Workplace 101: A Profiles Global Business Blog

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Understanding what really motivates top performance

One of the most significant challenges of this decade is the selection, retention, and motivation of top performing talent. Organizations have implemented costly benefit programs, signing bonuses, and countless other attractions designed to win employee loyalty and stimulate employee engagement.

Typical benefits include a comfortable and unique work environment, the option to telecommute, casual dress code, snacks, etc.  Some organizations go as far as having a "bring your pet to work" day, a concierge service, and take home meals. 

“How could I have been so stupid?!!!” We have all screamed those words. The only thing that differentiates each occurrence is the degree of the stupid action that preceded that question. What are we actually saying when those words exit our mouths like a blow horn? Did our IQ drop just long enough and far enough to propel us to make a decision 30 or 40 points below what should be produced in those moments?

Author: Dr. Greg Stewart

Too few of us have it. We are either chronic avoiders or belligerent truth-tellers. We either skirt around the issue or we stab our words of truth into the very heart of people’s self-esteem “just to get it over with.” We don’t have emotionally intelligent guts.

What is your pattern? What is your technique or plan for sitting down and talking to someone about the “hard truths?” Hard truths are called hard truths for a reason. First of all, truth is truth. We all need to conform ourselves to it. The truth is that we all have issues. So it’s really not about that, it’s about the degree and frequency of those issues. That’s the second point. Finally, and most importantly, the “hardness” of the truth is directly related to the distance a person has to travel to get from where they are (in their self-understanding) to where the truth lies.

Guest post by Greg Stewart

How many times have you said that about someone? They either don’t have any idea on how they come across to people or they don’t know really how bad it is. Worse yet, they do know and they frankly don’t care. Or . . . what if they do know how they come across, and how bad it is, but they believe they don’t have any other choice but to respond that way because they blame it on the company, or people around them. It is enough to drive a person absolutely insane.

I have a better question: Do you think it’s even remotely possible someone has said that about you? Ouch.

By Dr. Greg Stewart

Do you remember Milli Vanilli? I know, blast from the past. They were a pop-artist group from the late 80’s and early 90’s with popular songs like “Blame it on the Rain” and “Girl, You Know it’s True”. They were not only made famous by those songs, but by a much more powerful fact: they lip-synced the songs. The voices you heard weren’t actually the voices of the studly-looking guys in the videos. Yes it’s appalling. My question is: what did the guys who actually sung the songs look like? Did you ever wonder that? They must have had a face only a mother could love to actually have to find other guys who were better looking.

What comes to mind when you think organizational culture? What are your company’s core values? Does your organization have a mission statement? What is it? Odds are, it probably has a lot of nice-sounding words in it like “integrity,” “respect,” “communication,” or “excellence.” That’s great, but do those words accurately reflect your company’s values and corporate culture?

Effective leadership development enables companies to react quickly to change and endure difficult times. Developing leadership capabilities is essential to ensure focus on the short-term and long-term health of any organization.

This webinar will focus on actions you can take to “Develop Leadership Capability” throughout your organization. A Fortune 500 company and global provider of professional, technical, and management services, AECOM serves clients in over 100 countries. In recent years, AECOM integrated 28 operating companies into their single worldwide organization, it was a challenge coordinating numerous stand-alone units into a single matrix organization.

With the new integration strategy in place, AECOM began experiencing rapid growth, and a need for leaders to operate beyond their individual business units.

Anyone seeking the best possible levels of productivity from their people knows the importance of employee engagement, and most organizations have some type of program in place to drive employee engagement levels higher to achieve better results.

Not all people in leadership positions are effective leaders, but they can be developed into excellent leaders. Extraordinary leaders are not born or created over night. Some may say that Richard Branson has a certain ‘Je ne sais quoi’ about him, that Steve Jobs grasped the attention of everyone when he presented to an audience, or that Jeff Bezos is the most upbeat CEO of our time. But what really makes a great leader in big and small organizations today?