In Good Boss, Bad Times, in May's McKinsey Quarterly, Robert Sutton from Stanford’s Graduate School of Engineering provides the recipe for bosses that have to deliver the bad news of layoffs and pay cuts, and face anxious employees.
To set up his recipe, Sutton first describes the hazards of the “toxic tandem,” when the boss is oblivious to the needs and actions of subordinates, at the same time that subordinates are hyper vigilant – alert to every signal from the executive suite and the boardroom to figure out what’s going on, and likely to assume the worst. “Tiny signals get magnified,” explains Sutton.
Sutton’s recipe for leadership and organizational success is: prediction – letting people know when they are safe to the extent possible; understanding – providing people with an explanation; control – giving people some control over the way it happens (cutbacks, layoffs, etc.); and compassion.
Sutton’s mention of the hyper vigilance reminds me of Ken Chenault’s advice when I met him in April.He underscored the importance of leaders communicating and being present, especially in times of economic stress.“Don’t assume that people are seeing what you are seeing.And, you’ve got to act. Never let events freeze you up.”
Looking ahead, Sutton reminds leaders that they will be remembered for how they handled these tough times. Regarding the employees who remain, he says that “when they see that it’s fair, they are more likely to stay loyal, suffer less psychological damage, and also feel more guilty and work even harder to help you… whether people lose their jobs or not—has an effect on the whole system.”
When Rem Koolhaas disses you, should you pack up your geospacial software, go home, and sob quietly into your pillow in the bedroom of the apartment in your zoned mixed use neighborhood? Not according to John Norquist, CEO of the Congress on New Urbanism (CNU), and former mayor of Milwaukee. Norquist and a large cohort from the CNU gathered in Denver last month for their 17th annual Congress.
Koolhaas, who has called New Urbanist design in effect “not real enough,” is just one of the more famous of New Urbanisms detractors. As a fan of the movement, I wondered why there is such vitriol in some circles for a movement that seeks to make both public and private space more pleasant, sustainable, and livable. New Urbanism seeks to wrestle away community planning from an “automobile monoculture” and bring human beings and human interaction more fully into the equation. While a meeting like CNU 17 might conjure images of people standing in trees shouting “TRUTH!” and “BEAUTY!” the CNU represents a planning and development model gaining momentum as good business. Reporter Katherine Gregor noted that one of the overarching themes of CNU 17 was exactly this: smart planning supported by federal transportation policy and funding provide an engine for growth, wealth, and jobs. It seems New Urbanism might just be a pretty healthy mix of dreaming and getting things done.
New Urbanism takes its place among a larger movement often referred to as “Smart Growth.”As large tracts of McMansion style homes stand half-finished or still on the drawing board across the country, as studies show a reverse migration from suburb to town and city neighborhood, architects and developers are taking notice and changing their strategies.According to Norquist, even traditional tract home builders like Toll Brothers are beginning to focus on the space outside the homes and ¼ acre lots that up until very recently seemed to form the sum total of concern for both builder and buyer.
Winners of design prizes at CNU 17 demonstrate this shifting strategy both in the US and in the global economy. They include a regional plan for Buffalo, NY. In Buffalo, participants developed, in the words of the plan rationalle:“an interlocking array of plans for downtown, waterfront, and parks rationalized under the umbrella of a city-wide master plan with the former elements adoptedby reference as part of the latter. These elements nest within broader regional efforts at "smart growth," cultural tourism, and regional economic development planning.” An international winner, in the student submission category, was a redevelopment of a theater complex, revitalizing a neighborhood in downtown Beijing, China.
CNU 17 highlighted the promise and obstacles faced as an economy recovers and as people look for habitation that fits their lifestyle and their aspirations. Maybe when truth and beauty meet up with economic opportunity, a (walking) path forward begins to emerge.
“Sex and the Boardroom: Is power the ultimate aphrodisiac?” screams from the tip top of the front page of today’s Financial Times in bold letters, referring to a page 10 article by Luke Johnson entitled “The sex snare set for top dog executives.” Poor guys…sounds tough!A snare…a trap!In the article itself, citing Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, the writer mulls about ambition, testosterone, the temptations of power, men’s “sexual appetites,” anthropologists, biologists, “lusts,” and “nubile women.”
Sorry to bring this down from such erotic heights, but what does this have to do with the boardroom?
Where sex is concerned, it is probably more relevant to shareholders that boards be comprised of women and men with the experience, expertise, and diversity of backgrounds and perspectives to make decisions that will maximize shareholder value.That companies have policies and practices to identify, recruit, and promote the most highly qualified and talented women and men for employment, and provide an environment that motivates people to be their most productive.
How about "gender in the boardroom," not "sex and the boardroom."
I recently enjoyed lunch in the Stortinget , the Norwegian parliament building withAnsgar Gabrielsen, former Minister of Trade, who has been internationally recognized for his bold legislation requiring – nay, forcing – publicly traded Norwegian companies to boost astronomically the percentage of women on their corporate boards from a mere six percent to a full 40 to 60 percent representation. The rationale: companies with substantial numbers of women in their senior ranks do significantly better on the triple bottom line – including the financials.This story has been reported widely in the European press (as an example, I was just sent this link to a recent BBC report ), and the governments of France, Spain and Germany have sent delegations to explore possible applications in their own business boardrooms.
In a nutshell, then-Trade Minister Gabrielsen used the power of the press to get the jump on potential political opposition and by-passed the usual parliamentary processes around introducing legislation to announce in banner headlines to a receptive public what he planned to do.While conservatives and the business world (male and female) howled its disapproval with the fury of battle-enraged valkyrie, the law passed. Now, two years later, even the most adamant opponents almost unanimously agree – some grudgingly, some enthusiastically – that the move was very good for Norwegian boards.I will report more on those reactions later this week.
While the larger story is fascinating, I was equally intrigued by the person of Mr. Gabrielsen.How is it that a lifelong politician, a conservative, a self-avowed non-feminist, took the leap of forcing such a dramatic change?What did he understand that other men in positions of power with responsibility for delivering the highest returns to their stakeholders do not?What compelled him to take action when other did not?
The following is a largely unedited version of our conversation over fiskesuppe (fish soup) and jorbaer (strawberries), Norway’s signature spring lunch.The challenge that I set to Mr. Gabrielsen:What message would you send to boards outside of Norway who will not be subject to such legislation, but who want the most effective boards they can assemble?
AG:This is about shareholders rights.This change gives shareholders more choice about a key element in value creation in a company, diversity. Diversity is a value in itself that creates wealth.It’s important that boards have diversity in education, experience, expertise, age, gender, etc.Too many boards have seven, nine, eleven people who are made in the same factory, very often with the same education, very often in the same year.They go sailing, boar hunting and salmon fishing together.They dine in the same restaurant.They are very alike.I believe in the opposite. It is important that people think their own, different thoughts, and gets to say what is needed, not what is wanted.
KS:So this really isn’t about women per se.It is about how boards are organized and function to get better results.
AG:I am not feminist.I am a conservative.I am practical, rational and I want Norway to flourish.
KS:So why focus on this? There are so many other ways to get at that objective.Why women on boards?
AG:I was trying to maximize value.For that to happen, we need 100% of our best people. We have spent billions on educating both the boys and the girls – and then we cut the girls out. That doesn’t make sense.I had found on the Internet a report. I forget which one.I saw what the scientists say [about the positive economic impact of gender equity at the top of organizations]. The reports were somewhat contradictory but I decided: ‘It cannot be worse if we use the other 50% of the population.’I was not interested in arguing.
KS:And it would have been an argument?
AG:This issue of advancing women was a topic every two to three years in Norway.The project never made progress.I realized:‘It is not ME who should provide the evidence.It is the ones who think their 50% know it all that needs to prove THEIR case.What is the reason for keeping 50% of the population out of the boardroom? My career has been about helping companies and the public sector to understand each other. I know the business sector. I had been in parliament.
KS:And so you forced the issue.
AG:Conservatives were in the majority and we were not making the big step.If you wait for everyone to get on board around an important change, you can wait forever.In October 2001, I was made Minister of Economics and Trade.In six months, I decided for myself: ‘I will be the one who makes the difference.’ I knew that the person who would make a difference had to be a conservative man from business – or a minister of trade – not from a female or a female advocate.
