{"id":519,"date":"2006-09-11T01:00:22","date_gmt":"2006-09-11T09:00:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/systematichr.com\/?p=519"},"modified":"2006-08-04T08:46:52","modified_gmt":"2006-08-04T16:46:52","slug":"hbr-%e2%80%93-why-work-should-not-be-engaging","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/systematichr.com\/?p=519","title":{"rendered":"HBR \u2013 Why Work Should Not Be Engaging"},"content":{"rendered":"

I\u2019m an avid reader of Harvard Business review. Most of the time, I skip articles that are not meaningful to me. The ones I decide to read are almost always quite insightful. Then again, sometimes I stumble on something that is so ridiculous it\u2019s quite funny. The following is one of the latter.<\/p>\n

Why does a job have to be meaningful and fulfilling? Isn\u2019t it enough that work is simply worthwhile \u2013 which is to say worth the employee\u2019s time considering his or her circumstances? A former student to mine sells a remedy for irritable bowel syndrome, a job she doesn\u2019t find particularly meaningful. But she dies believe that for someone with her skills, experience, priorities, and goals, selling this product for this company is certainly worthwhile. Consequently she believes that she has a good job. ((Kersten, E.L., February 2006. \u201cWhy They Call it Work\u201d from \u201cThe HBR List \u2013 Breakthrough Ideas for 2006.\u201d Harvard Business Review. Pg 25, 26.))<\/p>\n

Understanding that E.L. Kersten is one of the founders of www.Despair.com<\/a> one would understand why s\/he has this view of the working world. However, I would be a small fortune that Kersten is actually a very engaged employee. I would be that s\/he has great fun in his\/er job, and that s\/he is able to express great creativity, control and etc. in the job.<\/p>\n

Kersten\u2019s example above is a good one. If I were selling irritable bowel syndrome drugs, I also would be disengaged. I might be satisfied, but certainly not engaged. And the truth of the matter is that we don\u2019t necessarily care if 100% of our employees are engaged. We simply want most of them doing a great job, and be satisfied with their current station in the workplace. What we don\u2019t want is a bunch of dissatisfied employees running around hurting our brand and the perceptions of other employees.<\/p>\n

The employees we care to engage are those that are higher producers, thinkers, creators, and leaders. While engagement at all levels will lead to greater creativity throughout the organization, engagement at the senior levels leads to proportionally greater increases in value.<\/p>\n

Now I\u2019m not saying that IBS salespeople and the like are unimportant. Engaging those employees in their work is a desirable thing to do. But my take on Kersten\u2019s article is that you must be a realist and focus your engagement energy where it counts the most.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I\u2019m an avid reader of Harvard Business review. Most of the time, I skip articles that are not meaningful to me. The ones I decide to read are almost always quite insightful. Then again, sometimes I stumble on something that…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_coblocks_attr":"","_coblocks_dimensions":"","_coblocks_responsive_height":"","_coblocks_accordion_ie_support":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[10,8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-519","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-engagement","category-strategies"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/systematichr.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/519","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/systematichr.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/systematichr.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/systematichr.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/systematichr.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=519"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/systematichr.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/519\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/systematichr.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=519"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/systematichr.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=519"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/systematichr.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=519"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}