• Posted on December 18, 2023
• Amita

HARVARD BUSINESS REVIEW OF
DESIGNING WORK THAT PEOPLE LOVE

Introduction

The paper offers a critical analysis of one of the issued cover stories by Harvard Business Review, “Designing work that people love”. The paper is to critically analyze all the aspects of the story through providing some relevant theoretical perspectives and models. “Designing work that people love refers” to the fact that all the business organizations should implement business procedures in a way which is healthier for the employee and they feel love and are passionate about what they do for an organization. Due to the recent crisis of the pandemic and economic downfall, a decent number of people have left their jobs for which most of the economic sectors are suffering to fill those vacancies. To get back the people to business, organizations are focusing on the well-being of the employee at first by setting long-standing policies and giving extraordinary incentives. The paper will discuss all these crucial factors regarding the cover story by Harvard Business Review.

Discussion

As per the report of ADPRI, 18% of the respondents were involved at work before the pandemic, and 17% of them felt resilient at their work, and the rest 14% believed their team leaders and senior leaders. Work has not been a comfortable zone for the workers and the tension of the pandemic has even added more workplace stress like headaches and anxiety. Though the difference seems small among the percentage, the notable point here is the figures are already very low which are relevant. So enhancing wages or easing the professional on-ramps are not the best possible solution though it somehow helps to improve the well-being of employees. A recent survey of nearly 50,000 people stratified random working populations across the globe have agreed that performance, resilience, engagement, retention, and inclusion were not due to pay, work location, or liking a colleague, or even a belief in the objectives of a company (Marston and van Hoof 2019). The major three factors which provided significant explanatory power were about the excitement of employees at work, chance of applying their own strength, work in the areas where the employee is personally good at. The experienced people, experts, and research have stated if an organization intellectually associates people to what they love or enjoy to do, it achieves higher benefits, higher resilience, engagement, as well as lower turnover. The cover story theory has focused on three major points through which companies will be able to create a working place where people can find love in their work. The principles are such as: “people are at the point”, “one size fits one”, and “trust is the key to grow”.

Importance of Loving the Designated Work

When people love the work they do, it becomes very easier for them to proceed in a workplace as it becomes a comfortable area for them. This section defines the importance of loving the designated work for oneself which most of the companies skip with negligence.  Research has stated that loving the work widens one’s perspectives and liberties the mind to have new feelings and thoughts. Then work does not feel like pressure but it becomes a source of resilience and energy. The data of ADPRI suggest that Individuals who love everything they do are much more likely to excel productivity and remain there at their job for such a long term. Connection for a longer amount of time than other people do, as well as to persevere through life’s inevitable troubles. Thus, finding love at a job is neither selfish nor egotistical; rather, it is a precondition to and an enhancer of success (Guerreiro, et al. 2019). The point here is not about indicating the fact that only loving the work brings the utmost efficiency and resilience but is to prove that maintaining a good connection among leaders and employees is based on finding love in the designated work. It increases the assurance of going a long way for both the employee and the organization. Though it changes as per the type of work but is still not impossible to find love in slaughterhouse work or housekeeping. The ways which the organizations must adapt to engage more employees and allow them to find love in their works are defined below.

Assigning Effective leaders

The most amount of seeing love in the jobs are on the shoulders of the leaders who lead and motivate the others to work. The best of the employees should get rewarded if they perform extraordinary than the others which motivates them to work more effectively. Creating a positive environment, valuing the inputs of the employees, and taking inspiration from them in the decision making process boost their energy. The employees then feel valued, loved at the workplace and they result to find love in what they do.

Flexible Working Schedules

Workers feel more empowered to manage their career as well as personal life if they perceive more flexibility at the workplace. People who are at ease will indeed be happier and more productive since they won’t feel as though they are pressed in any manner. Employees who have flexibility in work hours report feeling generally less worried, more rested, and cheerful (Orth, et al. 2018). Everybody has a different time table, and that everyone believes that certain periods of the day are better for productivity. While a few workers could work best in the morning, others might perform significantly more effectively at night. Every worker is able to keep their ideal daily and personal routine thanks to flexible hours of work.

Communication Flexibility

In the workplace, there is always a gap between the higher authority people and the employees which must be reduced by now. When an employee is able to communicate with the people they intend to convey about any of their issues at the workplace, it becomes more of a friendly zone which benefits both sides. If the senior people pay attention to them, employees do not feel hesitated and can focus only on their work precisely (Zhao, et al. 2019). All these factors are beneficial for the organization to fulfill their recent objectives.

