For the past few weeks, I have been doing my bit of web research on how can I enhance the productivity of my team and find a solution to training them with new stuffs happening in the industry. Apart from sharing few links from time to time to present a picture of what’s going around the world, I also try to inspire them to suggest new opportunities they see in a brand we are working for. So that they do their bit of research, are encouraged to see more possibilities at work place and open up a bit with their thoughts and ideas.
Still, I sense a gap. I am looking for something that can help each of them polish their skills, learn new things, be excited about their profession and take the work place as not just their job, but an institute of possibilities. They should sense growth in their work with each passing day. And feel contended about what they are doing.
I know many of the rodinhooders are doing some great stuff with their staff. But I have my own monetary constraints. So I can’t go with anything like industry workshops, hiring a speaker once a month who can talk with them or send them to sessions or classes where they can take up industry courses. But I am trying hard to fit this all in my budget, still was wondering if any of you could come out with anything interesting regarding the same.
Would really help me out.
Thanks Rodinhooders!!
Sudarsan Ravi
Hi Anamika – Try some online free courses or youtube videos that are apt or relevant to your line of work. I have had my team attend online seminars, take coursera courses. I also keep sharing good blogs and their links to the team based on my reading.
Tejas Vishnu Nimbargi
Hi Anamika,
My first doubt is why do you have to hire a speaker. You have someone called ‘Anamika Joshi’ who could share her ideas with her employees and they would be happy to get motivated. Nothing better than the boss himself/herself approaching employees, telling them about the growth, sharing the concern and motivating them to polish their skills.
Sending them to workshops and classes for polishing their skills will come later as your financial constarints become less..
But believe me,
for a start up the most important thing is to instill a sense of ownership in your employees. They will find out free-of-cost ways for their own development.
I hope you get good detailed help from the experienced guys present here.
All the best! 🙂
Anamika Joshi
Hey Sudarsan – Will try the online thing. Online Seminars should do something good i guess. 🙂 Thanks!
Anamika Joshi
Hi Tejas
That’s a truth. Not that I haven’t thought of it. In review meetings I do try instilling in each of them a sense of responsibility and inspire them in my own ways. But right now I am looking more at skill based development that’s more focused on helping them learn new skills in their own field.
But I think, I can be more structured in my approach to the review meetings and make sure to have something new in hand to share with them all.
Thanks!!
Tejas Vishnu Nimbargi
Yes, then as rightly said by Su
Rohan Bhansali
Anamika, a few suggestions from what we do at Gozoop:
1) Make one of your team mates present to the rest of the team members on efficiency and productivity. Once given the responsibility, he or she will do a lot of research on the topic and also have custom suggestions that suit your organisation. Make this learning inclusive. This works very well for us.
2) We have a compulsory “Leave by 6:30PM” day. This helps our team more efficient and also promotes work – life balance.
3) We have recently started an internal “Campaign of the Month”. The best marketing campaign for the month gets recognition and a fun gift. This provides good positive reinforcement for doing something out of the box. Simple but effective.
Good luck!
Anamika Joshi
Whoa… that are some great tips.,. Thanks a lot Rohan!
Anamika Joshi
Abhishek – so truly said… May be I can sit with each of them one good day and have a better understanding of their ambitions and dreams. Thanks a tonne!
Anamika Joshi
🙂 Hmm.. But here is why I was planning to do it along with them…
I have a fantastic graphic designer who is awesome with his work, imagination and dedication. But he often finds himself handicapped when it comes to creating illustrations. That restricts him from creating something which we have discussed. So we used to outsource illustration jobs that required much detailing. But he had a good eye and even started creating characters with whatever resources he had. Seeing his interest, we bought him a pen tab (a device used majorly for illustrations) so that he can pamper his interest.
But we found that he never gave that device a try even after we asked him to do so once in a while.
One day I asked him, “Hey, what are your plans. Don’t you wish to learn making illustrations?” He said, “No, I want to learn animation”. Which was something we had no idea about. He then explained why and how, etc. But I started analyzing my failure to understand his vision.
Sometimes your idea about a person’s vision covers only what he/she has made you think and not what actually they dream of.
Having said that, I will definitely try doing that without bothering them 🙂 🙂
Himanshu Sehgal
Make them do a Art of living course and keep wondering how 6 days course can change a person and brings out the best. 😀
Anamika Joshi
Himanshu… This is something which infact I was thinking of doing it myself…. But that was for a different purpose… I am not sure how many of them will be actually interested in doing that or how exactly will that help them with their skills. May be as an individual it could help them.
Anamika Joshi
Very rightly said Abhishek… But it’s rare that employees come and discuss with you what they want and what not.. It’s truly rare..I think its all about finding a balance between their aspirations and your company’s. Guess I need to get myself educated on various levels.. 🙂
Himanshu Sehgal
I have seen people organizing AOL courses in their company. And successfully completed it too. You should also give it a try. Yes it will help them on individual bases, but than individual plus individual forms the right team.
Anamika Joshi
:)) That’s true… May be I can ask them if they are interested and see if it helps! Thanks Himanshu! 🙂
Anamika Joshi
Thanks Rahul…. Good one!
Abey John
Hmmmm. The answer is not in formulas but in the internal plumbing of our being…. short version: one has to let go… longer version some other time. Easy fix: Get them all to take a yoga course and do the practices for 6 months at least. Isha’s inner engineering course is good. AOL’s course I believe is also equally good. Dunno about the other yoga teachers but there’s possibly more out there. I saw someone give an intro to Sri Sri at some blah blah conclave and he made a very insightful remark, something to the effect: yoga impacts you at the reflexive level. And that cascades into improved productivity better zest for living and enjoying your work and all sortsa things. My yoga practices, when I was doing them, confirmed that.
Perzen Darukhanawalla
Hi Anamika –
I work for a startup and what we have is a small annual development allowance that we are free to use for professional development. However, we are encourage to find free webinars/courses and have to commit to our boss what we aim to learn from it. Because these courses are sometimes free, as human beings we don’t take it seriously. However, committing to my boss that I will learn XYZ and then try to put it into action means I become accountable for my learning.
It’s also important to let employees be a part of the decision making process. More responsibility = you love your job more 🙂
Anamika Joshi
Hmmm.. You and Himanshu have things in common – thought-wise 🙂 Now I guess I should start understanding AOL and the results even better to suggest the same to my employees. Thanks !!
Bhawana Sahu
There’s Yoga,Tibetian Yoga, Isha foundations inner engineering and AOL course. I am a AOL follower, so if you are finding a mentor for AOL course, I can help you with that.Meditation & Yoga will truly help, but initially the tiredness and laziness will not let everyone be interested in it. We always used to feel that we should skip the yoga and go and play badminton instead in our college days 🙂
The average age group of your employees will also help you decide, what motivation inducing measure to be used for them.
I believe in simple steps and analyzing the inner self. So please do analyze if there are factors like monotonicity of work, strictness of superiors, vision mismatch between the top management and the employees, and no freedom to express.Accordingly, find a measure. Pushing courses, meditation or sports won’t help. Untill we know what is the root cause.
Get some music on, let everyone find peace within the workplace and let them have the freedom. They’ll eventually give their 100%.
Add ons will surely be group participation, courses and perks.
Anamika Joshi
This is more structured and workable I guess. And I think that will make them bound to be attentive and learn things… though I still need to figure out more about webinars and courses they provide.. Thanks Perzen!
Abey John
As they say – just do it. :))
Ashwin C Parulkar
I think what Gozoop guy says is a gem..but suddenly your quest started drifting here to AOL, Yoga, and pranic healing etc..
1. Leave at 6.30 is great policy for those who don’t have any meaningfull contribution on an active project…rest who are critical to project can work
2.presentation by the selected employee on a topic
3. All online TED VIDEOS and smany such : watch and discuss and let some one draft the insight and send online
4 if you can invite some one from experts forum offer them taxi fair and food with your crew..I think many people want to share their knowledge and not every one does it for money all the time
Abey John
Ashwin, this is a quest for improved productivity, deepening the creative plumbing of the team, and sharpening their vision.
Presentations, TED videos, lectures, 20% time to work on your own thing, etc tackle it at the knowledge level but leaves the subconscious in the lurch. It also plays to the superstition that there are people with inferior and superior capabilities and therefore need “education” to ramp up their capabilities. Which in turn sets up the framework for the reward system at whose teat we all suck blissfully and strive hard to be “worthy of the reward”.
Western (read – empirical) self improvement theories have only a vague notion of how to tap into the mystical garbage that we all have.
