Mark C. Crowley

Transformational Leadership For The 21st Century

What people feel in their hearts has profound influence over their motivation & workplace performance.
“In contrast to longstanding management thinking, the heart is the driving force of human achievement, and employee engagement is a decision of the heart.”
– Mark C. Crowley
MARK C. CROWLEY
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Here’s Why Bill Gates Calls Steven Pinker’s “Enlightenment Now” The Greatest Book He’s Ever Read

Posted by on Mar 3, 2018 in Current Affairs, Leadership, Wisdom From Other Authors | 0 comments

As I started reading Steven Pinker’s new bestseller, Enlightenment Now: The Case For Reason, Science, Humanism And Progress, I must admit I was curious to learn why Microsoft founder, Bill Gates, called it the greatest book he’s ever read.

And after making it through only a few pages of the preface, I thought I had my answer. Harvard psychology professor, Pinker packs more information into his sentences than any mere mortal could ever accomplish. Filled with astonishing erudition, brilliant references, and stunning conclusions, this is a book written by a genius for geniuses! The thought even crossed my mind that only a Mensa member could fully benefit from this book. “No wonder Gates loves this!”

But as I kept reading through its nearly 500 pages, I soon realized my initial assessment was entirely wrong. Gates didn’t herald this book for its style. He lauded it for it’s research – and for Pinker’s perfect timing in urging readers to start embracing optimism instead of the negativity that pervades so much of today’s discourse and thinking.

“Ordinary people think the world is going to hell in a hand basket,” Pinker writes, “and a solid majority of us believe our country is headed in the wrong direction.” And it’s easy to see why people feel this way. “Every day the news is filled with stories about war, terrorism, crime, pollution, inequality, drug abuse and oppression. We never see a journalist report live from a country to say ‘war has not broken out here.’”

In response, Pinker fills his book with chapter upon chapter of evidence that proves human life is only getting progressively better. We have fewer wars, less violence, more freedoms – and life expectancy has increased by 10 years in just the past half century. In areas of health, wealth, equality, the environment and overall wellbeing, all of it is ascending.

Consider these compelling examples of how life is actually improving:

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Leadership’s 4 Year Failure To Engage

Posted by on Jan 30, 2017 in Current Affairs, Heart Leadership In Practice, Leadership | 0 comments

If American companies were given a report card today for their progress in improving employee
engagement over the past four years, most would receive a failing grade.

Surely, many leaders will scowl at the notion that they could be seen as failing at a time when elevating engagement scores has been one of their organization’s highest expressed priorities. But since the Summer of 2013 when Gallup announced workplace engagement had reached rock bottom, the truth is that scores aren’t meaningfully better.

“How is it possible that the needle hasn’t substantially moved in 4 years?”

“Since our company’s internal numbers look good, aren’t we being lumped in with all the low performers?”

“How can a committed organization jump-start their engagement performance?”

I recently reconnected with Gallup’s long-time research director, Dr. Jim Harter, to discuss these inevitable questions. And if you hope to earn an “A” in engagement when the next grading period comes, the following insights will be helpful.

There Has Been Some Improvement

At the start of October, 34% of American workers were fully engaged in their jobs. That’s an increase from 30% in 2013, which means an additional 7.2 million workers are now willing to put in discretionary effort in order to help their bosses and organizations succeed.

“I recognize this is a positive change,” says Harter, “but we’re not satisfied. Too many workplaces remain indifferent to committing to supporting employee’s basic needs and to leveraging that for higher performance.

Compared to the best practice organizations in the US – ones that have now reached 70% or higher engagement – I’m pretty critical of overall leadership.”

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Five Magnificent Ways You Can Lead Like Google Without Spending A Dime On Perks

Posted by on Dec 14, 2016 in Current Affairs, Heart Leadership In Practice, Leadership, Uncategorized, Wisdom From Other Authors | 0 comments

Unknown-2As research for an article I later wrote for Fast Company Magazine, I traveled to Google’s Mountain View, California campus, and spent the day meeting with several of their talent management executives.

Within just my first hour at Google, I saw firsthand all the reasons why so many people in business consider the tech giant to be an incomparable outlier – an organization whose leadership practices bear little relevance to the real world, and to most other organizations:

  • Staged in the parking lot was a row of luxurious Wi-Fi-outfitted shuttles that transport hundreds of “Googlers” to and from work every day at no cost.
  • At eleven o’clock in the morning, I saw two young employees unabashedly playing a “Dance, Dance Revolution” arcade game – while others were gearing up to play eight-ball on a nearby billiards table.
  • I saw the bowling alleys, the laundry-room, the endless snacks, the gym – and I enjoyed one of the 75,000 gourmet meals Google provides its workers free of charge every month.

IMG_0196To the uninitiated, it’s no wonder that Google has been named Fortune Magazine’s “Best Company To Work For” an unprecedented five times. Who wouldn’t want to work at a place like this?

But Google’s methods for inspiring its 50,000 workers to commit themselves to doing amazing work far transcend the generous perks. And this is exactly the point that Google’s head of People Operations, Laszlo Bock, makes in his new book, “Work Rules! Why Google’s Rules Will Work For You.”

After reading Bock’s book – twice – I’m convinced that his (and Google’s) understanding of what drives human beings to consistently excel in their jobs is nothing short of brilliant.

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Gallup’s Profound Discovery: Engagement Is Driven By Good Managers With Rare Talents

Posted by on Dec 13, 2016 in Current Affairs, Heart Leadership In Practice, Leadership, Uncategorized | 0 comments

Searching For Talent “Talent hits a target no one else can hit. Genius hits a target no one else can see.”

