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Improving Company Morale?
Undaar asks: "I work as a developer for a web development company. We were pretty hard hit (as were many companies that do what we do) by the "economic down-turn". The company went from over 500 people to under 200 in under two years. It's more stable now, but people are consistently laid-off. Consequently people feel like they always have to look over their shoulder to avoid getting fired. Most lunches are spent complaining about lack of enjoyment/challenge from the job and the fact that upper-management seems not to understand what we do. Employers: what have you done to improve employee morale in your company? As an employee, what can I do to improve the morale in the people I work with? How can I make my work environment more enjoyable? What kind of constructive suggestions can I take to management so that they can help improve the situation?"
Two years ago I wrote this: Management Techniques of the Bottom 95% of U.S. Corporations.
:)
Just take all the advice and reverse it.
No, seriously. That really helps at my company. Granted, it's only a small company of around 30 people, but every last Friday of the month (and occasionally others) they bring us beer and sometimes margaritas. Everyone hangs out in the kitchen and lets off some steam and it really does help. There's usually leftovers too, so my friend and I sneak back there about 15 minutes before quitting time on other days and have our own little party. Several times the owners have walked past on the way to the bathroom and occasionally they join us.
I read an article about 10 years ago which was about some guy in Brasil, I think it was, whose rubber company was about to go down the toilet financially. So he went to his workforce and said "Here's the situation - we're up shit creek financially, either I make half of you redundant, or we take half pay, until the situation improves - you decide" and put it to the vote. The workforce apparently decided on the half pay option, but productivity soon improved and they could afford to pay their old salary. The guy went on to experiment with introducing worker democracy on a wide scale - salaries, job descriptions etc. and apparently the company became very successful. I've always thought that sounded like an interesting idea, has anyone else heard of this?
I reserve the right to be wrong.
Or, if you must lay off, act like you don't want to do it.
I've been through or in six rounds of layoffs at four different companies since I was an intern in '98. The very best handling I've seen was when I was with SGI (the company formerly known as Cray at the time) as an intern.
First, you could tell that the boss genuinely hated, hated laying off her people and felt like she'd failed them somehow. Second, when the layoffs actually happened, she held a meeting with the survivors to tell us about it so we didn't hear it through the grape vine. Finally, the department took the whole afternoon off. We had the option to go home, but instead we grabbed some beer and a couple of pizzas and went to a local park, played frisbee and hung out (the people who'd gotten laid off were invited too, which I thought was classy).
At my last company, they laid off like theives in the night. They'd call people in out of the blue, then send out an email apparently designed to scare us all into working harder and longer. One time, we laid off a dozen people and the CEO's wife (who was executive something or other) went out and bought a new Lexus the same day. It's amazing nobody took an AK-47 to that shithole -- they definately had it coming.
Every year during my review, I just pray the words "slashdot.org" aren't mentioned.
If things are bad then trying to raise morale is nothing but an attempt to deceive employees. To try to convince them things are OK when they're not. But employees aren't so stupid. Nothing tells an employee that their company is in trouble more than morale boosting exercises from management.
Doesn't it make you feel good to know that our freedoms are protected by politicans, lawyers and journalists.
Flexible work hours and an open plolicy regarding internet and telephone use is a very good policy, but the absence of this type of policy is a symptom of a deeper problem within corporate "culture," by that I mean the treatment of employees like any other "just-in-time" business resource.
Many companies today layoff and re-hire (euphamistically called "contract hire") employees as they're needed. Contract prices today are generally no where near where they were a few years ago because of the surplus number of contract workers and the new rage to outsource work to drastically cheaper overseas labor pools. Corporations spent the 80's and 90's trying to convince people that it really was in their best interest to function as resource units, even suggesting that it put the individual worker in the driver's seat, but in realitiy of course it was always in the corporations best interest. An excellent book on this subject is Thomas Frank's One Market Under God which chronicles the enormous PR and marketing resources expended by big companines to cultivate thier self-serving pseudo-populist image. Great insight also into the backgroud behind all those MCI and IBM commercials featuring throngs of third world looking people and the proverbial work-at-home CEO mom. Does Microsoft really stand in awe of us? I don't think so.
Few people are doing well contracting today. Employers need to realize that paying employees well and not treating them like children, indentured servants or worse as a simple "resource" like computers or other equipment but instead like fellow human beings, is the best way to make everybody happy and productive.
Taken from Fuckedcompany.com in Dec. (Jo Anne was soon fired afterwards, go figure).
From: Jo Anne Miller
To: Gluon - Site - All
Sent: 12/6/2002 3:03 PM
Subject: Commitment Message from the ALL HANDS MEETING
Importance: High
As those who were present at the All Hands Meeting this morning already
know, I am seeking the PERSONAL Commitment of everyone at Gluon to the
Release 2.1 development schedule. I expect a return email from all the
staff to tell me if they can step up and make the commitment to DO
EVERYTHING IT TAKES, INCLUDING POSTPONING DECEMBER VACATIONS to hit the
2.1 ready for field trial milestone of January 20, 2003 and ready to
deploy milestone of February 21, 2003. I also need to know if you will
volunteer to be here the week of December 23-27 and Dec. 30-Jan. 4.
Please consider this decision carefully. Don't say yes if you don't
believe that you and your fellow Gluon teammates can make this happen.
Don't say yes, if you aren't ready to find bugs, fix bugs, document the
product and get this ready to go out the door. Don't say yes if you are
too burned out to look forward to continued late nights, long hours and
stretch milestones.
Now more than ever, the Gluon team must have the start-up/do whatever it
takes mentality. If any of you are not of that mentality anymore, have
personal/family issues that prohibit you from making the full
commitment, please tell me that as well and I will do whatever I can to
assist you to find a job outside of Gluon.
I am attaching the four key slides from the all hands related to our
commitment to refresh your memory of what is required and why.
Looking forward to hearing back from everyone
Jo Anne Miller
Gluon Networks, Inc.
5401 Old Redwood Hwy.
Petaluma, CA 94954
707-285-4001
www.gluonnetworks.com
www.bleepyou.com
Enjoyment and challenge on the job is not something that is pointed out to you; it is something you must find for yourself.
:-7
This sort of presupposes that such oportunities/challenges exist in your work place. Their are environments, typically only in small businesses, where management is so clueless that you can actually find yourself in hot water for proposing ways to get the company out of the IT shithole you're in.
Case in point: I'm currently working for a bookstore at a university. A few years back we purchased a point of sale and inventory management system. The product we purchased so poorly developed it's egregious. In many instances it just doesn't work, and where it does work we have to go through so many hoops to get it to work, it would be better ditching it altogether. Now, this product also has various web services that are meant to run on our AS/400 server. They allow our customers to perform various activities such as: order a textbook, reserve a textbook, request a textbook adoption (for faculty), and so on. Now, as with most of the products supplied to us by our vendors, these products barely work. This is exceptionally damaging to us as an institution as these are programs that our customers interface with directly. So, I have recently proposed an alternative to management. That we set up a linux server running mySQL, apache, and PHP. We could then create web applications to replace the faulty applications we are now using.
I've spent quite some time with this proposal: In fact it's turned out to be forty-some page memorandum, complete with research and estimates on how this change would effect our company.
Now, here's the kicker. Management turned out not to be interested in even looking at the proposal. It seems he's more interested in protecting his image than the company. We've spent over a quarter million dollars on equipment and software alone, not to mention outrageous support fees. He's expressed the opinion that since we've invested so much into this product already, he can't just back out now. You see, it would make it look like he made a bad decision. Not just a bad one, but a very costly one. Since the University is considering outsourcing the bookstore, it is important that his image remain intact. Even if it means that we can barely funciton.
So, for the time being I am stuck with: Data entry, employee training, finding workarounds, and writing shitty reports and query utilities with Visual Basic (the only thing I've been able to use out of concern for future maintenance--it has to be able to be modified by Joe Random Coder). Damn it. I swear, it seems like nothing I do will actually have any impact. Why, then, should I care?
FYI: I am a graduate student studying mathematics. I've been with this bookstore for 5 years now. I was hired as an undergraduate student studying Comp Sci. I am now working full time and have education benefits for me and my wife, which is what is keeping me with this employer. And yes, I am at work now.
Do I contradict myself? Very well, then I contradict myself, I am large, I contain multitudes. -- Walt Whitman
I worked a summer job in a laundry. One day midweek, I looked up from the %meaningless task% I was doing to see the owner of the entire chain helping fold sheets.
I asked how often he does this, to which he replied "Whenever I feel like a change".
The girls on the line really liked it. He didn't have his own table at mealtimes, didn't have his own parking space, and you could call him "dave".
Ace fella. And even though the job was shit, most people were happy at it.
yes, www.dotcomforwardslash.com is my real URL.
My last job (incidentally, 70 weeks ago, unable to find work since) required me to relocate 3,100 miles from the Right coast to the Left coast, to work for them, leaving a very stable job behind. A week after I got there, my hiring manager was fired, along with 76 other people. We were 250 people at the time.
Over the next 14 months, we went through 5 rounds of layoffs, including the last one which liquidated my entire department, leaving me as the only person standing. Even my boss was let go.
In 18 months time, we had gone from 250 people to 30, and were on our 4th CEO. All three founders had resigned, two failed merger deals (one with a company that just recently bit the dust themselves), two sexual harassment suits pending against the first CEO and his team, and it only got worse from there.
We originally had free vending machines, but those were soon turned into pay-only machines. The senior management team had free parking in a mostly-empty garage space, and we had to pay $20.00-per-day to park across the street. The middle-management groups were internally promoting themselves, laying off more and more people, and making the remaining people work longer and longer hours, for less pay. We were earning (as developers) roughly 1/4 of what the managers were earning at the time. They were working 4-day weeks, 5 hour days, feet up on the desks, while we were camping in the offices overnight sometimes to meet customer deliverables.
