Posting Brown Boxes or Building Dreams?
Firstly a big thank you to Simon Monger, Internal Communications Manager at Freshfields for inspiring this post…
Did you hear about the guy at Amazon who recently left his job as VP in charge of corporate applications and information technology to take up a position with The Seattle Police Department as its Chief Information Officer? The question that everyone is asking is why would an executive at a high-profile company like Amazon leave to help a local police outfit figure out tech?
The answer is simple: he wanted to do something more “useful to the world” than “helping ship brown boxes” for Amazon. Whilst he was very complimentary about working at Amazon, it clearly just wasn’t doing it for him: he said he wanted to give something back.
We know that the “purpose motive” is important for employee engagement. The purpose motive can best be explained by the old story about an unannounced visit by John F. Kennedy to the space center at Cape Canaveral in the mid 1960’s. Kennedy toured the complex and met a man in overalls. “What do you do here?” he asked. The man replied, “I’m earning a living.” Kennedy nodded and moved on. He met another man in overalls and asked him the same question. “I clean away all the rubbish,” the man said. Kennedy smiled and strode on until he met another man in overalls and asked the same question again. This time a big smile came across the face of the man who replied, “Mr. President, ‘I’m helping to put a man on the moon.” Clearly chap number 3 had the purpose motive, the first couple he spoke to less so…
Of course we’d all love to have a workforce who are clear that they’re putting a man on the moon [insert your company equivalent]. However, the reality is that this is often not the case. For some people working at Amazon it is about making dreams come true via those brown boxes they post or ship around the world. As my friend Simon Monger points out in response to our friend who left Amazon for Seattle Police Force:
“ …the way I see it you were making dreams come true, making Christmases and birthdays great, helping loved ones to connect with distant relatives, supporting small businesses and enabling them to succeed…you were doing so much more than simply shipping boxes about.”
This is why Simon is a great IC pro, he’s good at helping employees connect to the bigger picture. But for others, such as our guy above, they’re simply posting brown boxes around the world, and no amount of great communication can convince them otherwise. So, who is right?
This is the challenge for employee engagement, the viewpoint of the employee is entirely personal, it’s all about their reality. Certainly the company should be helping employees to connect what they do day to day to the bigger picture, to help give them a sense of purpose. Some companies do this brilliantly and others less so. However, even where companies do this really well, you can’t force someone to connect with the bigger picture and purpose of the company, if they’re not feeling it.
We talk about need for employee values, to be aligned with at best, or at least not in conflict with, what the company is all about. For some people no amount of communication will convince them that they are helping to put a man on the moon, or building a cathedral, or making dreams come true, they will always be sweeping the floor, bricklaying or posting boxes.
Here is the other point I’d like to make though – for a lot of people this actually doesn’t matter. When we worked with a company called Bard, they developed a great model to understand what it is employees actually engage with:
(click image for full size version)
For some people it’s all about the job they do, for others it’s the people they work with, and for some it’s about the purpose and meaning…Of course the sweet spot is when you have all three! We’d love to hear what you think? Are you posting boxes or building dreams in your job?? And does it matter to you anyway?
