The Performance Improvement Blog

Culture vs. Control

The dust has settled a bit on the working-from-home issue which was stirred up about a month ago when Yahoo's 11,500 employees received an email from the HR department putting an end to “work-from-home arrangements” throughout the company. Apparently, Marissa Mayer, the new CEO of Yahoo, is trying to change a culture that had lost the nimbleness and creativity that it needs in order to compete in the world today. Whether you agree with this action or not, it is clear that she needed to do something about Yahoo’s workplace culture and reign in the behavior of some folks who were taking advantage of Yahoo’s work-at-home policy.

Unfortunately, the media debate quickly focused on the future of telecommuting and the plight of working-mothers rather than on the real issue which is creating a culture in which everyone is focused on innovation and results. Sometimes, to change culture, especially in a large, complex, global organization in a fast-changing industry, one has to exert greater control in the short-term to create a culture in which collaboration and teamwork will be how work is done in the long-term.

In a results oriented culture, how one works is determined by what one needs to achieve. If that goal can be achieved by working from home, then that could be an option. If achieving a particular performance goal is best done by face-to-face contact with other employees, then being in the office is probably the answer. 

For example, if my work objective is to write code for a particular Web site transaction and I can write that code from home just as well as I can from the office, then maybe working from home is a good option for me. If my goal is to create a new look and feel for an online news service, and I need the creativity that comes from give and take with other employees, then I should be in the office.

The problem is not with working from home per se; the problem is how to achieve the intended results. To start with location without consideration for the performance goal is to put the proverbial cart before the horse.

If a CEO is concerned with how employees are using their time, then she needs to talk with her managers about helping these employees set goals and be accountable for achieving results. Often, employees are not clear about what is expected of them. In the absence of this specificity, they (like all of us) fill the void with their own ideas of what they should do and how they should do it (within a general policy). When their actions come into conflict with the goals of the organization, then leaders may have to institute controls on behavior until managers can shape the expectations of employees and create a culture that is aligned with intended outcomes.

Related articles

Culture Change is More Than Skin Deep

Culture and Creativity

Meetings: Love Them or Leave Them

Why is it that after all that has been said and written about wasteful meetings, managers continue to conduct meetings that are unnecessary and wasteful?  Carson Tate writes in the New York Times:

The meeting culture that is dominating corporate America is unsustainable and unproductive.
How many meetings did you attend last week that didn’t even have an agenda? How many resulted in a new idea? And at how many meetings did you think, “Why am I even here?”

Time is a commodity. And time spent in a meeting should generate a return on investment. But how often do we think about our time that way, and set expectations for meetings to produce real returns? In my experience working with Fortune 500 companies, the answer is rarely. This is just one result of a meeting-intensive culture.

This problem is not new and neither are the solutions. The famous John Cleese video, Meetings Bloody Meetings, was first produced in 1976 and dramatizes humorously the ineffectiveness of most meetings. As I have written in previous posts, meetings are overused and under-designed. We can no longer afford to have meetings just because that’s what we do at 1:00 on Mondays, or because the planning committee has something to report, or because the COO wants to announce a new policy. These are not good reasons to bring people together, wasting their time and energy. 

Technology has been both a blessing and a curse when it comes to meetings. On the one hand, location is no longer a barrier to group conversations. Smart phones, tablet computers, and laptops are all devices that allow people to participate in meetings remotely. On the other hand, meetings can be called with little planning and often with little consideration whether this is the best use of everyone's time.

In his 2003 book, Making Meetings Work: Achieving High Quality Group Decisions, John Tropman offers
very practical advice on how to have a useful meeting. His research on this problem found that when leaders had successful meetings they almost always had these four features:

1. Their meetings were characterized by decision accomplishment. Decisions got made in these groups. Participants appreciated the sense of closure that almost always occurred.
2. There was little decision rework. The group did not have to get together to decide again something that had already been decided or, as likely, had been avoided.
3. The decisions were good. There was a feeling, buttressed by reality as time passed, that the work of the group was of high quality. These were not just decisions made to “get something done.” They were thoughtful and reasoned, and they were actions that made a difference to the bureau, company, or agency.
4. People had fun! These were meetings that participants looked forward to. There was a sense of enjoyment and involvement. Participants felt that their time was well spent. They felt the meeting they were in was the “real” meeting. It was an authentic team experience.