 – Schopenhauer

It’s been nearly three years since Gallup announced its stunning finding that engagement in the American workplace had fallen to crisis levels.

In what became the shot heard ‘round the world in business, the research firm revealed that 70% of the nation’s working population admits to being disengaged in their jobs (i.e., content with collecting a paycheck while investing little of their hearts in their work) – and that nearly 1 in every 5 workers is so discontent that they’re perversely motivated to undermine the effectiveness of their bosses and organizations.

All of this profound unhappiness has a primary source, of course, and organizations across the land have scurried to create taskforces, introduce employee satisfaction metrics and experiment with innumerable strategies in their efforts at finding it.  Like any problem decades-long in the making, however, no new programs or organization-wide themes are likely to prove effective at creating a sustainable solution. (For proof of this, we only need to look at where engagement is in 2017.  The needle has barely moved).

I’ve always believed, of course, that our shared engagement problem is the direct result of ineffective – even destructive – leadership.  More specifically, I’ve shown that human beings have greatly evolved what they need and want in exchange for their committed efforts at work, while our traditional managerial practices have failed to keep up.

Last fall, Gallup helped confirm this assessment when their research revealed that too many people in supervisory roles today, across all industries, lack the requisite ability to manage.  Their important revelation was that employee engagement in the 21st Century is largely dependent upon having a good manager.

In a series of discussions I’ve since had with Dr. Jim Harter, Gallup’s Chief Research Scientist, I’ve learned there are five specific talents that characterize the most effective and influential workplace leaders.

The direct and immediate take-away is that some people are naturally imbued with qualities and talents that virtually preordain their leadership success.  The surest way of restoring high engagement, therefore, is to only select people with these traits into all future managerial roles.

Managers, Not Organizations, Drive Engagement

“We’ve long had the understanding in business,” Harter told me, “that organizations have an overriding culture – one that’s either highly engaged or not.  But when we mapped engagement data down to the team level, we started noticing that engagement – and all performance metrics – varied widely.  Our discovery was that culture varies by team.  When we got under the hood a little bit, it became more obvious that whatever was happening with a team was directly related to its manager and to the tone they were setting.”

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Three Stunning Leadership Trends That Should Give Hope To Workers Everywhere

Posted by on Dec 9, 2013 in Current Affairs, Heart Leadership In Practice, Leadership, Life Lessons, Wisdom From Other Authors | 1 comment

Heart & Mind“The future ain’t what it used to be.”

 – Yogi Berra

Directly or indirectly, the common theme expressed in everything I write is that our traditional ways of leading people in the workplace are failing.

We’ve seen employee engagement fall precipitously over a generation, and now have irrefutable evidence that it cannot and will not recover until we collectively adopt leadership practices that intentionally support the higher needs of workers – human beings.

My goal for each new article has been to further explain why leadership must change, and how some enlightened organizations and visionaries already are contributing to the creation of an entirely new, and far more effective model.

As we approach the New Year, I see it filled with promise.  It’s clear that our collective view on how best to inspire employee performance is fundamentally and irrevocably shifting.  What’s stunning to me is that it’s happening so fast.

To give you a new glimpse into the future of leadership, I want to share three profound trends that are building wave-like momentum in business.  A major transformation is underway and it’s largely being influenced by some noteworthy reversals in our thinking.

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The Single Greatest Reason The World’s Workforce Is Disengaged

Posted by on Oct 14, 2013 in Current Affairs, Heart Leadership In Practice, Leadership, Wisdom From Other Authors | 0 comments

Gallup Poll“No problem can be solved until it is reduced to some simple form. The changing of a vague difficulty into a specific, concrete form is a very essential element in thinking.”

–J. P. Morgan

 

In the early part of this past summer, Gallup released its “State of the American Workforce” report – a massive research undertaking that identified how connected and contented people feel in their jobs.  It’s from this study, 150,000 personal interviews over the course of a year, that researchers determined only 30% of us are fully engaged at work.

The news got even worse a few days ago when Gallup announced the results of its global workplace study.  Across 142 countries, they discovered only 13% of the working population does much more than show up on time and meet the minimum expectations for their jobs.

Take a look at these worldwide results:

  • 13% Engaged: Employees feel a strong connection to the success of their organization – almost as owners – and invest significant discretionary time and effort. 
  • 63% Not Engaged: People feel less connected to their work and are disinclined to display initiative.
  • 24% Actively Disengaged: Workers who are unhappy, unproductive – and liable to spread their negativity to co-workers.
  • This means 87% of the world’s working population is not meaningfully engaged in, or otherwise enthusiastic about their jobs.
  • Worldwide, actively disengaged employees outnumber engaged employees by nearly 2:1.

Soon after the U.S. engagement report was released, I interviewed Dr. Jim Harter, Gallup’s Chief Research Scientist, and wrote a subsequent article for Fast Company Magazine.  Leveraging much of Gallup’s research, I listed the key reasons American workers have grown so distressed in their jobs, and described the most effective ways managers can address them.

But now, four months later, I’m left to wonder how the world’s economy succeeds by having just 13% of the working population fully committed to excellence? Clearly, we manage, but is this really the best our global society can do?

With the hope that Gallup’s new research might shed new light on this engagement crisis, I reached out to Dr. Harter again.  To frame up our conversation, I asked him just two questions:

(1)  Is there one universal root to why people across the world are so disheartened in their jobs?

(2)  As a society, can we fix this so that people can instead thrive at work, maximize their own potential, and help drive greater performance for their organizations?

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