Yoga actually has an answer. At the minimum it sharpens your awareness and creates more ‘headspace’ for your own uniqueness to flow. How deep you get into yoga is entirely up to you but sustained practice even of a few well transmitted asanas taps into your intuitive drive which then cascades into improved productivity, more insight into the way things work, and which consequently bubbles up into what is seemingly more creative responses.
We are awash in content (knowledge) but the question is which knowledge should you ingest today. Of course yoga is not going to magically change things over night but over a period of time you will see the quality of your decisions improve. With the internal plumbing sorted out, then, knowledge is just another tool, which you tap into as needed. Focus on clarity. Everything else will follow automatically.
But yes, it should be a reiterated that yoga is not a magic bullet….but it will give you enough clarity to figure out the problems and solve them.
Ratnakar Gokarn
Before you have your employees twisting into different yoga positions and meditation try and get a copy of
“Peak : How great companies get their Mojo from Maslow” by Chip Conley and “Drive : The surprising truth about what motivates us” by Daniel Pink.
Might give you some inspiration and insights. Both great books.
The first book was really good and an eye opener.
BTW check out also this video by Vishen Lakhiani called ” How to build the worlds greatest work place”.
He is a rockstar. He built the company from literally nothing to one of the best places to work in the world.
You may not apply lot of things he does, but there are somethings you can take away from this.
Abey John
I haven’t read both books but my first reaction is to call it BS: Fucking empirical doofuses. 🙂
Maslow’s hierarchy of needs I know. Hmmm okay. My refutation logic is already forming but lemme read the reviews and confirm whether I am just being a yoga blow hard or they have something real to say and can flip the switch on what I know. Be right back. :))
Ratnakar Gokarn
Abey,
You havent read the books even and dont know who these guys are but you want to come out with your first reactions?
You are acting like the guy who arrives ready to punch without even knowing who he is supposed to fight.
Till the time you have reached and achieved what they have, open your mind to possibilities. There is humility in acknowledging that there are people wiser than us.
Take a chill pill, I have nothing against yoga or meditation. They are people who have built extremely successful companies. They dont have the magic bullet (in your speak), but it does not harm to listen.
Abey John
Okay back.
Daniel Pink is right: “the secret to high performance and satisfaction-at work, at school, and at home—is the deeply human need to direct our own lives, to learn and create new things, and to do better by ourselves and our world.”
Chip Conley’s implementation of Maslow’s hierarchy is also …. well … is a bit meh …. but okay. It is manipulation but since the intent is well being it is also acceptable even though its shelf life is questionable. And it fully yanks the chain on that bit superstition called “rewards and awards”.
Daniel Pink is closer. Recognition that we are all unique individuals with our own unique motivations. One review says you’ll get the meat of the book from his TED talk so probably should check that out.
I guess within the culture we will live both books have some utility. But where yoga differs is that it targets your being at its core. The innate drive for every being to be free.
Ask any prisoner in a jail what they want. Even if it is a 5 star jail. They care a fuck for the gourmet meals, super luxurious jail cells, and precious rewards of “good behavior”. The number 1 thing on their minds is: “when do I get out?”. Maslow’s hierarchy collapses there. Unless you convince them first that it is better to remain in prison and be well fed and comfortable rather than go out into an uncertain world. Basically use fear as a control mechanism.
The truth is we are all free. Already. The problem is we have “forgotten” this. Every system, moral, religious, self-improvement, productivity boosting, blah blah blah in some manner or the other tries to move us closer to this awareness of our freedom. And they use a complicated mess of ideas and rules to do that.
Ideas and rules in and themselves are not bad. But when institutionalized they turn hard and brittle and eventually atrophy – the law of entropy gets them.
Of course, you can institute compensatory mechanisms to combat that but most organizations don’t have the necessary awareness or knowledge to maintain it on a sustained basis and apply course correction as things evolve. Which in some cases will require demolishing the core tenets they erected in the first place.
The only group I’ve seen who’ve managed to preserve this integrity are the Tibetan Buddhists till the Chinese invasion. They managed to run it for a 1000+ years without atrophying.
The best examples of rules disintegrating into meaninglessness are the christian church and maybe the various 1000 year+ muths in India. Dunno too much about the internal workings of the muths but that murder case on the chief honcho of the Tamil Nadu math is symptomatic. The church I know of and can confirm is about as crap filled as anything else.