Meetings can be productive, meaningful, and fun. However, this requires leadership that is intentional about the design and facilitation of these gatherings. Meetings should have a plan, involve group decision-making, and create a collective sense of accomplishment. Otherwise, there is no need to meet. 

Invisible Gorilla Strikes Again

This time it’s radiologists. In a study reported by NPR, 83% of radiologists failed to see the image of a gorilla on slides that they were reviewing for signs of cancer.  The conclusion by reporter Alix Spiegel is:

… what we're thinking about — what we're focused on — filters the world around us so aggressively that it literally shapes what we see. So, [the researcher] says, we need to think carefully about the instructions we give to professional searchers like radiologists or people looking for terrorist activity, because what we tell them to look for will in part determine what they see and don't see.

This phenomenon of selective attention permeates our society. Drivers don’t see approaching bicycles and motorcycles. Police can’t always determine who’s the victim and who’s the perpetrator in a violent situation. Soldiers responding in a conflict don’t always see the innocent bystanders in their line of sight. Teachers don’t always notice when a student for whom there are low expectations suddenly does something extraordinary.

When I was a teenager, I along with others observed a socio-drama as part of a lesson in tolerance. In this theatrical event, a crime was committed. We were asked to say who committed the crime. To us it was obvious. When the action was repeated it wasn’t so obvious and we learned about how our prejudices and perceptions influence our judgment, especially in quickly evolving situations.

And I wonder about leaders of large, complex organizations.  Do they sometimes display "selective attention"? Do they look at but not see the signs of a failing business model? Do they look at but not see the signs of a recessionary economy? Do they look at but not see managers who are not doing their jobs effectively? Do they look at but not see customers who are dissatisfied and looking elsewhere. Maybe it’s denial, but it also might be an inability to see something that is unexpected. 

Hyper-Connectivity: Get Used To It! Educate for It!

Why is it that the economy is expanding but the number of high-paying jobs is not increasing (and possibly decreasing)? Tom Friedman in his New York Times op-ed column suggests that the answer to this question is the “Great Inflection”. This is a time of dramatic change in work and education due to technology. He writes:

Because of the way every industry — from health care to manufacturing to education — is now being transformed by cheap, fast, connected computing power, the skill required for every decent job is rising as is the necessity of lifelong learning.

Job seekers, employees, and managers need to prepare themselves for this change. The days of going to school, learning a skill, and working for a company until retirement have long since gone. If you don’t come well educated, familiar with the latest technology, but also ready to learn whatever is new, you are not likely to find a good-paying, career-shaping job.

I live in a region of the country where many new businesses are being started. However, these businesses won’t make a dent in overall unemployment. They are too small, require only a few highly skilled IT professionals, and don’t have jobs for the secretaries and entry-level folks who filled workplaces in the past. Some of these companies have been created to get flipped, so they outsource as much work as they can. The few employees who are hired by these companies are tech-savvy, but even so, they will have to continually reinvent themselves as these companies grow and morph.

At the same time, not much has changed in the way we educate students and train workers to accommodate this new workplace. We continue to emphasize K-12 schools, two and four-year colleges, as well as employee classroom training even though all of these are centuries-old, arbitrary constructions designed primarily for the benefit of teachers, not learners. These methods of educational delivery are reinforced by a system that rewards time in class, credit-hour production, and continuity at the expense of learning. These institutions are not adequately preparing learners for the “Great Inflection”.

The change that companies and their employees face due to technology is mind-boggling. Friedman
quotes Craig Mundie of Microsoft as saying:

…not just elites, but virtually everyone everywhere has, or will have soon, access to a hand-held computer/cellphone, which can be activated by voice or touch, connected via the cloud to infinite applications and storage, so they can work, invent, entertain, collaborate and learn for less money than ever before.

We need education and training that are in line with this fast changing world of work.  As Friedman points out, it’s not only a flat world; it’s also a hyper-connected world.

A perfect example of this point is Agahozo-Shalom Youth Village for orphan and vulnerable youth in Rwanda. A third world country but the residents and graduates of this village communicate with each other using Facebook. They are hyperconnected which has profound implications for how they will live and work in the years ahead.

Related articles

Thomas Friedman: Hyperconnected

Why Learn?

Lifelong Employee Learning

I, Robot; You, Learn

A Year of “The Performance Improvement Blog” in Review

It’s time to do a little year-end reflecting on my blog posts from 2012.