People

The cover story of Harvard Business Review claims that effective organizations keep their employees or the people at the top of their priority list. Organizations with love plus work see their people not as machines but as human beings, commit to the lifelong learning of the employees, and support alumni. People are considered as the root of all benefits, and innovations in a company (Lee, et al. 2020). To make the people as priority also include some relevant points which organizations should follow such as:

• Supporting their career growth
• Offering suitable insurances and benefits
• Prioritizing the well-being and mental health of employees
• Creating a communicative culture
• Setting the main initiatives and aim of the company
• Being transparent.

The benefits of engaging the people as the prime point in the company are established below. A model is used here to define people management in a company which is “Maslow’s hierarchy of needs”.

Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs

This is a relevant model on people management in a company, developed by Maslow which states that people feel motivated to gain the particular needs to provide efficiency at work and find love in what they do. The model is structured with five different needs of employees such as:

 

 

Physiological Needs

Physiological needs are considered as the most important needs of an employee or a human being which includes food, cloth, drink and shelter. These are the basic needs due to which people are huddling every day at their different and respective workplaces. For this, the companies must pay their employees a decent amount of salary which is just as per their workload (Neate, et al. 2019). Giving an assurance to these needs motivates the employees to work in an honest and passionate way. Maslow stated that the other needs are secondary until these specifics are met.

Figure1: Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs

(Source: www.simplypsychology.org)

Safety Needs

After satisfying the physiological needs, the security or safety needs become important. The companies must assure financial security like social welfare of employment, free from fear in the workplace, stability, and health and well-being of the employees like safety against expected injuries or accidents. If any employee met any tragic health related issue, the company must not kick out the person at that time rather assist him to get better rapidly and rejoin the firm as soon as possible (Jin et al. 2018). If the costs are taken care of by the company, the staff feel that they are an integral part of the company and do not think to leave it within a short period of time.

Love and Belonging Needs

Love and belonging needs is what the over story by Harvard Business Reviews is all about. It refers to the emotional requirement of a human for interpersonal connections, affiliation or sense of being a part of a team. The companies must involve leaders who are good at communicating, building relations, making intimacy and trust, promoting giving and receiving affection. A workplace where the employees feel comfortable to work is more effective.

Esteem Needs

Maslow has placed the esteem needs at the fourth stage of people engagement in a company which includes accomplishment, self-worth, and respect. The developer of this model has divided the esteem needs into two parts such as: “esteem for oneself”, and “desire for reputation/respect from others”. The second part is relevant to a workplace where an employee wants to feel driven, respected, and valued by others. It can be achieved by training the employees to respect and value each other’s work, role and place at work.

Self-actualization Needs

This self-actualization needs refer to an individual’s realization of personal development, self-fulfillment, and seeking top experiences.  Finding love at work allows the employees to develop the desire of accomplishing everything in his potential in order to become the best version of oneself (Roberts, et al. 2021). For example, employees can aspire to reach higher seats like the leader, manager or others, they can prepare themselves by showing their skills and creativity.

Empowering the Leaders

Companies which are dedicated to love create its people and operations around that matter. To benefit the people pinpoint their specific type of loathing and love and convert them into relevant contributions, a company must empower their leaders to bring out the most of every employee’s personal creativity and skill. The cover story has claimed to focus on aspects like avoiding standardizing tools, and focusing on the teams to accomplish this. To support the argument on empowering the leaders a relevant model is placed below which defines the beneficial sides of deploying special leaders. There are various types of leadership applying which the companies are able to bring out the best skills of their employees, among them some are defined below. The styles are from the “Six Goleman Leadership Styles”. The style of leadership varies as per the requirements of the different companies.

Six Goleman Leadership Styles

Autocratic Leadership

This leadership style refers to a leading way where all the powers are in the hands of the leaders. Here the leader sets one objective or goal which the others must follow. This leader does not need any input from the others but aims to achieve the main goal anyhow at the end. Here the other people must complete the work they assigned to within the given time not to interpret any other activities (Wang, et al. 2020). This gives power to the leader to lead in their own ways to bring effective results. The leader here is aware of all the qualities of the employees and according to that, he allocates the work individually which opens the space to bring out the uniqueness of the employees.

Democratic Leadership

This leadership derives the uniqueness of the people through a different manner. It refers to a style where leaders and employees walk side by side and everyone is connected to the activities overall including the major decision making. Here the members are guided by the leaders and their inputs are taken by the leaders as well which is a more flexible way to know about one’s knowledge in depth (Bakker, et al. 2019). Here, different perspectives are shared among each other easily. This leadership is considered to be highly productive as well as effective as morale and interest of the staff increases during the whole process. This style is applicable in any small or medium sized organization and no one is a commander here unlike the previous autocratic leadership.