KS:So what did you do?
AG:My strategy started with the question:‘Who do I need to make an alliance with?’I realized: ‘I do not tell anyone.’When I switched my vote, in effect, I made the conservative majority the minority on this topic.
KS:Bold move.
AG:I found a debate in our Parliament from 1910.It was about giving the women the right to vote. Many men in Parliament made the same arguments against that as they give against having women on boards.
KS:Norway and the other Scandinavian countries are world famous for having greater gender equity than just about anywhere else on the globe.Families receive great social support when they have children, allowing both men and women time with their children when they are born, and quality care for their kids when they go back to work.Why wasn’t the situation already taken care of at the top of the house? Why, in all places, was this still a problem?
AG:From the time the first man came into the world, the one who gets power wants to keep it.
KS:Just men?Isn’t that true of mankind in general, women included?
AG:I believe that women are equal to or better than men.Why? Women don’t take high risk.These big international scandals – Enron, Elf – the people who got them in trouble were men.The whistle blowers were all women.I wanted to break up the alpha male club. We had educated 50/50 boys and girls.The women had the experience. There was no reason why they should not advance to the highest levels.
KS:You did this in such a bold way.On 22 February 2002, the headline suddenly appeared in the paper, and by 6 PM you were in the office of a rather furious Prime Minister’s office.
AG:Yes, and I didn’t move.I knew it would work out.On 8 March 2002, I invited six men and 94 women to parliament.For the six men who were there, the effect was very visual and visceral.They got it.They felt what it was like to be in such a small minority. And they realized that they knew almost all of the men and none of the women – maybe one or two.The fault was not with women but with the men’s own entirely male networks. By November 2003, Parliament supported the legislation.It took a little longer for certain members of the business community to get behind it.
KS:I have to say that you went about accomplishing your goal in what can only be described as a very male way: a forcible sort of strength and courage that took on what needed to be done with no one else’s permission.And then, when you had advanced on the issue, you creatively found ways to co-opt others to join your side.
AG:I had to force it because I knew that both the party leader and the prime minister would have said no.
KS:Why do you think the situation exists in the first place? Not just in Norway, but anywhere?
AG:There is something between men and women where they fight each other.In my view, we need both perspectives because men and women are different.Think of 10 boys on a hiking trip. Think of 10 girls on a biking trip. It is hard to name what the real difference is. The older I get, the more I see that nature is driving us.
Military
experts like Michael Vlahos have spent more
than a decade re-exploring the role of “strategic narratives” in war. This is
because, as I mentioned in my last post, there has been a shift in the nature
of war. In my interview with Vlahos, we discussed how the role of “strategic
narratives” has been thrust to the forefront of our arsenal of military tools.
In
this context, strategic narratives are considered to be "compelling
storylines which can explain events convincingly and from which inferences can
be drawn." Or alternatively, “an interlocking framework of ‘truths’”
that explain how a conflict came to be, where it is going, and how it should be
argued and described.
The
story of the September 11, 2001, attacks offer a modern example of what
strategic narratives are and why they are useful tools for understanding
conflict. In 2003, 75 percent of Americans polled supported the U.S. response
to the 9/11 attacks – its offensive against Iraq.
Four
years later, in April 2007, 58 percent of participants of the same poll now
felt the U.S. attack on Iraq was a mistake.
Many
military experts find strategic narratives, or the discourse of the historic
event, as a way to explain this shift and manage conflicts so that they can
win. This is important because people would naturally rather support the winner
than the loser. As Nicollo Machiavelli eloquently
put it:
“…because if the two powerful
neighbors of yours come to blows, either they are such that, one of them
winning, you have to fear the winner, or not. In whichever of these two cases,
it will always be more useful to you to come out openly and make a good war;
because in the first case, if you do not come out, you will always be the prey
of whoever wins, with the pleasure and satisfaction of the vanquished, and you
have neither reason nor anything that might defend you or that might give you
shelter. Because he who wins does not want suspect friends who did not help him
in adversity; he who loses does not shelter you, because you did not want to
rescue his fortune with arms in hand.”
