workers.” And today I should add that more and more are “investor workers,” bringing their own profitable ideas into their companies. But where will leaders come from to run these new organizations, lead this emerging workforce, and deliver a viable new economy? What about the social contract between employers and employees, that hallowed implicit contract that usually offered some form of loyalty and responsibility to both parties? Roughly 25 percent of the U.S. workforce has been dumped since 1985 and even at present, when the unemployment rate is low, about 6 percent, you can figure on a half to three-quarters of a million employees in flux every year.
An interesting bit of data is that in 1998, about 750,000 workers were laid off or quit or retired, and of those, 92 percent found jobs that either paid more or were equal to what they had been getting. A recent survey reported in the Wall Street Journal revealed that four out of ten employees were less than three years in their job, only a third of the workforce works in an old-fashioned nine to five job, and the quit rate this year is 14.5 percent. Ten years ago it was about 3 percent. I figure that the chum of the workforce at any given time is between 20 and 25 percent; that is, the number of workers who are temporarily out of work or looking for new opportunities is roughly that figure. So what about the social contract, which in our “Temporary Society,” in our “Free Agency Society,” seems to be: “We’re not interested in employing you for a lifetime. . . . That’s not the way we’re thinking about this. It’s a good opportunity for both of us that is probably finite”? Is it all going to be many finite trips?
In light of this constant flux, organizations going for longevity need to discover continued sources of learning, growth, and revitalization. But how do we reach the next generation? Do we continue to do what we have been doing, with just a little bit more? Why fix what ain’t broken? The discrepancy between the promise of available talent and delivery on their potential raises questions we need to consider. Are we providing learning experiences that will build the cognitive, emotional, interpersonal, and leadership competencies that are required for sustained success in the “new economy”? Is there space in our clogged work lives for the philosophy, the metaphysics, the critical thinking of the enterprise? Are we giving our employees a passion for continual learning, a refined, discerning ear for the moral and ethical consequences of their actions, and an understanding of the purpose of work and human organizations?
It is an intense journey to achieve a positive sense of ourselves and to know our abilities and our limitations. We can get there by understanding what it takes for us to learn about ourselves: learning to solicit and integrate feedback from others, continually keeping ourselves open to new experiences and information, and having the ability to hear our own voice and see our own actions.
Is this a tall order for today’s organizations and their leaders? Not when we examine what’s at stake. As we face revelations of corruption and fraud in our workplaces; as we totter on the brink of economic instability, and swing from disillusion and cynicism to outrage and despair, the times call for us to wake up, call forth integrity, and have the courage to champion the dramatic changes we require.
Cloke and Goldsmith have created a blueprint for organizational revitalization, renewal, and regeneration. The direct, explicit, accessible strategies they prescribe will transform work environments into living, vital learning opportunities that challenge leaders on every level, from CEO’s and middle managers to team members and line workers, to apply their wisdom to the systems, structures, and day-to-day interactions of organizational life and better themselves, their experience of work, and their collaborative endeavors.
November 2002
WARREN BENNIS
Distinguished Professor of
Business Administration
University of Southern California
Preface
I have often thought that the best way to define a man’s character would be to seek out the particular mental or moral attitude in which, when it came upon him, he felt himself most deeply and intensively active and alive. At such moments, there is a voice inside which speaks and says, “This is the real me.”
William James
Being “deeply and intensely active and alive” is not only, as philosopher William James describes, the best way of defining our characters, it is how we create them. Our characters, along with our attitudes, ideas, emotions, bodies, and spirits, are molded not simply by the events we experience but also by the ways we experience them. As a result, the more awake we are, the more we define and create ourselves as aware and authentic human beings.
Why, then, do millions of employees arrive at work every day and immediately slip into a hypnotic, semicomatose state? Why do they become spectators and passive observers of their own work lives? Why do they show up only in order to receive a paycheck and begin their “real” lives only when work is over? By failing to be deeply and intensely alive, employees lose their passion and love of what they do. They become cautious and frightened of losing jobs they secretly loathe, or do not care about, or have given up on, or barely tolerate. They grumble and complain, yet feel trapped and unable either to improve their working conditions or leave and find better ones. They become miserable and depressed and engage in pointless conflicts, destructive gossip, and petty personal rivalries. They feel put upon, harassed, overworked, and underpaid. As a result, they slowly die somewhere deep inside. Ultimately, they stop caring and simply wait for weekends, holidays, sick leave, retirement, and death.
Why do so many employees become inactive, inauthentic, apathetic, and unclear about who they are at work? Why is it so easy to get lost in passivity, anesthetized surrender, lethargy, cynicism, apathy, and doubt? What in our workplaces induces this hibernation of the soul? Why do so many people remain in this state for most of their working lives? What can be done to wake them up and cultivate their awareness and authenticity at work?
Ask yourself: What percentage of my working life and that of my coworkers is spent being “deeply and intensely active and alive”? What percentage is spent on autopilot, operating in a fog or haze? How often am I fully awake and using all my potential and how often am I sleepwalking or doing only what is minimally required? What percentage of my working day is spent fully in the present and how much is spent recalling the past or fantasizing about the future? On a scale of 1 to 10, with 10 being highest, how committed am I to making a difference? How much of myself do I bring to my work, and how much of me is playing a role or hiding behind a mask? Even if I bring 90 percent of myself to work, what would happen to me, my coworkers, and my work if I were able to bring that extra 10 percent?
If we never face these questions, we may fail to realize that what we produce at work are not simply products and services but the processes, relationships, and social and organizational environments in and by which they are created. Most important, we create ourselves by the things we do, the ways we do them, the people with whom we do them, the environments in which we do them, and the attitudes we bring to doing them. The best way to become an aware, authentic person is to practice being awake and alive eight hours a day every day at work.
It is therefore a matter of personal and not merely organizational importance that we decide to wake up, choose who we want to be, and practice being that person every moment of every working day. Our characters and personal lives depend on our capacity to be active and alive, aware and authentic, congruent and committed at work. Yet we cannot achieve these personal goals without actively transforming the organizational structures, systems, cultures, processes, and techniques that put people to sleep and turn them into automatons or objects to satisfy corporate or bureaucratic ends.
Waking
