Are we having fun yet? Job Satisfaction 2.0
Last year, I had the great fortune to visit and consult with some of the leading marketing firms in the country. Beneath the veneer of optimism I saw a lot of tired people. Employees plunged into a mad rush of activity, busyness, ringing BlackBerries and the kind of glazed look that seems to come from a culturally induced ADD. As Edward Hallowell calls it: Crazy Busy.
Are we open to answers that don't start with a dollar sign? Douglas Rushkoff, the host and writer of NPR's The Merchants of Cool has nailed it. In Get Back in the Box he says "Those charged with cracking the whip have been among the first to break ranks. CFO's who bear the brunt of the business world's short-term bottom-line obession are exhibiting some of the lowest rates of job satisfaction even though they are among the best paid executives. A CFO study revealed that a full 68% say pressures have increased on them in the past two years and 63% believe that this stress has had a deleterious effect on their health." 
In another study by the Radcliffe Public Policy Center, 64% say they would prefer more time to more money and 71% say they would pay for more time with their families. It's the boomer fall out. Nobody seems to have a map or GPS location for the work/play ideal.
Rushkoff has some terrific insights into this utopia. He talks about motivation specialist Alfie Kohn. In close to a dozen books on the subject, Kohn has sought to show how competition is poisonous to our working relationships, how incentive plans of any kind tend to undermine quality, how the pursuit of affluence leads to depression. Rushkoff continues, "the social currency of an innovative operation is not the money, the promotions, picnics or climbing walls, but the creativity itself. Real fun is not merely incidental to the work at hand, it is the work at hand."
But here's the CreativityCentral twist. It is nearly impossible to create a collaborative, creative environment without the passionate involvement of the the person at the top. Someone like Virgin's Richard Branson. I've seen agencies that labor hard with tough clients -- and the difference between a positive and negative environment is the leader and his or her mentoring of mid managers.
Okay, I hear the clarion call of "old news." But if you're a manager and are not actively engaged -- I mean really engaged in creating an atmosphere of playful collaboration -- then you're managing, not leading. And chances are you're among the 68% of managers who are nursing that growing ulcer.
How do you integrate productive play into your organization? Where do you start? More to come on Creativity Central.
P.S.
This is from the Partnership for Public Service and American University's Institute for the Study of Public Policy Implementation: 2004
"If the senior leader at your organization doesn't really care about this, nothing is going to happen," he said. Leadership, he added, includes not only the top official, but managers throughout different units as well.
Robert Tobias, director of ISPPI, suggested three areas for agencies to focus on: leadership, utilizing employee skills and teamwork. The most important factor to improving job satisfaction, he said, was "not pay, it's not creating a family-friendly environment - it's leadership."
The lowest-rated response in the leadership category was to the statement, "In my organization, leaders generate high levels of motivation and commitment in the workforce."
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