This
thought process also applies to business because the same human principles
operate here. Corporations must build authentic narratives that make people
want to belong. As Vlahos said in our interview, "The relationship between
customers and the corporation needs to be something more than manipulation by
the corporation to get what they want. It has to satisfy their vision of what
they are and what they want to be.”
Importantly,
Vlahos contends that a corporation’s narrative needs to be in harmony with that
of the greater civilization. A business’ actions become the posts of its story,
and a company needs to show that ultimately this fits with where the community
at large wants to go.
It
is that link – between the corporate narrative and the cultural one – where
Ethonomics comes in. If people want companies that are moving in the direction
of ethics and sustainability, then companies must show that their narratives
fit this vision too.
What
I loved about this interview was the practicality of it. Here is someone who
knows a lot about war and bloodshed explaining the strategic benefit of being
“good”!
Using
Strategic Narratives to Explain Apple’s Allure
When Vlahos
turned to the implication of strategic narratives in business, he picked a
prominent corporate “war” to make his point: Apple vs. Microsoft. The narrative view offers a fascinating
explanation for what is happening between these competitors.
Microsoft has
generated significantly more value than Apple, but Apple
has plugged into the national Zeitgeist(our general
trend of thought and feeling) more powerfully. Vlahos says that narratives
can explain this, and a company’s narrative is often tied to that of its leader.
Steve Jobs,founder and CEO of
Apple, has been able to sense the national narrative of being an “underdog” and
plugs into it. He represents something that many of us want to be part of. Jobs
represents salvation and success through innovation and hard work.
Conversely, Vlahos sees that “[Microsoft ChairmanBill] Gates represents, whether he
likes it or not, the gilded age – the age of Rockefeller.”
The gilded age narrative may have been an alluring
historical story, but it is no longer the ideal. It does not lead to where the
majority of Americans want to see us going – to a place of efficient
sustainability where average people have the chance to realize their dreams and
monopolies do not win.
The
strategic narrative plays a role within the company and outside of the company.
Ask yourself the questions below to see how you can craft a narrative that your
employees and your customers can support.
1.What is your company’s narrative?
2.How does your company’s narrative fit the broader
cultural one?
3.Is the narrative closely associated with your company’s
leadership?
4. How
can I share our narrative to inspire others?
With so many challenges facing our country and the U.S. government, many people have doubted whether we would see significant action on climate change this year.They may still prove correct, but with the passage of the Waxman-Markey Bill (the American Clean Energy and Security Act of 2009, or ACES) by the U.S. House of Representatives the wheels are moving.It was no sure thing that the bill would pass the House, and it’s even less sure that it will pass in the Senate.There are more than a few who would rather it doesn’t.I’m going out on a limb though – I think we should do something about climate change.And to go even further out on the limb, I’m going to say that the ACES bill is a step in the right direction.
While it still has to make it through the Senate this fall, getting approved by the House of Representatives is a historic achievement for a climate bill. The last major attempt, with the Lieberman-Warner Act, died quietly after a brief flurry of excitement in 2008.
The Waxman-Markey effort targets a 17% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions below 2005 levels by 2020 and an 83% reduction by 2050, primarily by using a cap and trade system.One of the difficulties with cap and trade is that most people still don’t get it, not knowing what the term means.That makes life hard for those working to move the bill forward.
Cap and trade means is that major polluters will have a cap, a limit, on the quantity of greenhouse gases like carbon dioxide (CO2) that they can produce.Some businesses like burning coal for power produce a huge quantity of CO2 and these will be affected the most.You can meet your cap either by reducing how much CO2 you produce, or buying something called carbon allowances.If your business comes in under your cap because you got creative and efficient, then you’re all set.If you produce more than your allotted share of greenhouse gases though and go over your cap, that’s where the trade part comes in.The cap and trade system allows you to buy carbon credits, or allowances, to meet your target.
It’s simpler than it sounds actually, and cap and trade systems like this have been shown to work, helping to greatly reduce acid rain in the U.S. in a short period of time and for a lot less money than the critics said would be needed, for example.
