If you want people to work harder, hire the ambitious, lead by example, and reward real performance.
The AEC business is pretty simple really. We can say we sell expertise or creativity when we have fixed fee pricing, but for all practical purposes, we sell the time of the people who work for us. So the more hours we have to sell, the more revenue we should make.
Then there is the other little secret – one that not everyone understands – that being that all hours worked beyond 40 billable are the most profitable hours. That’s because the overhead was recovered in the first 40. Anything beyond that has no overhead associated with it. In the case of salaried people, the revenue from each of those “over-40” billable hours is pure profit. Even if overtime is paid to the employee, those hours beyond 40 billable are still more profitable hours for the firm than the first 40 were.
Yet, in today’s culture, there is an increasing emphasis on work-life balance. I constantly see LinkedIn posts by so many self-proclaimed “successful” people advising their readers to not sacrifice their personal time for the job.
Here is an example of one I read the other day:
In the pursuit of “success,” it’s easy to forget what really matters.
But here’s the reality:
– Work isn’t your family
– You’re not your job title
– And job security isn’t a promise
You weren’t born to grind.
You were born to live.
Performance reviews don’t determine your worth, and your value isn’t measured by deadlines or KPIs.
My response to this is: “Unless you want to get ahead.”
So with this being the “popular wisdom” today, how do we get our people to work more hours?
There is no simple answer. These are the things that come to mind:
- Hire the right people in the first place. That is those who are hungry. Those who had to work hard to get through school. Those who have clear goals they are working toward because they want to elevate their financial success. Those who realize that making more money improves the lives of their families. Yes – these people do exist.
- Be a company with a REAL purpose. Have a purpose that resonates with your people and makes them feel their work makes a difference in the lives of others. Again this is not always easy, but it’s a heck of a lot easier in our business where we do make the world a better place through our work than it is in many other types of businesses. It cannot be made up and full of empty cliches. The founder and leaders need to live it. They need to continuously remind the people in the firm why they are doing what they are.
- The leaders have to exemplify the behaviors they expect from their people. If the leaders cut out early – if the leaders are unwilling to burn the midnight oil to accomplish the impossible – if the leaders check out at night or on weekends – you can pretty well expect the rest of the people to follow suit. It’s not “do as I say,” but rather “do as I do.” This is fundamental.
- The rewards have to be there. Most firms in this business do not really reward hard work and extreme productivity in spite of their claims that they do. They instead base salaries more on education and registrations and where someone is in the hierarchy – and then look at that on annual intervals. Stop doing that. Look at what you pay your people – especially those in the first 10-15 years of their professional careers – four times a year. Better yet, adjust their pay any time you feel they deserve it.
- Overhaul your bonus programs. Once again, the typical AEC firm has an annual bonus program. But once a year is not often enough if you really want it to be motivational because the reward is too far removed from the activity that generated the profit that allowed the firm to pay out the bonuses. How about having a quarterly or monthly bonus program? I’ve found the resistance to doing this is typically based on management’s fear they will make money one quarter and lose it the next, but rolling losses forward into the next month or quarter to be made up before any monies are paid out will mitigate this.
- Shine a spotlight on your most productive people. Many firms will promote the successes of their people in terms of getting professionally registered, or winning design awards, or selling work. But how many promote the successes of those with the greatest productivity? Very few in my experience. Make it part of the culture and celebrate those people versus not talk about them as if they are freaks.
I’m out of time and space here or I could probably go on. But the point of all this is to stop wondering why your people don’t put in more time than they do when we live in a culture that celebrates leisure over productivity, and when your own management practices make no attempt to overcome that by being different from everyone else’s who are in the same business you are.
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Mark Zweig is Zweig Group’s chairman and founder. Contact him at mzweig@zweiggroup.com. |