I recently had two experiences, one right after the other, In which people weren’t grateful for what they received for the simple reason they didn’t have the information that would make them appreciate what they were getting.

Warren Egnal is the founder and principal consultant of Engagement Strategies, a firm that excels in increasing engagement through change management and communication strategies.  As Warren was describing what he was doing for some of his clients, he mentioned a problem at a famous and hugely admired Fortune 100 company.  The company is accurately described as employee-centric and makes every list of Best Companies to Work For.

But, in the last couple of years, employee griping has been rising while gratitude has been falling.  Why, Warren asked me, do you think that’s the case?

In many studies in many countries over the last five years, CEOs have declared their single biggest problem is employees.  It’s hard to know from the data what “biggest problem” means:  is it recruitment, retention, morale, satisfaction, skill sets, leadership style…or my current personal favorite commitment and engagement?  We don’t know.

But we do know that the great majority of CEOs are not turning to their Human Resources Department for help.  Wow.

First, hearty thanks to SJ, who recently asked me an important question:  How important is it, he asked, for people to really understand what’s important to them now and in the longer term in order to make sure that they don’t accept a job or join an organization in which they will never be able to be fully engaged?

Dear SJ,

Your question brought back my own memory of a summer job I once had in which I held both of my bosses in contempt.  All I was working for was the $599 I could earn and my father could still claim me as a dependent.

Judith M Bardwick
July 17, 2008

Senator Phil Gramm, you’ve taken a lot of flack this week about the comments you made on July 9^th to the Washington Times.  You called us a nation of “whiners” who suffer from a non-existent “mental recession.”  Well, while you’ve got the mood right,  you’ve also got a case of hoof-in-mouth disease.

It’s not “whiners” – your word, not mine – that are the problem.  The problem is, despite a really good economy for most of the last twenty years, many people, all over the world, are scared and worried and they have a right to be.

There are two laws I really like:  the first, Murphy’s Law says, If anything can go wrong, it will.  You can bank on that.  The other, Bardwick’s Law of Entitlement says, What ever people get for free stops being a delight and very quickly becomes an entitlement.

Woe befalls the endlessly generous giver who never requires something be earned.  Instead of receiving gratitude and love from those they’ve benefited so generously, their free offerings are taken for granted and therefore have no value.  At the same time, "What have you done for me lately,”  has no limit and is never satisfied.

Dear Reader, you may well be wondering where I’m going with this.
 

Board members, like top executives, are not involved in day-to-day operations.  Their responsibilities involve the largest picture, floating high above the lower and middle levels of the organization, seeing forests but not trees.  But it is critical that board members learn why employee’s feelings are so important and they need to gain agreement among all the stakeholders—management, employees and shareholders—that achieving high levels of employee enthusiasm and involvement is everyone’s responsibility and a high priority. In an increasingly harsh economic reality, all of an organization’s stakeholders need to direct their competitive energies externally, against the competition while they collaborate within the organization.

What people do is largely determined by how they feel.  Too many people are being affected by the widespread Psychological Recession, which is the depressed and anxious feeling that the present is no good and the future will be even more catastrophic.  Making it worse, you feel you’re hanging from a tree limb in a cold wind and no one cares.  To a large extent, these feelings stem from employees’ feelings that they are no longer stakeholders in the companies they work for, with the predictable result that anxiety and stress dominate the workplace.

Dear Readers,

Thank you all for your interest in my book, One Foot Out the Door, and for visiting my website. This is an open forum for ideas, thoughts, questions and I hope we create a really interesting and worthwhile dialogue with lots of participants.

I would like to address a few common questions about the fundamental pillars of One Foot Out the Door. Following are a number of FAQs: