How likely is it that your team would say ‘Yes’ in response to the following statement?
‘My supervisor, or someone at work, seems to care about me as a person’
If they do say ‘Yes’, would you be one of the people they think of as demonstrating ‘caring towards others’?
Gallup has found that people who answer ‘Yes’:
- Are more likely to stay with the organisation
- Have more engaged customers
- Are more productive*
So, caring about your employees/co-workers seems to be a good idea. But, so often this comes across as fake and, in my opinion, fake interest is worse than no interest at all.
In order for this to feel authentic to both you and others, it needs to connect to a deeply held value. So, my question for you is: Who do you want to be at work? How do you want others to see you? If ‘caring’ is a value you want to enact at work then not only will you feel authentic and vital but you might just be adding to the bottom line too!
* Taken from Vital Friends – Tom Rath
Working with ACT 
Good one, Rachel…
Could you give the reference to the Gallup text?
Here’s BTW a nice counterpart: http://newsroom.blogs.cnn.com/2012/01/02/how-to-kickstart-your-career-for-the-new-year/
And we can take this one step further still: how can : the supervisor invite and reward caring behaviors from his teammembers?
Here’s to a rewaarding 2012!
Maarten
Thanks Maarten, The research is taken from ‘Vital Friends’ by Tom Rath. As far as I know, Gallup don’t seem to publish their research in peer reviewed journals – which is a shame. I like your extension into evoking and reinforcing behaviour. If ever you would like to write a guest post we would be delighted! Rachel
Hi again, Rachel.
Not yet a guest-post, but…
To elaborate a bit more: as you know, ACT therapists convey to their clientsthe message: “We’re all in the same boat”.
To what extent could that also apply to managers and supervisors vis à vis employees?
Or is this question more relevant only to the french setting, where the “authority’ aspect is in general highly valued, much more than the “common humanity” aspect?
Maarten (definitely not french in this aspect)
Maarten, I suspect that you are right and France is much more hierarchical than Australia. But I certainly see inexperienced and ineffective managers here who try to hold onto the role of expert and it rarely goes well for them or their team. Frank Bond is starting to show that psychological flexibility is a key feature of effective leadership – which to me makes intuitive sense and is very exciting as we know how to train it!