Every day, people would come in wondering if "..they were next". That's not a nice way to come to work, not wondering if you're going to lose your job, but when.
In November 2001, I decided to pack up my things, and resign. The company wasn't going to survive a 6th round of layoffs, and now with the board in control, they had changed direction, completely tarnishing their name with the Open Source community. I moved back 3,100 miles to the Right coast, and haven't been able to find a job since (yes, it's incredibly tough out here).
After I left, they worked on a product, and after the remaining developers completed version 1.0 of the product, and delivered it, they were all fired, en-masse.
How's that for morale for you?
As a currently very happy employee myself, I can tell you what specific conditions exist at my job that make me happy. Most of these conditions are a function of the job being A) unionized, and therefore solid with good benefits and a living wage, and B) in government, so there is a well-thought out bureaucracy in place to keep things running smoothly. BUT, the specific happiness inducing effects shouldn't be too hard to replicate in private industry -- IF the bosses want them to be. So, as a public service message from moi, here are the factors which lead to happiness:
1. Pay your employees a living wage, and AT LEAST give them medical and dental. Note that this doesn't mean you have to make them rich! But if you're not paying them at LEAST in the 40K range, they're going to be too busy worrying about getting their rent money together, to worry about YOUR work. In places like NYC or Boston, better make that 60K or your employees will be living in cardboard boxes.
2. Don't breathe down your employees' necks. Where I work, the bosses leave you alone as long as you produce. So, if your employees aren't missing deadlines, leave them alone and let them do their stuff. When managing programmers (as with herding cats) less == more. Just tell them to keep you posted on their progress, at least once a week (say, Friday before COB). If you need to find out how something is doing, ask casually (this is good because it shows interest and lets the programmer know he's not forgotten). The trick is to LET the programmers produce instead of trying to force it. You'll find they come to YOU to tell you how things are going, because people like to talk about what they're doing. And they'll like you more (this does matter).
3. Don't be anal about when programmers come and go. We're not the most precise people when it comes to getting up in the morning, or going home at night. We may get in a half hour late and leave two hours late at night -- you get a free hour and a half, and we barely notice. But if you enforce business hours, we get pissed and come in and leave on a much more exact schedule.
4. Casual dress code. This means, generally, something comfortable but tasteful, like jeans and a polo shirt. Don't enforce the whole "dockers and sky blue shirt" thing (god, that is SO over), or (worse) suits. If you're uncomfortable, you're worried about stretching your shirt collar, not coding that loop. This doesn't mean you have to let them walk in in a kilt and a see-through rubber shirt, either. But, let them be comfy.
5. Cubicle decoration (within the limits of good taste) should be encouraged. A cluttered, chaotic cubicle is a happy, productive cubicle. A pile of paper on a desk is a sign of activity. Don't sweat stuff like this.
6. Coffee. Lots of coffee. Don't skimp on the sugar and half-and-half, either, or no one will drink the coffee and that's like no coffee. Any old coffee pot will do as long as the coffee is a reasonable, good brand and when people notice the pot is empty, they can set a new one on to brew. I can't stress the importance of caffeine and sugar to programmers enough. They WILL find ways of acquiring it; if you don't supply it, they'll be taking breaks to make coffee runs. Which do you prefer; three minutes to fill the mug at the office coffee pot, or fifteen minutes to walk a block to the Starbucks, with you playing Spy Games to figure out who's going where and when?
7. When nothing serious is going on, let the programmers do pilot projects that will eventually be good for the department. You can direct this a little; if you know, say, that you're going to be using some specific set of email tools, mention it to a programmer who isn't too busy and ask him to fiddle around with it and see what he can make it do. Then, keep the source code around for when the project ramps up. Remember: idle hands are the devil's playthings.
That's about all you have to do, really, to keep people happy. Leave them alone, let them do their thing, keep up the supply of interesting things to do, don't push them unless you really have to, feed them lots of coffee, and let them dress comfortably.
Farewell! It's been a fine buncha years!
Welcome to every company everywhere.
Actually, that's not entirely true. To the original poster's questions:
Employers: what have you done to improve employee morale in your company? As an employee, what can I do to improve the morale in the people I work with? How can I make my work environment more enjoyable? What kind of constructive suggestions can I take to management so that they can help improve the situation?
Here's what I've learned in my brief time spent on this earth about management and leadership. I've learned most of what I know from real-world inferences derived from what not to do. However, I have read a fair amount of leadership, management and sales literature (it should probably be said that I'm a software engineer by training/trade). I've found it boils down to a few things along one main theme:
You've probably already spotted the theme here: people, people and people. Unfortunately, if upper management doesn't buy into this, you're fucked. There's very little you can do (unless you're in a leadership position yourself) to combat this.The best you can hope for is to be laid off so you can collect unemployment while you search for a new job. Think of it as bozo cancer which has metastasized. If you are in a position of leadership, here's some things you can do:
moto411.com