Thanks for reading my last blog and providing feedback. Appreciate your time spent doing the same. I should apologize that i did not mention my colleague Venkat's name in my last blog. I sincerely thank him for improving my English and sent formation. It made it more readable.
In this post i want to focus on something which so important for organizations and teams. This is about nurturing the roots of any organization.
Plant's root is that part, which in most cases is below the soil and not seen. It is tucked away below the earth reaching to great depths doing its job silently unnoticed. Roots have four major functions.
1) absorption of water and inorganic nutrients
2) anchoring of the plant body to the ground, and supporting it
3) storage of food and nutrients
4) vegetative reproduction
Why am i writing about botany you might be wondering. No i am not. I hated it in school and college even though my father was a agriculturist. The beauty about roots is that, it does not matter how big the tree might be, but still you water the roots. You don't water the leaves or any other part of the plant. The strength of the plant is determined by the health of its roots. Getting to the point, this so true with organizations. In an organization context, its roots are its PEOPLE. Are they being nurtured well? They are away from the front page of news papers or television screens. As in the case of roots, they are hidden and provide the required nourishment to the organization. I focus on two aspects. It is important that organization and the leaders spend time to nurture roots.
Let me first take one aspect, which the organizations can do to bring the required focus in providing the employee 'nourishment'. When i looked at the balance sheet of several companies, i realized that training is not even a line item reported as part of quarterly reports. May be it gets subsumed into other expenses. I feel companies which are serious at ensuring that they have the right focus on empowering employees with required training and knowledge, need to ensure that they have committed investments on training. The shareholders should put pressure on management to report this number and provide enough details, so that all can know how the company is placed to achieve the vision that it has put forth. Shareholders can link the vision with right investments that company is making in training and re-skilling.They can easily evaluate whether the company does 'Walk the Talk'. Ultimately shareholders should be concerned about the sustenance of their own wealth.
Also companies should be outcome focused when looking at training. Most of the companies look at the number of hours spent on training as a metric. But they should focus on the outcome of the training.
1. how many employees are using the training in day today activities
2. how many can act as trainers
3. how many can create IP around the new skills by mixing it with their current skills are few options
Moving on to how managers and leaders can improve the nourishment. Managers or leaders should spend enough time in nurturing the right talent. They should spend time in identifying the right candidates with whom they need to spend at least 30% of their productive time. They should spend this time in providing them guidance across different aspects. It can be
1. Helping him to set the right career path and identify the gaps that employees need to work on to take the proposed career path
2. Spend enough time with employees in reviewing the deliverable. This might seem trivial. But i have observed that this is one of the most important activities that a manager should master. This helps him to create the very much needed bandwidth which he can focus to think head. This is also a way to share the expectations from the employee. Through this intervention, the manager or leader can set the bar high by bringing his own learning and visibility.
3. I also believe that managers and leaders should take calculated risk by putting employees into very challenging situations with good intentions. Manager should also provide the employee the required confidence, that in case he is not able to deliver, he would back him up. This commitment is very important to ensure that the employees take up the challenge with confidence.
4. Recognizing employees who achieve the set goals is very important. I feel many managers don't think about this seriously. They are very casual in appreciating the achievements. I feel this does not motivate others to go beyond the call of duty and also to take ownership on outcomes.
To conclude, i believe management and managers should nurture the roots in different ways. The time they spend on nurturing the employees, provides both management and managers immense bandwidth which they can focus on creating sustained competitive advantage.
In this post i want to focus on something which so important for organizations and teams. This is about nurturing the roots of any organization.
Plant's root is that part, which in most cases is below the soil and not seen. It is tucked away below the earth reaching to great depths doing its job silently unnoticed. Roots have four major functions.
1) absorption of water and inorganic nutrients
2) anchoring of the plant body to the ground, and supporting it
3) storage of food and nutrients
4) vegetative reproduction
Why am i writing about botany you might be wondering. No i am not. I hated it in school and college even though my father was a agriculturist. The beauty about roots is that, it does not matter how big the tree might be, but still you water the roots. You don't water the leaves or any other part of the plant. The strength of the plant is determined by the health of its roots. Getting to the point, this so true with organizations. In an organization context, its roots are its PEOPLE. Are they being nurtured well? They are away from the front page of news papers or television screens. As in the case of roots, they are hidden and provide the required nourishment to the organization. I focus on two aspects. It is important that organization and the leaders spend time to nurture roots.
Let me first take one aspect, which the organizations can do to bring the required focus in providing the employee 'nourishment'. When i looked at the balance sheet of several companies, i realized that training is not even a line item reported as part of quarterly reports. May be it gets subsumed into other expenses. I feel companies which are serious at ensuring that they have the right focus on empowering employees with required training and knowledge, need to ensure that they have committed investments on training. The shareholders should put pressure on management to report this number and provide enough details, so that all can know how the company is placed to achieve the vision that it has put forth. Shareholders can link the vision with right investments that company is making in training and re-skilling.They can easily evaluate whether the company does 'Walk the Talk'. Ultimately shareholders should be concerned about the sustenance of their own wealth.
Also companies should be outcome focused when looking at training. Most of the companies look at the number of hours spent on training as a metric. But they should focus on the outcome of the training.
1. how many employees are using the training in day today activities
2. how many can act as trainers
3. how many can create IP around the new skills by mixing it with their current skills are few options
Moving on to how managers and leaders can improve the nourishment. Managers or leaders should spend enough time in nurturing the right talent. They should spend time in identifying the right candidates with whom they need to spend at least 30% of their productive time. They should spend this time in providing them guidance across different aspects. It can be
1. Helping him to set the right career path and identify the gaps that employees need to work on to take the proposed career path
2. Spend enough time with employees in reviewing the deliverable. This might seem trivial. But i have observed that this is one of the most important activities that a manager should master. This helps him to create the very much needed bandwidth which he can focus to think head. This is also a way to share the expectations from the employee. Through this intervention, the manager or leader can set the bar high by bringing his own learning and visibility.
3. I also believe that managers and leaders should take calculated risk by putting employees into very challenging situations with good intentions. Manager should also provide the employee the required confidence, that in case he is not able to deliver, he would back him up. This commitment is very important to ensure that the employees take up the challenge with confidence.
4. Recognizing employees who achieve the set goals is very important. I feel many managers don't think about this seriously. They are very casual in appreciating the achievements. I feel this does not motivate others to go beyond the call of duty and also to take ownership on outcomes.
To conclude, i believe management and managers should nurture the roots in different ways. The time they spend on nurturing the employees, provides both management and managers immense bandwidth which they can focus on creating sustained competitive advantage.