Throughout last year I used this blog to illuminate important leadership and management issues. The topics ranged from creating a learning culture to increasing employee engagement to improving organizational communication to evaluating executive coaching, and more.

Out of all of these blog posts I’ve selected five that seem to have had the most interest for readers. Here are the links with a short excerpt from each post:

How to Create a Learning Culture in Organizations - Organizational learning is not about training. Rather, it's about a community of workers sharing in a process of constantly seeking improvement through new knowledge, new skills, and new applications of knowledge and skills to achieving the goals of the organization. They examine what they do, compare that to what needs to be done, reflect on what they have learned, and make the needed change in the organization.

 

Leaders Make or Break Employee Engagement - A leader’s attitude and behavior determine whether an organization has an engaged workforce or not. In other words, what leaders think and feel and say and do has a profound impact on employee satisfaction, enthusiasm for their work, desire to do their best, and commitment to go beyond their job descriptions every day. In an article for The Business Thinker, my colleague Jim Stilwell and I describe 13 ways in which leaders affect employee engagement. 

 

 

What Gets Measured Gets Done...Revisited - Measurement is not enough. An organization has to do something with those metrics in order to “get done” what needs to get done, i.e., organizational learning, performance improvement, and change. The act of measuring things like sales, customer service, product quality, teamwork, employee engagement, or learning, does not necessarily mean that anything will be done differently.

 

 

Why Evaluate Executive Coaching - CEOs and Boards are beginning to ask if the substantial investment they are making in executive coaching is paying off.  Unfortunately, we don’t know much about the impact of coaching. Studies tend to rely on surveys of executives who are being coached. But this method of studying coaching is fraught with problems.

 

 

What Do You Mean? - Dan Pallotta, president of Advertising for Humanity and HBR blogger, in a post titled “I Don't Understand What Anyone Is Saying Anymore”, writes about business jargon and how it affects communication in organizations. The blog post must have hit a nerve because it has broken the record for most comments to a single HBR Blog Network post. 

Wishing you a healthy and prosperous 2013!

Employee Satisfaction and Engagement Once Again Linked to Financial Success

Still another study , recently published by The Forum at Northwestern University, supports the notion that satisfied and engaged employees are essential to the financial success of companies. Dr. James Oakley, now Associate Professor of Marketing at UNC Charlotte's Belk College of Business, led this comprehensive study of these factors across a sample of 100 media companies. His research team surveyed a representative group of employees in each organization and received responses from 5,568 employees, averaging about 60 respondents from each company. They decided on doing the research within one industry in order to prevent some of the problems that occur when collecting data from a heterogeneous sample of businesses. Several different survey instruments were used to measure culture, climate, HR managerial practices, and market characteristics affecting each company.

• They used R.A. Cooke and D.M. Rousseau’s (1988) definition of organizational culture: “…the ways of thinking, behaving, and believing that members of a social unit have in common.”
• They defined organizational climate as: “…the way that organizations operationalize their culture in daily routines and behaviors.”
• HR managerial practices included selection, development, performance management, and compensation.
• Market characteristics included customer satisfaction, retention, and loyalty. And profitability was used as a proxy for financial success.

The following chart represents key factors that were identified and the positive and negative relationships among these factors.

A major finding was “… a direct link between employee satisfaction and customer satisfaction, and between customer satisfaction and improved financial performance.”

Based on their findings, the investigators recommend the following:

1. Ensure that the employee voice is being heard up and down the organization and that they feel they are making a difference.
2. Regularly survey employees about the strengths and weaknesses of the organization and take visible action based on that information.
3. Develop a healthy mix of employee cooperation and competition for the benefit of customers.
4. Establish clear performance objectives related to the customer experience and recognize employees for achieving those goals.

What I like about this study is that, unlike so many studies done by consulting firms, this research examines intervening variables that explain how and why employee satisfaction and engagement are linked to financial outcomes of companies and how culture and climate contribute to the employee experience as well as the customer experience. Of course, one could still argue that the links are not necessarily causal. It could be that company profitability causes high levels of employee satisfaction and engagement rather than the other way around. But at least in the case of this research there is a compelling theory to go with the data.

The study adds to evidence that is piling up around the impact of employee satisfaction and engagement on organization success. As we emerge from a depressed world-wide economy, the long-term financial success and sustainability of companies will be more important than ever. Therefore, we need to pay greater attention to the conditions that contribute to a positive and supportive work culture. Now, if we can only get leaders to pay attention to these factors in their organizations. 

