Fire Everyone! Big Bang Theory.
Google, Apple, Netflix (the usual suspects) manage to hire the greatest talent.
Occasionally, when I discuss options to boost an organisation’s innovation capability this one comes up: Fire everyone! Hire the best.
Here’s my take on this: it’s a dumb theory.
(c) ojogabonitoo/123rf.com
Fire and hire. Forget it!
(You simply can’t do it.)
Not long ago I heard a CEO speak at a conference about the challenges of steering through an economic down-turn in his high-tech, precision-engineering industry. Should you lay off well-qualified specialists to lower costs?
Or better: Can you actually allow yourself to do it? His answer: no.
With an unemployement rate well below 5% (he and I live in Switzerland), such a well-qualified caliber would have a new job in no time. Hence, once your business picks up, again, it will be pretty much impossible to hire her/him back or anyone equivalent. So, knowing your industry’s cycles you better stick with your own for the long-term perspective.
Face your reality.
If you want to boost your organization’s productive and innovation output you’ll have to work with what you have (Maybe Netflix, Google, etc. are excluded, here.).
In our world it’s our only real option. And that’s a good thing!
Recollect your latest hiring interviews.
How many of the candidates you interviewed mentioned “space/possibility to contribute/create” (there’s a great word for it in German: Gestaltungsraum) among their Top3 priorities in a job? All of them, right?
Now, how many of the ones you hired, actually find (and can use) this “Gestaltungsraum” in their daily work? Why not everyone?
In my daily work, I interact with many of these hires in confidence and also openly in teams and workshop groups. The unused potential is immense!
Invest in your own employees (including yourself!) and learn to innovate – instead of dreaming about Hollywood or hiring a star.
Toyota – one of the most innovative companies in the world.
Simply put, after World War II the US made the new Japanese laws. Among them: laws that prohibited companies to fire employees to prevent social unrest. The result: life-long employment.
In Toyota’s case: the company had no choice but to invest into its own workforce, their employees’ production and innovation capability. For several decades now Toyota was ranked among the most innovative companies in the world.
It’s a bit less stellar, spectacular.
But, we can learn a lot from their almost 70 years of experience. (See also: what we all seem to discover in the “Lean Startup” movement.)
Studies show that in more or less any modern service organisation, 35-40% of the activities do not add value. They are in “lean speak” waste.
Again, there are several options to tackle this potential.
I am giving away my favourite: let your employees take it on (not the bosses, not the external consultants). It’s the way Toyota does it. And, it can be translated to almost any business activity or industry.
At the core is your employee and his/her “Gestaltungsraum”.
There’s a surprising upside to it (and it’s not a surprise that this is my value proposition in my business*): you can learn to tackle this waste with an approach and with methods that are compatible with Lean Thinking/Design Thinking – as they base on the same principles. You clean up waste and at the same time train your crew in the most effective innovation skill set – of course, adapted to your culture. (There is no copy+paste.)
The Full Monty:
Invest in your own employees by developing their innovation capabilities.
Learn these methods and principles on real projects by tackling the up to 40% waste in your operations.
Use these liberated resources (time & money) to work on your future innovations and create new business.
Keep admiring Netflix, Google, etc. like Roger Federer, Coldplay, Brad Bitt or the Big Bang Theory.
*my business: www.ludensfaber.com
