Family-friendly workplaces don’t make a company great. But great companies tend to make workplaces family-friendly.

Source: Dan Pink

On the way to work the other day, the Wallflowers song “Fifth Avenue Heartache” came on the radio.

I started wondering what happened to them, and then remember that Jakob Dylan, the lead singer, was the son of the Bob Dylan. And oddly, thinking of Bob Dylan made me remember the 1998 Soy Bomb incident.

During his 1998 Grammy performance, artist Michael Portnoy rushed on stage shirtless with the words “SOY BOMB” painted on his chest. When asked about it, he explained:

“Soy… represents dense nutritional life. Bomb is, obviously, an explosive destructive force. So, soy bomb is what I think art should be: dense, transformational, explosive life.

We need more crazy artists in the workforce. More people willing to run on stage with the words soy bomb written on themselves (figuratively, of course). People willing to shake things up and challenge the status quo.

Do you encourage the freaks in your office?

Back in May, Fast Company Magazine wrote:

Want to keep the Gen Y’ers in your office happy? Make sure that you embrace sustainability in a very public way. A new report from Johnson Controls tells us that 18- to 25 year-olds want evidence that their employers are going beyond the minimum levels of environmental compliance by embracing all things green on an everyday basis…

The group also prefers everything from flexible and mobile ways of working to modern office spaces with “subtle art” and natural floor finishes.

My question: Who cares?

What people say they want is largely irrelevant. What they do matters a lot more.

Keep reading…

Ben Eubanks is creating an ebook a month in 2011.

This month, the topic is employee engagement, and I’m in it, along with a handful of other awesome people. You’ll find personal stories about engagement and what it means, tips for companies on communication and culture, and some really great, specific how-to content.

Download it Now

Behavioral economist Dan Ariely (a great blog you should definitely check out) recently wrote a piece called In Praise of the Handshake. In it, he told this story…

A CEO of a large internet company recently told me about one of the worst decisions of his career. He instituted a very specific performance-evaluation matrix that would determine 10% of his employees’ compensation. Before this, the firm, like most, had a general agreement with its employees—they had to work hard, behave well, and were measured on certain goals. In return they were rewarded with salary increases, bonuses, and benefits. This CEO believed he could eliminate the uncertainty of the incomplete contract and better define ideal performance.

The complete-contract approach backfired. Employees became obsessively focused on meeting the specific terms of their contracts, even when it came at the expense of colleagues and the company. Morale sank, as did overall performance.

While this isn’t exactly the same as what Dan Pink talks about in his book, Drive, I think there’s some strong correlations. People work better when you give them the trust and freedom to do awesome stuff. Specify a few key goals they need to meet, and then get the hell out of the way and let them do awesome stuff.

What do you think?

When my wife and I first moved into our condo, Joni, a really nice woman who lives a few units down, came over to say hi.

We were literally unloading our car. The moving truck hadn’t even gotten there yet, and there was Joni welcoming us to the neighborhood.

She told us how much she loved living there. She gave us directions to the market and the local Target. She made us feel like we were home. What a great start to a new chapter in our lives!

Does this sort of thing happen at your organization?

If so, what about your culture compels employees to welcome new people in so enthusiastically? If not, how can you create a culture that enables and encourages this sort of behavior?

I’m not talking about the obligatory HR welcome committee. I mean real, genuine enthusiasm at having a new person join an awesome community of people.

This isn’t hard.

Hire good people, treat them like adults, and get the hell out of the way. There’s not much more to it.

The tough part is actually doing those things. It takes practice and experience. It takes risk. It means actually going out and doing stuff – not just reading about it.

Most importantly, though, it means letting go of the urge to over-manage.