 

How to Keep Talent from Walking Out the Door

Are you worried about employee turnover in your company and how it might get worse once the economy improves? If you aren’t worried, you should be.

It has been estimated that as many as a third of employees are looking to change jobs. Now that the recession is easing and more companies are beginning to hire again, these employees will start acting on this desire.

My friend and colleague, Bernie Donkerbrook, retired Ford Motor Company program manager and now executive coach, places responsibility for retaining talent on the shoulders of an employee’s supervisor or manager. Bernie believes that there is much those managers can do to keep their employees engaged and productive. He writes:

In today's sluggish economic environment, companies operate lean, demanding more of employees in the process. Many are focused on surviving, not thriving. While uncertainty in the marketplace may keep employees loyal today, when the economy improves, they may be more apt to seek out career opportunities elsewhere. If organizations ignore the retention issue today, they will undoubtedly regret it tomorrow.

You should be asking yourself, “What am I doing to ensure that my key talent remains once the job market improves?” and, concurrently, “What am I doing to strengthen loyalty and build a positive work force, positive people, and good relationships with their immediate bosses?”

Here are actions you can take to increase employee retention (all of which are behaviors that can be coached, trained and developed in supervisors and managers):

• Improve relationships between employees and their immediate bosses. Many employees leave because they perceive that they are not appreciated, recognized, and valued by their immediate bosses.  Here is what you can do:
  • Have HR determine if there are supervisors/managers that have a higher than normal turnover rate in their units. Provide them with a coaching process for understanding and dealing with difficult issues. The supervisor’s/manager’s behaviors need to be understood and changed. There is usually a reason some bosses have higher turnover rates than others.
  • Make it clear to supervisors/managers that employee retention is part of their job and that long-term development of employees is part of their job, too...and part of their evaluation.
• Revitalize your organizational culture to include employee appreciation, recognition, and valuing.  “People honor a culture that honors them.” This is incredibly important…honoring, valuing, respecting and recognizing your people.  It makes a big difference in building loyalty to the company and also is definitely teachable.

• Remind your managers and supervisors of the power of the “Golden Rule” of behavior at work.
  • How would THEY like to be treated by their bosses?
  • What would THEY like to experience in their jobs?
  • How would THEY like to be recognized, appreciated and thanked for their efforts?
  • How long will THEY want to wait to be appreciated, recognized and valued?

• Tell your best people they ARE your best people. It is highly motivating to know you are well thought of. Let your best people know you want to keep them, to retain them with the Company.  Really… it makes a difference. Imagine yourself being told by your boss, or your boss’s boss, that you are important to the Company and they are counting on you.
• Ask employees what they need, want, would like to be doing. No promises, but it shows you are interested and want to make it work for them and the company.  For your best and key people, make sure they have a career development plan. This is so obvious but managers and leadership are so busy they often fail to take this seriously.  And, there is often no corporate plan to set this up.
• Ask employees for feedback on YOUR management behavior. How can you improve? What would they like to see more of and less of from you? Are you helping too much or not available often enough?
• Carve out one-on-one time with your employees.  Much successful retention and employee loyalty comes from, simply, one-on-one time with the boss.  Regularly demonstrate personal care and concern for individuals, their life and family, and what is important to them.  (Bosses may need coaching/mentoring on how to do this effectively.)
• Put people to work where they are their best.  Allow them to work at what they already do well, where they have excelled, and what they are excited about.  Ask them.  Everyone wants to be doing what they know they are good at and what they enjoy doing.
• Find out what inspires, motivates a person.  What is that person passionate about? Find that person work in these areas if at all possible.  At least, let him or her represent the company externally in the areas where there is passion.  This builds the corporate brand and demonstrates corporate engagement with the local community.    
• Find out if career growth opportunities are available for employees.  Do they have opportunities for development, growth, new challenges, and promotion? You may answer, as the manager, “Yes, of course.”  But what do your employees say about this?  There is often a disconnect between what employees experience in career development and what the company policy is said to be.  Do this:  Check it out. Find out what employees believe and what they experience on the job relating to career development. Most often, you, as the boss, will not like what you hear.
• Ensure that compensation is competitive. Eliminating any gap in compensation with the market is a great short-term neutralizer of negative energy.
• Pay for performance.  Do you reward better performance or is everyone at a similar grade-level paid about the same?  If everyone is paid the same, it is not very enticing for the highest performers when they know they are not appreciated in a financial way for their unique contribution to the organization. [Note: Plan pay-for-performance very carefully; these plans can have little or no positive effect if structured in the wrong way.]
• Pay attention to your stars, your top-performers.  Really! Stars will not wait around to be given authority, more responsibility, the opportunity to make decisions, or be promoted.
• Communicate, communicate, and communicate.  Find ways to let employees know you care about them as individuals.

