Attracting and Retaining The Right People

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Attracting and Retaining The Right People

I had an amazing experience during the first of a four-part webinar series on Authentic Leadership with Trucking HR Canada.

The trucking and logistics industry is complex, sophisticated, and built on grass-roots values. Like many industries, leaders are dealing with rising input costs, tight margins, increased pressure on time, and a continual shortage of team members. In the midst of these pressures, one thing leaders have control over is the culture they create.

If you want to attract others, you must be attractive:

1. Commit to leadership. There’s a difference between a boss and a leader. Bosses might get the job done, but leaders create a culture that inspires the right people to sign up and stay.

2. Ensure a healthy Senior Leadership Team. There is a direct relationship between the health of the leadership team and a culture that keeps people.

3. Hire for attitude. You can’t train someone to be nice. Hire good people and train them to execute good processes. In the words of the management guru Peter Drucker, “Hire s-l-o-w-l-y. Fire quickly.”

4. Foster alignment. We have to align people to the organizational values, and even more importantly we need to align the organization to the values of the people who make that organization what it is. Creating a place for people to live their values at work in a way that supports the values of the culture is what builds loyalty, ensures the long-term success of your organization, and creates a place worth working in.

There are people who do not feel safe at work. They don’t feel safe to speak honestly, offer ideas, or be themselves.

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There are people who do not feel safe at work. They don’t feel safe to speak honestly, offer ideas, or be themselves.

They fear that sharing concerns and mistakes will mean embarrassment or retribution; that if they are honest, they will be humiliated, ignored, or blamed. They fear asking questions when they are unsure of something. They sit on their hands, stay within the lines, underperform and become dissatisfied.

When people are afraid, they stay dangerously silent, they disengage, they lie, and they leave if they can. Or worst of all, they quit and stay.

Far too many managers – knowingly and unknowingly – believe that fear motivates. Too many managers are unaware of how unacknowledged stress and anxiety breeds fear. Brain science has demonstrated that fear inhibits learning, productivity, engagement, innovation, and fulfillment.

How can we, as leaders, create safe workplaces?

Why leadership training and development are so critical and why our teams deserve it.

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Three things I’ve learned about personal and leadership development:

  1. The greatest gift you can give someone is your own personal development. And one of the greatest gifts you can give your team is the gift of learning. Becoming a stronger, wiser, kinder person doesn’t just benefit you, it benefits those around you.
  2. Don’t mistake vertical growth for horizontal growth. I know of leaders who go on annual development courses to go deep into what we used to describe as horizontal growth. But now, podcasts, TED talks, Youtube videos and books, though useful, don’t necessarily allow you to go deeper. There’s a difference between learning “about leadership” (horizontal growth) and true leadership development (vertical growth).
  3. Development keeps us fresh, engaged, and relevant. Don’t put off developing yourself or your team. Leadership and personal development gives us perspective and strategies to navigate our world. Jim Rohn emphasized the crucial choice between discipline and regret: “We must all suffer from one of two pains: the pain of discipline or the pain of regret.”

Why accountability and empowerment are inseparable.

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Accountability is usually understood in terms of holding someone accountable. But what if we, ourselves, embraced being accountable for the benefit of our relationships, families, and organizations?

Empowerment is usually understood in terms of “giving power” to someone. But what if we, ourselves, embraced empowerment as taking accountability to create an organization where you enjoy working and which serves the greater good?

This means that accountability and empowerment are inseparable. Rather than being “granted” by someone else, they are virtues that come from within.

Today there is a deep desire to connect to our authentic self, our true nature.

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Whether or not we can articulate that desire, this yearning can show up when you say something like, “I have a good job and make a living, but I’m not able to find a sense of meaning in it; I want something that I have a reason for doing.” The pandemic made this inquiry, for many, more explicit and deliberate.

We live in a society obsessed with an economic view, which supports us to work at jobs that don’t mean anything, or that we can’t find a way of making the job meaningful. I think we inevitably end up depressed or exhausted when we focus our energy on something that only responds to material things and is void of meaning.

It’s fine to spend forty hours a week on a job that’s meaningless, as long as you know what your real vocation is and find a way to express it – either in your work or away from your paid work.

Then you won’t confuse your job with the meaning of your life.

Authenticity brings peace, power, and purpose into our lives and leadership.

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A research project posed two questions to a randomly selected group:

  1. What’s it like to live your life and not be the real you? Responses included: Exhausting, depressing, sad, stressful, lonely, disengaged, empty, and lost.
  2. What’s it like to accept yourself? Responses included: Happy, confident, joyous, free, inspiring, appreciative, alive, fulfilled.

Who would you prefer for a boss or colleague: An authentic person who is at peace with themselves or an inauthentic person who isn’t?

Leadership is truly about PRESENCE, not position.