s also important to update them based upon your circumstances. It’s pointless to accomplish a goal if it’s no longer relevant or fulfilling.
Pinpoint Successes and Failures. Consider what challenges you’ve overcome and what obstacles remain. Such reflection will ensure that you are efficiently refocusing your efforts and coming up with new strategies for goal attainment.
Create Systems. Create systems that make dynamic interaction part of your routine. For example, schedule time on your calendar for yourself or meeting with others, or add the goal reevaluation process to part of your daily or weekly task list. This reevaluation schedule should be commensurate with the timing of the goals (e.g., daily for short-term goals, monthly for annual goals, etc.).
Free Playbook For Creating An Engaging Employee Experience even During Challenging Times
- What The Future Workplace Looks Like
- How To Activate Emotional Intelligence Within Your Team
- Factors Of Employee Motivation
- Strategies For Employee Engagement
- A Hybrid Work Model For Collaboration, Flexibility, & Fulfillment
- The Power Of Coaching In The Workplace
- How To Reduce The Impact Of Labour Turnover
Allow for Goal Pursuit Transparency
Tell Somebody. You’re much more likely to stick with your goals when you verbalize them to friends, family, or colleagues. But go beyond the one-and-done goal reveal. When working with others, don’t “bury the lead.” Begin conversations by clearly explaining your goals and how the initiative at hand plays into those goals.
Network Accountability. Use guilt to your advantage. Nobody enjoys letting others down. To increase your odds of sticking with something, figure out how to create some degree of interdependence between your goals and the goals of others. This forced accountability will inevitably lead to ongoing conversations about how to properly pursue the goals together.
Know Your Why. It’s not enough to simply have a goal. You need to be able to clearly explain why the goal is important to you. Along the way, there will be many people out there that chip away at your ability to stick with your goal. It is in those moments where you need to be able to clearly articulate your why.
Embrace a Multi-Goal Mentality
Reconcile Competing Goals. A glaring flaw of goal-setting frameworks is that they only consider one goal at a time. This is unrealistic. We typically have a list of several goals, some short-term and some long-term, some straightforward and some complex, and some work-related and some personal. It is therefore important to evaluate when and where conflicts manifest. In some cases, it will be necessary to choose one over another. In other cases, it’ll be necessary to make compromises.
Goal Prioritization. Once we recognize the reality of having multiple, competing goals, it is necessary to continually reprioritize goals. Perhaps certain goals should get priority because they are more urgent or because they are tied to other important factors like our well-being or security. Additionally, these goal reprioritization decisions shouldn’t be tied to how we’re feeling in that moment. Instead, these decisions should be based on values and/or higher-order goals.
Time Allocation. We get done what we spend time on. The same rules we follow with respect to time management can be integrated with goal pursuit. The tendency is to spend time focusing on easier, short-term goals. What we should be doing, however, is constantly evaluating our time expenditure on all of our goals, and regularly recalibrating to ensure we first satisfy our highest priority goals.
Make Goal Pursuit Learning-Focused, Not Performance-Focused
Learning First, Performance Second. Focusing on objective outcomes is great. But sometimes we focus on the end-goal without considering how we get there. If the goal is relatively difficult, by definition, we don’t yet have all of the ingredients for achieving the goal. Thus, the focus should be on learning, not performing.
New Knowledge or Skills. It’s important to uncover what exactly we need to learn in order to obtain our goal. The first common category is knowledge, which entails the theoretical or practical understanding of a subject. The second is skills, which entails proficiencies obtained through training or experience. Obtaining knowledge comes from asking the right questions from the right sources. Obtaining skills comes from seeking out opportunities to practice the behaviors of interest.
Breaking Down the Process. Efficient goal pursuit entails breaking down goals into sub-goals, steps, or components. Sub-goals are smaller goals that accumulate as a larger end-goal. Step-based goals work like a Gantt chart, showing you what you need to do first, second, third, etc. to progress towards the end-goal. Component-based goals have an interactive effect such that the end-goal will only be achieved if several components are simultaneously achieved.
Keep in mind that goal setting is important, but it will only take you so far. To achieve your goals in the New Year, it’s important to focus on the process of goal pursuit.
Visit www.scottdust.com for more free resources for human capital enthusiasts, including a free e-book titled “A Field Guide to Human Capital Assessments.”