One of the great things about my job is that I get to read things I enjoy and then teach them. It is hard to think of anything I’m more proud of than the business communications class I’ve developed for Tsinghua University in Beijing. In this course I teach several applications of psychology to business.
The beautiful thing about teaching, in the traditional sense, is that you end up learning the material better than if you were the student. Why is that? It is because when you explain ideas to other people, you are forced to reflect on the material and put it into your own words. This reflection is where learning occurs. That makes me think that perhaps there’s something broken about the traditional approach of getting up there and lecturing. If I’m doing all the talking, and you’re just listening, I’m the one that’s truly doing the learning. Great for me, but not so great for you as the student.
So how do you engage students? Well, I’m sure you’re reading this because you’re a business guy. Your first inclination might be that you want to skip this paragraph. But what if I were to tell you that there are countless parallels between engaging students and engaging employees. By not being interested in this question, you’ll never draw these connections. Of course, you couldn’t just answer this question with one sentence, or one paragraph, or one blog entry. As a teacher I know my words won’t resonate with you as well as your own words will resonate with you. So think about this question. You’re planning a class, and you want your students to learn — actually learn — and not just go home and forget everything. What do you?
If you’re really clever you might take that first piece of information I gave you about learning. The power of reflection. Of course I want my students to reflect on what I’m teaching them. But they need context. Truly creative thinking comes from drawing parallels with your life and what you’re learning. A great way to do that is through projects. You say, let’s open a coffee shop in Wudaokou. It’s a tough market, because you have Starbucks, Twosome Coffee, Lush, Bridge Cafe, SPR, Paris Baguette, and you have just a handful of differences between them.
Up until then my students are mainly focused on communication with customers. Some of this communication can be very subtle and delicate. Take pricing for example. My students have thought of many creative ways to improve overall margins through the presentation of a menu. And then you ask them a couple of questions they don’t yet have the tools to answer. You ask “How are you going to keep employee turnover low?” and “What will your pay structure be?”
I’ll be the first to admit I had no idea what the wait staff at these establishment were making. Did you know that the typical apartment in Wudaokou goes for 3 to 4000 RMB per month? And if you work full-time at one of these places you make 3000 RMB per month? You’re probably thinking, wow, we really need to pay these employees a lot more for them to be comfortable. And that would be too presumptuous.
You really want an employee that you have a chance to engage, for which your pay level won’t be an issue. You need to go into the job interview with a line of questioning that answers the question: “How much money do I need to give to this employee, so that in giving them this money, they’re not worried about making ends meet?”
So let’s agree it’s a good idea to keep turnover low. If you’re not on board with that assumption, I give you points for thinking critically, but I’m not going to entertain that notion in this posting.
I’ll tell you what you don’t do. You don’t punish your employees for mistakes. What you do is give your employees the respect they deserve. You teach them all the skills of the business. You include your employees in your thinking for the business, from the way you treat customers, to your branding and marketing. You teach your employees how to work the cash register, to make the coffee, to clean the bathroom, to restock the cafe, to do payroll. And you surprise your employees from time to time with generosity, to show to them what they mean to your company. Your business grows as your employees engagement grows. The roles we assign to a position are arbitrary. Make it a multifaceted position, and your employees will grow as people.
By giving up some control, your employees experience autonomy. It allows them to work on their terms. By sharing your vision with your employees, they have a sense of purpose. It provides context for their efforts. And by giving more tasks, and more challenges to your employees, they master many different skills in addition to the typical skills associated with their job, including time management and collaboration.
What I’m describing with autonomy, mastery and purpose are the 3 components to intrinsic motivation, as laid out by Dan Pink. It’s very possible you’ve seen his fantastic Ted talk, but then again, it’s possible you did watch it and just simply forgot about it. If you want your company to improve from the inside out, you should start by asking yourself these questions. In your current role, do you have these 3 elements in alignment? Does your role prevent other people in your company from experiencing true intrinsic motivation?
— Guest Post by Michael Smith —
Michael teaches business and psychology courses for the department of foreign languages at Tsinghua University. His entries focus on the growing body of research in behavioral economics.
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