Dear Meddling Employee

When I came home from the very first day of my very first job as a teenager, I told my mother, "They don’t pay me enough!  I did this and I did that..."

My mother said, "The company doesn’t work for you.  You work for the company.  And your job is to make money for the company."

As an adult, I can see the complexities of the employer-employee relationship and note that, taken to an extreme, "make money for the company" can result in a sweatshop.  Still, my mother taught me two fundamental business principles:

1. To be a company and to stay in business as a company, the company needs to make money.
2. To be able to pay an employee, a company needs to make money. An employee practices enlightened self-interest by helping the company make money.

***

Ninety-eight percent of my work career has been spent as an employee and one percent as a sole proprietor.  That last one percent - this past year - has been spent as an employer, as “the boss.”

I have thought often over the past year of writing a letter of thank you - and of amends - to each of my employers.  I had no idea the price they paid personally and professionally to create a salary and benefits for me.  I had no idea how my work habits, occasional defiance, and occasional personal crisis disrupted the process by which they were able to create that salary and those benefits for me.  For whatever the reason, when I wasn’t working or was working inefficiently, I wasn’t making money for the company.  I was costing it money.

I write a workplace advice column for Valley Business FRONT, and the column on the meddling employee has generated several comments and a thoughtful response by Jim Schweitzer. 

A central issue of the discussion is the role of the creative employee - who may seem on the surface to be a meddler - in an organization.

I’ve worked at several organizations that treasured creativity.  At the finest, as employees, our continuing education - of our own choosing if accepted by a review committee of peers - was paid for, including transportation and lodging.  In-house, we had expert guest speakers in a variety of fields, quarterly workshops, and annual retreats.  I thrived in that environment and, through those experiences, created more valuable products for the organization.  The organization’s investment in my creativity yielded significant returns.  I made money for the company.

I have written that, as the founder of a one-year start-up company, I have taken no salary.  I yearn to provide creative opportunities for the contractors and interns who work for my company.  I simply do not have sufficient revenue to do it.  Currently.

I see a very difficult tension between creativity and profitability.  On the one hand, a company is dependent upon innovation to create products and services for which the market might clamor with demand.

On the other hand, if a company doesn’t execute its innovations, it won’t generate revenue to support itself.  If it doesn’t have revenue, it can’t support its creativity and innovation.

Therein is the daily judgment call - even the moment-to-moment judgment call - of company leadership:  How do I foster space for creativity and innovation for my organization at the same time as I foster execution of the more linear demands of staying in business?

***

As I mentioned in my comment on the meddling employee post, I have meddled and I have been meddled with, and I suggest a self-examination of motivations for each party.  Answering "What are we doing and why?" can be hugely instructive.

Elements of the “why” are universal.

I heard this at a workshop years ago and haven’t been able to find to whom to attribute it, but I think it expresses the essence of being human:  “What we most want is to know and be known, to love and be loved, to touch and be touched.”

And my husband is the first I’ve heard to articulate this principle this way, so I do attribute it to him:  “Ultimately, each of us wants to be valued.”

So I’ll conclude this way:

Dear Meddling Employee:

Value your work, this company’s work, and my work by contributing your work to this company in a way that helps it continue to be financially successful. 

If you are frustrated, please let me know directly and as specifically as possible what could change to free you to do your best work.  If what you request aligns with the company’s vision, and it’s within my power and the company’s means, I will do my best to make it happen.

If you feel as if you’ve tried to communicate this to me, and I haven’t been able to hear you, then maybe that’s a limit on my part, or a mismatch for both of us, and our work together is not a fit.

I hired you, or my predecessor hired you, because you and your work are valued.  My greatest hope is that we can continue to work together for the good of each of us, all of us, the company, and the greater good.

Sincerely,
Your Employer

Comments

[Robert Giles]

This post should be good for many people at different levels. Thanks.

I once worked where my colleagues saw no opportunities for advancement (typically to a significantly higher salary). They perceived that they were under-valued.I was young and saw many opportunities for me, most of them outside. Establishing named projects, even artificially-named levels, may have help. A course in creativity might have helped. I still wonder.

[John D.]

As someone who has had the pleasure of working alongside you at one of your "finest" places of employment, it was a great read with valuable advice(as always). Glad to see things are well with you.

[Anne Clelland]

Robert - Dad - I appreciate your perspective on the different perspectives a person has as a career develops. I, too, wonder what changes a "no culture" to a "yes culture," in one which opportunities are perceived at all levels.

And John D. - former colleague at one of the "finest" places - how kind of you to read and comment. I am doing well and wish you the very best, too!