Over 1000 pages long, the ACES also contains a host of provisions to support energy efficiency and renewable energy production to help us realize these reductions in greenhouse gas emissions.Still, when you’re reshaping a good-sized chunk of the economy it’s hard to please everyone, stirring a variety of groups to oppose the bill, and a long list of players angling to secure a piece of the action.
Businesses and states heavily invested in high-carbon industries like coal are not excited about the measure.This is to be expected.If you are an operator of a coal-fired power plant, a cap and trade system will eventually have to make your business more costly, or else it won’t work.Critics of the ACES are saying the cost of implementing the ACES will dramatically increase the cost of electricity as a result.
The biggest argument against the bill so far goes like this is that it will cost money, and is therefore a tax.Since few people understand cap and trade and nobody really likes taxes, this is probably a good way to go for opponents of the measure.But I think the strategy for the supporters should be to compare the cost of doing something with the cost of doing nothing.
The EPA has estimated that the bill will cost the average household somewhere between $80 and $110 a year, and the Congressional Budget Office has estimated it will cost the average household $175 a year.
Let’s compare that to what will happen if no action is taken on climate change.The Stern Report found that failure to take action to slow the rate of climate change could reduce global GDP by 5- 20% a year, a massive impact.Since the impact would be present every year, and not just for a single recession cycle, and the impact would only grow worse, climate change would be the worse economic disaster ever, not merely an environmental problem.
This might be a better argument than polar bears for a lot of people, really bringing home the impact.
Failure to take action on climate change, doing nothing with the present ACES bill, or any others any time soon, would eventually extract an enormous economic cost, and probably a very regressive one, hurting the poorest people around the world and in the US the most.Let’s call this economic cost the “Do Nothing Tax of 2009”, producing a little bar chart of $175 per household compared against 5-20% of lost GDP.We can create a campaign to contact senators who oppose Waxman Markey, praising them for their courage in supporting the massive “Do Nothing Tax of 2009”.
Some environmental groups are also opposing the bill.One argument is that it doesn’t go far enough.Greenpeace has already pulled their support, along with others, saying that the measures are too watered down by political compromise to achieve what must really be done.Others don’t like the role of carbon offsets in the bill to meet climate targets, or they are upset because most of the carbon allowances will be given away at first.
I’m sure they’re right, that the bill involves compromises, is not perfect, and ultimately may not do enough. And by the time it gets through the Senate, if it gets through the Senate, further changes are likely.Getting 60 votes for a bill like this is still no cakewalk by any means.I’m afraid it’s probably about as good as a climate bill as we’re going to get for now, and I’d really like to see us do something rather than wait for a perfect bill that might not arrive any time soon.Let’s take this bill and push as hard as we can for it to pass, and then start working on the next round to do even more.
Glenn Croston is the author of “75 Green Businesses”, the founder of Starting Up Green (www.startingupgreen.com), and the creator of the Green BizBlast, helping green businesses to connect with each other and the world.His new book “Starting Green” coming out in September 2009 provides the definitive guide to start and grow green businesses.
Upcoming we will be focusing on three main points of modern design within the sustainability conversation:
1. Iconic, long lasting design that inspires immediate and long-term relationships with design and product. For instance, I have my father’s MontBlanc pen he used throughout most of his life as my main pen of pens – a great combination of continual reuse and feel good all at once. With this we have an interview waiting in the wings ready to post with the Danish designer Jens Skibsted regarding his new book Instant Icon. We will also pursue friend and associate Eames Demetrios for commentary on icongraphic design approaches per the Eames Foundation.
2. Sustainable and Biomimiced materials which are materials that have, like a leaf, a planned timeline working toward cradle to cradle in some form or another. We have again in the wings an interview with Sergio Palleroni who has worked in sustainable architecture for many years (Design Like You Give a Damn) and who recently started the sustainable design and processes school for Portland State. We will be talking about resources such as Ecolect and will hopefully catch a few designers from Nike Considered to see how they are doing.
3. On a more intimate level, we will be interviewing a stanch ECO DAD who has ‘made’ his family the perfect eco lifestyle. We will get the resources and the real low-down on how this is going. We feel a reality program coming up in his future.
We will post the first article within the next two weeks. Enjoy your summer!
