Team can’t be a team when it’s all about what we take from each other

This blog is primarily devoted to brand strategy and communications subject matter, but today we take a break to talk about something impacting our firm now – an imperative in how we operate that we believe will pay long-term dividends in staff development and how well we interact with clients. That said, it bears an uncanny similarity to how some brands treat their customers.

Marketplace Mentality in the Workplace

In other posts on how brands must strive to build relevant relationships with core consumers, we’ve also exposed the flip side: a self-centered operating philosophy that drives many organizations to conduct their business as if consumers were balance sheet tools. It involves treating customers fundamentally as a source of transactions.

The organization’s proper goal may indeed be consistent profitable growth, but that inward-looking endeavor can sometimes spawn consumer-facing behaviors that at best view them as walking wallets. The primary priority in this operational scenario: how do I liberate customers as frequently as possible from their pocketbook? Consumers know this and can sense the attitude from a distance – hence the low regard especially for brands that resort routinely to various forms of bribe (discounts, coupons, sales) rather than investments in building the brand/consumer relationship.

This kind of thinking can also bleed into the workplace. Agencies can be notorious abusers of this operating method by creating policies and process that view staff as walking buckets of billable hours or cash generators based on delivery of service for various forms of compensation.

The Paradigm Dilemma: Invest In or Take From??

The view that professional service firm employees are revenue producers and the super stars therefore should be singled out and rewarded based on their ability to generate income, makes team oriented culture virtually impossible. In his brilliant book “Strategy and The Fat Smoker,” author and consultant David Maister peels back the veneer of service firm operations and suggests that in the absence of a purposefully built team-based culture, a firm strategy cannot be successfully implemented.

“Managers build their plans and strategies on the assumption that people in their firm are ready and willing to be team players, acting collectively to create or achieve something in the future. The truth, however, is that these attitudes cannot be assumed to exist. In fact they’re notably scarce. In many firms – perhaps even most – these preconditions for strategy may not exist. It is hard to identify and create buy-in for what ‘we’ (the firm) should do if there is no string sense of ‘we’ – a mutual commitment and sense of group loyalty and cohesiveness.”

The agency instead is built on a transactional mentality with all participants looking at the other on the basis of “what I can get from you.” A sort of organizational narcissism that says as long as you produce, I will reward you. And if you produce more than the other guy, I’ll reward you more. For the employee, this approach does not engender loyalty or sense of team play. Said another way, “what’s in it for me today, never mind tomorrow” says the whole relationship is transactional in nature.

The Three Musketeers…

In Alexandre Dumas’ 19th century novel he follows the adventures and exploits of four members of King Louis XIII’s royal guard in 1625. The famous line, uttered collectively by d’Artagnan, Athos, Porthos and Aramis remains ingrained in popular culture: “one for all and all for one.” The sum of their parts makes a better whole certainly, but what is really said here is – I have relationships that matter enough I’m willing to put myself at risk to defend my friends.

Team based culture rewards long-term business building strategies that will inevitably require individuals to make near-term sacrifices of one kind or another.

To successfully build an agency business around an all-encompassing strategic point of view and mission, people must work collaboratively. The organization’s best interests reside firmly at the top of the priority pyramid and have significance and meaning to people beyond their own self-interests. It is the polar opposite of star culture that promotes people looking out singularly for numero uno.

Our Approach

To this end, we’ve now invested in a series of team building programs and exercises, starting with agency wide Myers-Briggs testing to determine personality types, coupled with team building sessions that help people understand how to work more effectively with each other and communicate better. We’re putting more assets into training and professional development, increasing he frequency of formal and informal performance review – all to reinforce the idea that team culture is the path we’ve chosen at W&T. This also has impact on the kinds of people we bring into the organization, as well as a clear sense from principals on down that we not only care about people as individuals but also wish to build relationships with each other over time.

Outcomes

First we see this as fundamental in our ability to implement firm strategy, that the collective whole working in concert with each other will get us all there faster and more effectively. And that Clients will be better served by teams that rally around our desire to lead them in new directions. Experience and consistency in account service are vital, we believe, so our over-arching goal is to push turnover to zero. And to establish that overall sense of “we” that will be at the center of the company we wish to build over time.