Bad News is Good News

When evaluating programs and organizations, bad news can be good news. What I mean by that is any feedback is helpful to an organization if leaders listen to the feedback, look for value in the information, and make improvements accordingly. However, what so often happens is that leaders immediately become defensive and look for ways to discredit or cast doubt on criticism. Almost impulsively, they look for ways to find fault with negative feedback and only accept high ratings and praise. The tendency is to automatically try to identify the people who made critical comments and explain away what was said because of who said it: “They’re always complaining”; “That person is poisoning the well for everyone else”; “We couldn’t give them raises this year so they’re angry”; and on and on.

Some organizations have a culture that is so insular they can’t hear bad news. The National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA), “founded more than one hundred years ago as a way to protect student-athletes”, appears to be one of these organizations. In a series of columns written for the New York Times, Joe Nocera has described some examples of the NCAA failing to act in the best interests of students. He writes:

The N.C.A.A. claims — as it always does — that it is acting to protect its athletes “from exploitation by professional and commercial enterprises.” But this is classic N.C.A.A. Orwellian spin. Its true purpose in preventing athletes from engaging with agents while in college is to exacerbate their exploitation. The professional and commercial enterprise doing the exploiting, of course, is college sports itself.

I can’t vouch for the accuracy of the facts that Nocera cites, but it does seem that the NCAA is not making use of this opportunity to look at itself in the mirror and make improvements. Rather than accepting the feedback and explaining what they will do to make the NCAA a better organization for students and its member institutions, organizational leaders have become defensive and have attacked Nocera in the press. Dave Pickle, a long-time employee of the NCAA, wrote a blog post about Nocera titled, “News not fit to print.”

This isn’t a constructive response, especially by an organization that has responsibility not only to its member institutions but also to the wider public.  One of the primary ways in which organizations learn is by periodically examining what they do and what stakeholder’s (customers/clients, employees, suppliers, wider community, etc.) think of what they do. If leaders do not listen to the “bad” as well as the “good”, they cannot learn. Barriers to listening, such as the argumentum ad hominem defense, do not allow for continuous improvement. Like the NCAA, a culture can develop in organizations in which these barriers become ingrained in the way they do business. “Bad news” should provide an opportunity for learning and change. Great organizations turn bad news into news they can use.

 

There They Go Again: Bashing Brainstorming

What did brainstorming ever do to receive such vitriol? Jonah Lehrer writes in the January 30 issue of The New Yorker:

Typically, participants leave a brainstorming session proud of their contribution. The whiteboard has been filled with free associations. At such moments, brainstorming can seem like an ideal mental technique, a feel-good way to boost productivity. But there is one overwhelming problem with brainstorming. It doesn’t work.

Susan Cain writes in a January 13 opinion piece for the New York Times titled “The Rise of the New Group Think”:

…brainstorming sessions are one of the worst possible ways to stimulate creativity. The brainchild of a charismatic advertising executive named Alex Osborn who believed that groups produced better ideas than individuals, workplace brainstorming sessions came into vogue in the 1950s. …But decades of research show that individuals almost always perform better than groups in both quality and quantity, and group performance gets worse as group size increases… People in groups tend to sit back and let others do the work; they instinctively mimic others’ opinions and lose sight of their own; and, often succumb to peer pressure.

And now Cliff Kuang raises concerns with brainstorming again in an article for Fast Company titled, The Brainstorming Process Is B.S. But Can We Rework It? At least Kuang is asking how to make brainstorming more effective. Let’s brainstorm some possibilities (just kidding).

As I wrote in a previous blog post, “I believe the problem is in the implementation, not the method.” Indicting brainstorming is like saying that elearning is more effective than classroom-based learning. The truth is there is effective elearning and there is ineffective elearning. It all depends on the purpose, design, content, and delivery of the course.  

It’s the same with brainstorming. It all depends on the quality of design and facilitation. The critics are right; if all the facilitator does is allow participants to free associate for an hour and then go home, the process is “B.S.”. When that happens we can predict little creativity and little impact on planning.

