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What do you really want from your `staff and employees” You want them to be progressive, productive, customer/client concerned individuals making up a positive, and supportive team of each other, you and the business enterprise? Guess what? Your staff and employee want this for themselves as well.
- They would love to leave their homes and drive to work with joy and enthusiasm and a sense of pride and eager anticipation for their labours.
- They would like to celebrate your prosperity, success, and growth and know that they will help reap these harvests as well.
- They like to feel needed, relative and responsible.
- They will not at all envy or resent that you may make more money, have a higher degree of prosperity or even be a greater success in terms of reward.
- They are not stupid and will fully recognize that you are the owner and/or boss and that you paid your own dues or achieved your lucky breaks on your own.
Most of them would not want your job even if it were offered to them. People, like water, find their own level of comfort and peace of mind. And we have all known people who were happier in the shack in the valley than those living in the mansion atop the hill. Incidentally, I am not implying you are worried about your position. I am only reminding you that the work-place is a community, a culture of its own. It is either a happy, positive culture most of the time – or one filled with turmoil and internal anxieties most of the time. Everybody, just as any business, has off days. In any case, what are you wanting from your employees, your employees want to give. If you are not getting what you want and if your employees are not giving what they wish to give, something is missing.
What’s missing?
While you may be able to list any number of answers, I suspect the major challenge is pretty simple: you haven’t created a family feeling environment or a very fun place to work. Ask yourself these few questions:
- Have I brought a happy, positive attitude to the workplace?
Yes No.
- have I made the employees feel part of the success of the company?
Yes No
- Have I given the employees the opportunity to offer ideas about improving the work environment?
Yes No
- Have I shared the company’s problems with the employees, giving them the opportunity to share innovative ideas?
Yes NO
- Have I shown my appreciation for my employees’ contributions?
Yes No
- Have I rewarded my employees with a few surprise perks?
Yes No
- have I created a few incentive perks?
Yes No
- Have I acknowledged openly the importance of the employees to the success and growth of the company?
Yes No
- Have I made it obvious that I notice a hard day’s work from the employees?
Yes No
- Have I given the employees the freedom to be responsible for their jobs?
Yes No
- Have I treated the employees as I would want to be treated?
Yes No
If you answered question “K” with a “Yes”, then certainly you have answered “yes” to all other questions. Now then, let’s get more personal:
- Am I able to allocate authority?
Yes No
- Do I really give a damn about those who work for me?
Yes NO
- Am I tolerant of people’s shortcomings?
Yes No
- Am I pleased to see the others win advancement and achieve?
Yes No
- Am I kind to others?
Yes No
- Do I refuse to use my position to fulfil my ego in words or action?
Yes No
- Do I teach as opposed to sell?
Yes No
- Do I treat others as I would have others treat me?
Yes No
If you answered question “E” with a “Yes”, again you have answered “Yes” to all the other questions in the session. In fact, if you answered question “K” and question “E” with an absolutely honest “Yes” well you can toss this article aside because you are already a Love Entrepreneur.
The truth is that we have to be very mindful of self and others if we can say, in fact, that we treat everyone as we want to be treated. (I hope for a nicer, kinder world; a world that is more loving, caring and peaceful. This is not a difficult task whatsoever. If everybody only treated each other as they want to be treated, all war, starvation and the other human actions that create man’s inhumanity to man simply go away.)
We need to dump the idea that leadership is about disciplining followers, but rather that the true leader motivates desire; that the true leader does not instruct but rather inspires and that the true leader does not become the engineer of good, productive and progressive works, but instead becomes the example of these human potentials and possibilities.
Finally, a work environment that is happy and loving and creates a more customer/ client – friendly atmosphere than all the marketing strategies, price reductions, advertising, promotions, contests or anything else can ever hope to do.