”You may have seen Mircea Bravo’s short film, “Where have all the employees gone?” Mircea goes with his girlfriend to the restaurant, where he finds out that the one who is the waiter, who prepares the schnitzel, makes deliveries, goes to the market for the salad, sings in the restaurant, takes out the receipt and cashes it, also receives complaints from customers, is also the entrepreneur. He has no more employees, no one wants to work anymore, many have gone to work for the State, where they walk papers and take big money.
Somehow, this 4-minute film gives some good clues about the state of a large part of our society. I wouldn’t want to generalize, I’m sure there are people who do their job, are dedicated, go to work to create something, to have an impact.
But when people end up getting money just because they exist, when they don’t produce any value for money, the workforce becomes demotivated and mediocrity becomes widespread.
It is no secret that the world is changing. This process began before the pandemic, it has only exacerbated it. The way people perceive and relate to work is changing.
The German philosopher and sociologist Jurgen Habermas, who has become best known for his work in social philosophy, argues that we are facing the end of the work utopia. The concept that the modern age is based on the idea that people develop and cultivate their potential through work is no longer valid for the younger generation.
Work was seen, and is still seen, by Generation X, the baby boomers, as a place where people develop their personalities, where they get to know themselves, understand what they can do, what their capabilities are, precisely in the process of producing goods and providing services.
Whole generations have lived and fed on the idea that through what they do, through their careers, people develop.
These generations have sometimes gone to extremes, perhaps on the altar of careers, family relationships have been alienated and it is possible that now, the very young, will react by rejecting something they do not like.
There has been a lot of talk in recent years about work-life balance. The extreme we are in now is where there are young people who want to work a few hours, get paid well, and the rest of the time do what they want: travel, go to the gym, hang out on social networks, go out clubbing, to give just a few examples of activities.
Work is no longer seen as a prerequisite for advancement.
If people used to become better versions of themselves by striving, overcoming obstacles, setting goals, giving feedback, learning, failing and succeeding, now this process of humanisation is no longer taking anything into account. Or maybe it does take something into account, we will find out in the future. Now young people need time off to do something other than work.
We can’t say whether it’s wrong or not. Many social habits fall apart and new ones are born.
Many people don’t want to be on a schedule anymore, they don’t want to go to the office, they want to work as little as possible.
The efforts of companies and managers to create a sense of belonging and involvement are much greater than in the past and the results are still pending.
I’ve had situations where some candidates have sent me WhatsApp messages asking what the salary would be. It surprised me, but of course, I am from a different generation with a different way of doing things.
The idea that you can only offer as much as you can afford, you, the entrepreneur, doesn’t seem to interest some people. Whatever you do, if people don’t have a work ethic, a certain work ethic, you won’t attract them.
When companies in Romania can’t find people to work, they hire Filipinos, Nepalese or other Asian nationalities.
And yet, for companies, as for a society, it is important to find new ways to build teams, to create a culture where people are engaged, committed. Here are a few ideas, some easier to implement, some more time-consuming:
- Reduce the number of meetings. Perhaps if, at the end of each meeting, we ask participants how useful it was, what could have been conveyed differently, what wasn’t useful, we end up with fewer boring meetings, fewer people sitting in endless ‘calls’ for days.
- Reviewing activities – maybe we don’t need to do some tables, reports that nobody reads. Maybe if we eliminate some unnecessary procedures, people will not necessarily be more dedicated but at least they won’t be bored, demotivated. Let’s not forget the Gallup study before the pandemic which showed that 85% of employees were demotivated.
- Create a culture of encouragement, of positive feedback. It’s hard, especially in Romanian culture, to give positive feedback. We have been brought up not to receive much encouragement on the grounds that ‘we’re being too spoiled, ‘the baby needs to be kissed in his sleep’ or other wonders of the past. But we all need validation, and encouragement, we want to be seen. When I say everyone, I mean both the people on the team and the manager. When an individual does something well, it’s appropriate to tell them, to show them that we’ve seen them, that they matter to us.
- Rethinking the way we exercise our leadership.
Behaviours that were valued in the past may no longer have the same appeal to people. So leaders need to go back to school, read, talk to colleagues, be open to change.
I would recommend asking each person on the team what energises them but also what drains them. Sometimes people don’t know how to say what makes them happy, motivates them but it’s easier for them to put on their black hat and see what’s negative. Expectations have changed, sometimes they can be very high, even unrealistic.
It is also very useful for leaders to ask for 360 feedback. Toxic leaders, if we can associate these words, create disengagement, demotivation, they make people scatter like butterflies blown away by the wind.
Revisiting common purpose. People stay together and strive when something connects them, when they have goals that inspire them, that bring them value.
It is very difficult now for managers, like leaders of a country, to create cohesion in companies.
We can see cohesion in a company when individuals trust and support each other. This forms what the Latins called “societas”, a friendly association with others, camaraderie, business partnership. This definition applies whether we are talking about a family, a department, a company, a country as a whole.
In Romania, however, we have an exacerbated individualism, a ‘I’ll do it myself’ way of relating to the world. I was reading somewhere that a Eurostat study shows that we are in last place in the European Union in terms of social cohesion and solidarity. Perhaps this distrust of others also comes from the communist period in which our parents and grandparents lived, some of us lived partially. And the younger generations are brought up by people who were part of a system in which it was good to keep your mouth shut, and not to trust anyone.
Another thing that affects our level of trust, and ultimately our decision to be loyal to a cause, a team or an organisation, is what we see around us, how we treat each other. The principle of reciprocity says that if someone has done us a good turn, we do them a good turn, or at least we do them no harm. Society seems to have forgotten this principle and too often applies it in its negative version: you treated me badly, I’ll get even, I’ll treat you the same or worse. The law of Talion (an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth) has had more of a magnet in our land. But Gandhi said that this way of thinking can lead us into a world of blindness.
It is surprising now to see that very often people misbehave after you do them a lot of good, help them. It’s as if they want to punish you for having access to a glimpse of their vulnerable being. Or as if they position themselves as inferior and want to reposition by hurting others.
“O societate fară prințipuri, va să zică că nu le are” Caragiale said. Unfortunately, we seem to be living his plays.
Globalisation comes with a set of universal moral values. But habits contrary to these values keep people blocked from moving with the world.
We talk a lot about balance, mental health, diversity and inclusion in recent years. How much do we practice them, how much do we aim to behave in this spirit, on a daily basis?
Finally, I would recommend that we do not have an anti-historical mindset. The world is changing. We often want it to change but stay the same, like in Caragiale’s theatre.
Historical evolution is ongoing, the future is being written and we should prepare ourselves for what the future brings. This means learning, unlearning and relearning, it means accepting uncertainty, unpredictability, new ways of relating to the job, the ability to leave behind the ways of doing things we are used to and acquire new ways, just as the snake leaves behind its rough skin and puts on a new, more adapted one.”