Many leaders and managers are apt at challenging and supporting their team members to achieve high-performance goals and when the results are lacking, the answers is not in more challenge and more support - it requires a deeper approach. It has to do with engaging the employee from a closeness and comfort level (Thanks to my friend, Chris Hogan who has shared with me this concept that kick-started my thinking process in relating this to the subject of employee engagement).
As corporate goals and expectations of performance becomes increasingly demanding, leaders ought not to lose sight of the "humanness" of the employee and realize that it is the "heart" work (not necessarily just the hard work) that is the crucial turnaround factor. Before our team members carry out our instructions, there is a silent heart-cry for intimacy. It is not intimacy in the romantic sense of the word, rather it is about our attentiveness to each other's intrinsic need for understanding, comfort and encouragement. Before I do what you tell me to do, do you really see me? hear me? understand me?
It is a matter of putting the person ahead of the performance. Here's the paradoxically result - when we put people ahead of performance, then what you get is loyalty resulting in sustainable performance. Is this what we all want at the end of the day. In this week's Wise-Video, you will discover the two important engagement focus for the leader - one external and one internal. Do not neglect one or the other.
"Our chief want is someone who will inspire us to be what we know we could be." ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson
