It Feels Out of Control

The “people” issues we face every day seem to be impossible to resolve. How can I motivate my staff when the corporate purse strings are being pulled so tightly; fear and uncertainty fueled by this horrible economy are forcing hiring freezes and lack of career opportunities? Where is the incentive? At the same time, nobody is loosening the schedule I must meet or the scope I am being asked to deliver. I am working harder than ever. The pressure is relentless. How am I supposed to hold people accountable? Six Sigma, Lean…seem to help in the manufacturing environment. These approaches study our transactional processes and recommend changes to how we do our work in order to find greater efficiencies and quality improvements; ultimately reducing cost and improving customer service. What if we were to examine our people processes looking for efficiencies and increased quality in the same way. We don’t manufacture anything, we have no assembly line, so what would we do? We would focus on improving leadership skills and examine our knowledge worker processes to determine where we can make process improvements that would provide greater efficiency, increased productivity while improving our customer/client and employee satisfaction. It’s not only possible and worthy of our efforts; but, it’s the smart thing to do for your customers/clients, employees and shareholders. It’s the right thing to do for your team. Do it.