(sidenote: what astonishes me is that yoga managed to survive fairly intact and only now has turned into large scale monkey business while genuine teachers and gurus are being overshadowed)
The end goal is freedom. The more you liberate your employees (more accurately: the more you help your employees find their own liberation) the better they will perform. Any system that does this is good fodder.
Yoga is the only system that I know of that doesn’t ask you to fill your head with rules, ideas, and self improvement crap. It just puts you in closer touch with “life” and your own freedom.
Ratnakar Gokarn
Whew….I always enjoy your posts Abey. While the world is still digesting your last reply, just let me know what pot you are smoking….. I need some of that too :)). ( I am joking in case it does not come across that way in the reply)
Lets discuss philosophy and yoga when we meet in person. Hope to see you at the open house.
I just soak in what I can, our journey is made easier by the people who have walked the path before us and left us nuggets of wisdom.
Peace!
Abey John
🙂 I know. I have this bone to pick with empiricism. So anything comin out of that quarter is good fodder for a kick in the nuts. :))
My current working theory is “its all shit anyway” so I fail to get impressed by achievement. Though when I see genuine achievement it breaks me and brings me to my knees.
Am chilled. :))
Abey John
Even when I am cussing am peaceable and loving. :)) I need to find the trick on how to cuss without causing alarm or irritation. :))
Pot smokin? LOL lets not go there.
I need to figure out how to come to an open house. Should be lots of fun. :))
Hope to meet you soon too. 🙂
Abey John
Become a student of “undivided reality”… will make pot look like kindergarden :))
Abey John
+1 Vishen Lakhinai… saw him on Yanick Silver’s arcade show… hate what he does but love his core principles and the way he is going about it. Totally yanking the rewards angle to get the whole jingala engaged… 🙂
Ashwin C Parulkar
Aby never saw you bursting like this before. But you should not bash some ones view point….and yes you need to find a zen master ASAP :)))
Abey John
Ashwin, I want to agree but I am conflicted. :)) And zen master, yes. :)))
Abey John
Okay my gurus are kickin my psychic ass for not trying to explaining myself. So here’s the background to why I took off on Ratnakar’s comment:
In the 70’s Zen & The Art of Motorcycle Maintenance hit the charts. This was the story of Robert Pirsig a philosopher and a science genius. Won’t go into the details but the essence of what he said was: “There is a flaw in scientific method. And this flaw can be demonstrated by the fact that for any given theory there are an infinite number of hypotheses.”
Then he went onto to explain the problem with subject object analysis etc. The response he got was, to put it mildly, not very welcoming. Which eventually led to a break down, commitment to a mental asylum, and eventually shock therapy. Finally though he recovered and wrote the book.
And the fact is what he has said/discovered is equal to what Copernicus did when he demonstrated that the earth is not the center of the universe. It totally changed our world view. Pirsig did something similar and the scientific community’s response has been to reject him.
That outraged me and outrages me still. This is like the fuckin medieval priests. And science is supposed to be free of all this crap! So there is no real spirit of enquiry. You are just fuckin peddlin another religion. rant rant rant rant rant rant… pant pant pant… sigh…
So since then I’ve always shown the finger to empiricists. Generally I try to avoid making snide remarks when I hear the glories of empricism being waxed but when Ratnakar took up the implied position that empricisim is superior to yoga I saw red. 🙂
Am sure this explanation will make no sense but to paraphrase Adyashanti – “all you can do is fail, so since you are anyway going to fail, fail as well you can.”
And now my darling gurus, will you get off my back?
Ashwin C Parulkar
:))) Aby…Aby Aby…breath slowly…close your eyes….focus your attention on chakras one by one…..zzzzz….
Can some one pl start agin with some meaningful suggestion for the lady.
Abey John
Exactly Ashwin… :))
Anamika Joshi
Hi Bhawana
Sorry for such a delayed response to your ideas. Was away on a trip. Coming back to your solutions, your third para is very effective in many ways. Though these things get analyzed by us on an everyday basis, still we have not been able to encounter these issues effectively. This may be due to many reasons including our own strict schedule, inability to interact regularly, inability to understand their vision and many more.
I am personally a yoga propagator as I have experienced the effectiveness whenever I am able to do it. Regrading AOL I have least idea though I am trying to understand it with the help of few of my RH friends 🙂
Thanks for your wonderful response.