However, when it is done well, when it is done in context and with preparation of participants, and when there is follow-up after the initial generation of ideas, then brainstorming can be very effective. A good facilitator:

1. Is clear about the purpose and intended results of the exercise and discusses this with participants
2. Prepares (even trains) participants for doing brainstorming (e.g., gives an example)
3. Establishes norms for how participants are to behave in the session
4. Leads the conversation in such a way that gets everyone involved, gets all of the ideas displayed in front of the group, and does not allow criticism until all ideas are listed
5. Helps the group reach consensus on a subset of ideas on which to do further work
6. Begins action planning to do the follow-up work
7. Helps participants learn (and learn how to learn) from their involvement

There is an art and science to brainstorming. The facilitator must be able to follow the rules of brainstorming but also deviate from and expand on those rules depending on the situation.  

When done well, there are many uses of brainstorming. It could be used to evaluate a program, consider new strategies and methods, identify problems, create a vision for the future of an organization, or solve problems.  Often, brainstorming is used simply to warm up the group for a lengthy strategic-planning or prolbem-solving discussion. The technique creates an atmosphere of trust where everyone is heard and all ideas are respected. Now, what’s wrong with that? 

 

Can Groups Be Creative?

It would be easy to become anti-teamwork after reading “The Rise of the New Groupthink”, a Sunday New York Times opinion piece written by Susan Cain, author of the forthcoming book, “Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can’t Stop Talking.” She writes a thought-provoking article that challenges the prevailing thinking about employee innovation and creativity. In effect, she makes the case for solo innovation. While I agree that organizations try to do too much in groups, I fear that an article like this might prompt managers to throw the baby out with the bath water.

Cain starts with this generalization about workplaces:

Most of us now work in teams, in offices without walls, for managers who prize people skills above all. Lone geniuses are out. Collaboration is in.

This describes the image, not the reality. First of all, most of us are in work groups, not teams, at least not the kind of teams that Katzenbach and Smith (and others) define as being a team. And work group meetings tend to be poorly planned and badly run. I’ve posted about this previously. As for people skills, managers sure don’t act like these are prized abilities. A command-and-control management style still dominates the workplace. And regarding collaboration, too few managers and employees know how to collaborate effectively. To them, collaboration means ccing everyone on an email.

There is much rhetoric about teamwork and collaboration, but these behaviors are still very rare in organizations today. So to indict the current work environment as not being conducive to creativity and innovation because it is too collaborative misses what is actually happening in the typical workplace. In fact, employees are not collaborative enough.

Cain is also critical of group brainstorming.  She writes,

…brainstorming sessions are one of the worst possible ways to stimulate creativity…The reasons brainstorming fails are instructive for other forms of group work, too. People in groups tend to sit back and let others do the work; they instinctively mimic others’ opinions and lose sight of their own; and, often succumb to peer pressure.

I believe the problem is in the implementation, not the method. Any group that makes a list of ideas these days calls it “brainstorming”. This is not the kind of brainstorming which results in new and better ideas. When done right, brainstorming is free-flowing, non-judgmental, and relies on the dynamic interaction of everyone in the group, regardless of status. Unfortunately, every manager thinks that he or she can manage a brainstorming session. After all, how difficult can it be to ask a question and make a list of the answers? However, effective brainstorming requires highly skilled facilitation and not every manager has the skills and temperament needed to provide this to a group. An effective brainstorming leader ensures that everyone is engaged in the work, encourages everyone to contribute their own feelings and beliefs to the conversation, and doesn’t allow one or two people to dominate the conversation.  

Isolating everyone and putting up barriers to interaction is just as counterproductive as forcing everyone to interact with others all day long. Some people need some quiet and solitude to be at their productive best and some people need some social interaction. Even the research cited by Cain supports this notion. Not everyone in the research populations she cited seeks isolation. The last thing you want to do is label someone “introvert” based on an assessment tool and then make that person toil alone until they come up with the next big idea. While some people can’t tolerate frequent interruptions, becoming tense and irritable, others thrive on the chaos and perform best in that kind of high-energy, social environment. 

We need to do a better job of helping employees figure out in what kinds of environments and on what kinds of projects they work best and provide those conditions for them. We need managers who take responsibility for helping employees optimize performance. And we need leaders who can build teams that nurture creative and innovative thinking.

Thank you, Susan Cain, for stimulating this blog post.