A group of 15 CEOs at a Chief Executive roundtable on “Building a High Performance, Highly Engaged Culture” concluded that the challenge is only getting greater. Their assertion was that the rise of the Millennials, a demographic contingent of 20- and 30-year olds, means that CEOs cannot simply assume that they will embrace corporate ideals. The example given was a preference by this age group to work shorter hours and flexible hours.
It is difficult to accept CEOs believe that generations older than the Millennials were embracing the corporate ideals of long and rigid hours. Their broader concern was that a focus on short-term results produces behaviors contrary to the needs of Millennials. Maybe the Millennials are more outspoken about what they need from work, but the concerns regarding problems generated by a focus on short-term results has been a long-term problem. The short-term result focus is a hallmark of Bulk thinking.
The CEOs are correct in noting that the pressures of short-term results erodes trust between leaders and employees. W. Edwards Deming noted the importance of trust in his book Out of Crisis in 1982 – an observation he certainly made decades before that publication.
Rather than bemoaning the challenges of building an engaged culture on the coming of age of a new generation, all of us should embrace the challenge of using Lean thinking and Lean principles such as Respect for People in building these cultures. Building engaged work cultures is not a new challenge, and it is not a challenge that will ever go away. It is part of work life, and a part that should excite rather than scare us.