That is if, as so often remains the case, the current top team is all or almost entirely male despite the best, sincere efforts of all concerned to find and elevate more women.
Shared below is the lightly edited (and disguised) note that I just sent to a senior level woman tasked by her CEO with leading a diversity effort.The well-intentioned CEO’s original request was for more women at the top (there is only one female on the senior leadership team); the brief quickly expanded to be “more diversity in general” and ultimately morphed to “more diversity of thought.”Here is my reaction to the situation:
Some thoughts to continue the conversation. First, thanks again for meeting. I really appreciated all that you shared, and I am impressed with what you have done.
Second, I agree that diversity of thought is the real end game here. The ultimate goal should be that your company evolves to a point where diversity of thought can flourish, and where ideas, energy and action become the points of distinction -- not gender, ethnicity or any of a host of what are now called “differences.” When you think about it, however, starting with diversity of thought as a short term goal is putting the cart before the horse. It is an outcome of other steps that must be successfully undertaken first. Chief among these steps is the issue of getting more women to the top. Why? Because as we discussed, women by definition bring diversity of thought to the top team when it is overwhelmingly male -- you have experienced that personally. It has been amply proven in many studies conducted by major and well-respected institutions that women and men as a group tend to think in ways that are more complementary than identical: they each bring different ideas and perspectives to the table. Therefore, advancing a critical mass of women into the top team is a vital first step toward your ultimate goal. Advancing women in sufficient numbers will allow them to act as their true selves; when they are in too small a minority they must either conform or simply not be heard.Getting enough women into the top team will start to free up the thinking that can immediately lead to better outcomes (wiser decisions, better communication, flatter teams), and create the conditions for other forms of diversity to flow through. And, fact is, you can only tackle so much at once, and women are half of the workforce – you will get a lot of results for the effort.
Why do organizations so often quickly move past the issue of getting more qualified women to the top and go straight to diversity of thought? Frankly, because gender is such a hot potato. This does not need to be the case. It is possible to handle the gender politics with more cool: with sensitivity and more “clinical analysis”. The more that the strengths that each gender brings to business discussion and decisions are understood, the more that gender differences can be valued in ways supportive of both men and women, then the more that positive change can occur.
By the way, developing the ability to hold these conversations and do the right analytics around gender (and, when the time is right, other forms of diversity) will also be of great help to your CEO Jerry. Clearly, his heart is in the right place: he wants to tackle the issue of diversity. It also seems to be true that he is not quite ready to take it on with the boldness that a real diversity effort requires of its CEO.
It takes the leadership of the CEO to overcome the cultural inertia and organizational systems that bias the organization away from diversity. From what I understand from our conversation, he may not truly feel fully confident through and through of the "case for change", or how to make the case convincingly (especially with his alpha male colleagues). Jerry needs more ammunition -- which you are in the process of skillfully providing him in the form of the internal “case study/diverse team guerilla action”. We also need to gather the well-researched external case into a form that he can internalize and share.
These are my thoughts at the moment. Would love to hear your reactions, and I am afraid that this note is already too long!
Lots of attention will be paid this week to the sentencing of Bernard Madoff, and rightfully so. There are no words for his actions. He was epic in his perfidiousness. His behavior was monstrous.
But when we talk as business people about the times we are living in, we do ourselves a disservice if we pay too much attention to the 71-year-old former chairman of the NASDAQ who pulled off one of the largest investors frauds of all time. Sure, Madoff was a creature of Wall Street who lied to his investors, betrayed the trust of his friends and disgraced his family.
But Madoff is not to our times what Enron was to 2001. He is not a symbol of the collapse of Wall Street, the global financial crisis, greed, dishonesty or anything else. He is one-of-a-kind. Thank goodness.
If we pay too much attention, we risk missing the bigger or more important story of how the U.S. wound up in the longest recession since the 1930s. There’s no one company and no one person whose story summarizes the economic crisis we are still struggling to overcome. Our problems are wider, deeper and rooted in a crisis of values that has affected thousands if not millions of people, very few of whom were crooks or thieves.
