Idea in Brief
Research has shown that managers can take four measures to help employees thrive at work. All four are necessary to promote a culture of vitality and learning.
Provide decision-making discretion.
Facebook employees are encouraged to “move fast and break things”—they have lots of leeway to solve problems on their own.
Share information.
Workers at Zingerman’s restaurants—right down to the busboys—get up-to-the-minute feedback on every aspect of the business, from customer satisfaction ratings to the number of dirty mugs in the sink.
Minimize incivility.
Leaders at Caiman Consulting attribute the firm’s 95% retention rate to a culture in which background checks look for a reputation for civility.
Offer performance feedback.
The mortgage finance company Quicken Loans has dashboards showing continually updated data on individual and team performance against goals.
When the economy’s in terrible shape, when any of us is lucky to have a job—let alone one that’s financially and intellectually rewarding—worrying about whether or not your employees are happy might seem a little over the top. But in our research into what makes for a consistently high-performing workforce, we’ve found good reason to care: Happy employees produce more than unhappy ones over the long term. They routinely show up at work, they’re less likely to quit, they go above and beyond the call of duty, and they attract people who are just as committed to the job. Moreover, they’re not sprinters; they’re more like marathon runners, in it for the long haul.
