Cultivating a Sense of Accomplishment in the Information Age

In his Wall Street Journal column today, Cubicle Culture author Jared Sandberg writes of A Modern Conundrum: When Work's Invisible, So Are Its Satisfactions (subscription required).  In it, he contrasts the immediate sense of accomplishment people could get in traditional, more tangible types of work ("a chair made or a ball bearing produced") with the greater difficulty many of us face today, trying to "find gratification from work that is largely invisible, or from delivering goods that are often metaphorical."

"Not only is work harder to measure but it's also harder to define success," says Homa Bahrami, a senior lecturer in Organizational Behavior and Industrial Relations at UC Berkeley's Haas School of Business.  "The work is intangible or invisible, and a lot of work gets done in teams so it's difficult to pinpoint individual productivity."

She says information-age employees measure their accomplishments in net worth, company reputation, networks of relationships, and the products and services they're associated with - elements that are more perceived and subjective than that field of corn, which either is or isn't plowed.

No wonder performance management is increasingly difficult to do effectively.  And yet this article makes the point, I believe, that measuring and recognizing work done well is as important as ever - not only for today's organizations, but also for the people who work in them.  As workers, we want to know that our efforts make a positive difference.  Employers, at a macro level, and individual managers, at the micro level, who can help employees see and appreciate the impact of their work - through coaching, feedback and appropriate goal-setting - will have an advantage in the competition to attract and retain knowledge workers.  Not to mention an advantage in accomplishing the knowledge work itself.

Comments

[Frank Giancola]

Ann,

Another great post! I'm not sure a lot of managers know who their top performers are, for the reasons Bahrami notes.

Thanks for finding the important ideas for us to ponder.

Frank

[Paul Hebert]

And I would add that not only is it more difficult to identify the specific behaviors to measure - the rate of change and innovation in the market demands that those measurements change more oftent.

It used to be that a company could put together a plan, outline the steps to success and reward people for working the plan.

Now, the steps in the plan are more difficult to assign to an individual and those steps change faster.

This is a huge wake up call for managers in any organization. Management isn't as easy as it used to be - it's getting much, much harder. I wonder if companies are investing in management training for the new world versus using training designed for the old world. Just thinking outloud.

[Ann Bares]

Frank:
I believe you're right, that the intangibility of knowledge work may make it more difficult to know who top performers are - but I think that makes the job of the manager/coach/mentor more important, not less so. Thanks for the comment!

Paul:
You're right that the pace of change (plans can't stand still long enough for us to measure how we're doing against them) is yet another variable that makes accomplishment hard to measure. Making the job of the manager/coach/mentor ever more difficult - but I would argue, ever more important. And you ask a good question about manager training - I fear that many organizations are way behind the curve on this. I wonder how many management development/training experts are ahead of the curve on this. Perhaps someone will weigh in.

Thanks for the thoughts!

[Wally Bock]

I picked this as one of my top five posts on my Midweek Look at the Business Blogs.
http://blog.threestarleadership.com/2008/02/20/22008-a-midweek-look-at-the-business-blogs.aspx

[Ann Bares]

Thanks, Wally. Readers - if you don't already benefit from Wally's midweek review (he does the reading and research for us!), click on over and check it out.

[almostgotit]

Hurray for "Knowledge work" and other Peter Drucker-isms! Speaking of excellent management and the Druckers, I've just received an email re. the exciting and brand-new "Doris Drucker Women in Leadership Fellowship," an MBA fellowship to be held at the Drucker School at Claremont, is currently accepting applications from "talented and exceptional women interested in entering careers in management and leadership." Peter Drucker's widow, Doris Drucker, is on the selection committee, which is trying to get the word out to as many women as possible, especially as this is the first year this generous fellowship is being offered. (for more info: http://www.cgu.edu/pages/5384.asp)

[Maia Field]

Measuring work is a tough job and I think it is important to do it right, important for the employers but also for the team leaders and project managers. It can influence the level of their work and also raise their self-esteem. Thank you for sharing these pieces of information.