Consider the chain of poor decisions that led up to the collapse of housing prices across the country. People borrowed money to buy homes, unsure if they could pay it back. Lenders were reckless, pushing money out of the door and inventing products like NINA (no income, no asset) loans. Investment banks packaged the loans into complex financial instruments, the collateralized debt obligations that we’ve heard a lot about. The ratings agencies carelessly certified those mortgage bonds as safe and sound. Global investors chasing high yields bought in. Regulators turned the other way.
Then the house came tumbling down.
During each one of these transactions, people were disconnected from values. They didn’t stop to ask themselves some fundamental questions: Am I doing the right thing? Am I creating sustainable value? Am I behaving in ways that will benefits others, as well as benefit me?
During each of these transactions, people were trying to outsmart the system instead of outbehaving their competitors. They were operating in the shadows, rather that embracing transparency. They were thinking short-term, instead of trying to create sustainable value.
For me, at its essence, this crisis is the result of countless misguided attempts to disconnect – in our now connected world -- from the fundamental values and principles that propel and guide human endeavor.And it is also the result of countless misguided attempts to abstract and obfuscate – in our now transparent world -- responsibilities and obligations that make mutual relationships possible and sustainable.
And these actions are not limited to the housing crisis.There is a deeper and more systemic problem in business – in our habits of thought and behavior.We have falsely linked size and scale with sustainability.Companies for decades have pursued size and scale, equating bigness with success.No longer is a company too big too fail.Size alone does not make something sustainable.To the contrary, the aggressive pursuit of scale – whether it’s more revenues, profits, customers or stores, or a bigger market capitalization – is exactly what tempted some companies to lose sight of the values and principles that lead to true sustainability.
Bernard Madoff will go to jail for many years, and that’s good. (Frankly, I had hoped to see a significant sentence for the man who not only swindled people of their money, but who stole our trust and robbed from the world all the good works that won’t be completed by the many nonprofits he defrauded and destroyed.) But the rest of us still have a lot of work to do. As I’ve said before, sustainability is not about size and scale, but how we do business, and how we do what we do is an untapped source of competitive advantage in business. This economic crisis hit us hard because too many people didn’t get their “Hows” right. Let’s do the hard work now so that we don’t make the same mistake again.
Boomers and Gen Y, the largest cohorts in the workplace, both want to “contribute to society through their labor,” according to a new article in Harvard Business Review by Sylvia Ann Hewlett, Laura Sherbin, and Karen Sumberg, of the Center for Work-Life Policy. Furthermore, “their workplace demands have significant practical implications for how employers should design work environments to attract and keep talent.”
“As the economy recovers…companies will return to the challenge of winning over enough highly capable professionals to drive renewal and growth,” according to the authors. The article provides examples of companies that are making the best use of their talented personnel, often reducing costs, while appealing to the interests of Baby Boomers and Gen Y’s. The companies include UBS, CVS, American Express, Time Warner, Cisco, Booz Allen, Novartis, and Ernst & Young.
According to the authors, Gen Y’s say it’s important that their work make a positive impact on the world, profess to be very ambitious, and are comfortable working with people from different ethnicities and cultures. Baby Boomers say being able to work flexibly is important, report having elder care responsibilities, and are members of external volunteer networks, with more than half volunteering their time to advance environmental, cultural, educational, or other causes.
Moreover, Boomers and Gen Y’s “rate other forms of pay as at least as important as money: a great team, challenging assignments, a range of new experiences, and explicit performance evaluation and recognition.”
This information reinforces the trends among businesses to engage employees in local and global service opportunities. Companies that encourage and support regional and international volunteerism among their Gen Y employees foster personal and professional development, while building company loyalty, improving their brand, and building stronger communities where their customers and employees live, here and around the world.
Businesses that facilitate nonprofit board involvement among their well qualified Boomers help strengthen nonprofits that improve communities, while providing productive opportunities for their experienced executives and professionals to apply their experience and expertise. Although the HBR article indicates a lower rate of interest among Gen X’s in “giving back,” my experience indicates that Gen X’s are also avid participants in service, including on nonprofit boards.
This important new study by the Center for Work-Life Policy gives further evidence that purposefully designed corporate social responsibility programs will advance the interests of businesses as well communities.