Figure2: Leadership Styles by Goleman

(Source: agilevietnam.com)

 

 

Bureaucratic Leadership

This type of leadership resembles authoritarian style a great deal. The primary distinction is that within this approach to leadership, directors may discuss the collective on every matter, but they retain full power to make the last decision. It can occasionally be incredibly successful and fruitful. Each individual’s responsibilities are concentrated, and their employment is quite safe. Each stage is carefully planned and scheduled. Here the uniqueness of the employees is enhanced along with its implementation (Inceoglu, et al. 2018). As the leader and the employees get engaged in a constant communication process, it is rather a great way of building good connections among the group as well.

Laissez-Faire Leadership

Within this style of leadership, participants are free to make their own choices. While this leadership style boosts staff morale, it can occasionally produce unintended outcomes. Most often, settings where youngsters are permitted to decide for themselves exhibit this kind of leadership. A further illustration of such a type is the freedom given to preschool pupils to act in accordance with their individual desires. Organization members are allowed to discover who they are in this process (Su and Swanson 2019). The participants ensure adequate communication and collaboration. While the employees are allowed to apply their own skill and knowledge to complete a task, theft gains practical experience and their confidence receives a boost as well. It motivates them to work further in an expressive way.

Transformational Leadership

Under this style of leadership, wherein the managers constantly look to understand the attitudes and societal changes of the subordinates. Transformative leaders equip their team members to handle crises, drastic development in the goal, and other challenging circumstances. This kind of leadership does not rely much on prior statistics. A leader can motivate the group to reach the goal and fosters interaction and communication (Stephan 2018). These leaders work with rather a wide area as it also involves handling the crisis, and makes changes at stages when needed.

All these leadership styles are defined in order to provide the idea of how an effective leader is able to bring out and develop the personal skills of each of the employees within an organization. Leaders are the most crucial factor in a business as they are able to boost and promote group work, cultivate a sense of long term good, inspire motivation and trust, and give purpose and correct direction to a work and the related members.

Trust as the Root of Development

As per the 50,000 people survey of ADPRI, when the participants have trusted their workmates, group leader, and the senior leaders, the engagement was highly resilient and effective. This happens due to the fact that trust takes out the capability of the employees to find and do what they really love. As per the cover story, many people are in love with their jobs because it allows them to get creative about the way of doing it. The story has defined some of the major rituals to engender trust in an organization deliberately such as to discard exercises which erode the trust. It has rather claimed to pay attention as much as possible. Working companies with love create trust by giving attention to the employees through the group leaders. Whenever there is a culture of trust in business, both the employers and the staff gain benefits. In addition to strengthening and maintaining professional connections, trust can serve as a positive norm for a variety of work-related activities, such as teamwork, cooperation, and employee productivity.

Less Stress and Higher Morale: Establishments with high degree of trust tend to have happier employees than those with a low degree of trust. Employees are much less prone to experience anxiety since they can work while always checking their safety (Trougakos, et al. 2020).  High work engagement, wherein employees are less efficient than they might be, and poor attendance, where employees take extra sick days to deal with the excessive stress, can both result from a stressed atmosphere.

Increased Productivity: Employees that work with unreliable coworkers may talk or refuse to work together. Such behavior indicates that they’re not working productively, and production harms the business’s bottom line. Employees are much more inclined to finish their tasks if they possess less complaints to make. The bottom line at the ending of the season might be significantly impacted even by 10 minutes daily of useless work for every worker.

Better collaboration and teamwork:

Teams often have a large number of members. The group will not really function as effectively as it can when there is mistrust among some of the individuals. Because they fear a teammate would utilize their experience or expertise to gain an advantage, certain coworkers might not even completely express their knowledge (Urbanaviciute, et al. 2019). Others could hesitate to share their opinions with the group till the very completion of the project out of a concern that people won’t be given the treatment they deserve.

 

 

Implications on Business and Non-business Organizations

The potentiality of people

This paper is thoroughly described about the potentiality of people especially as an employee for dedicated organizations. When resignations of employees in any organizations show in a series of rows and already it hit a recorded number. Due to lack of proper communications and productivity, employees cannot express their inner voice properly and thus unwanted situations are created repeatedly with every single employee. “Though resignation is just a reflection of the tip of the iceberg of the mountain of problems.” The tendency of designing very tiny job descriptions with full detailed lucid performance metrics, organizations often ignore the full  potential of an employee that they already possess (Wiese,  et al. 2018).Thus responsible organizations often avoid the hidden abilities  of  an employee. It is observed that most organizations contain or engage with a certain percentage of an employee’s potential. This results in the employees feeling unfulfilled and making the decision to leave the organization.

Designing of jobs for people’s love and enjoyment

In this section the discussed paper is concerned about the actual requirement of employees that they want to reveal. Due to the presence of obligatory baristas, proximity to senior leaders all are broadly redundant into this hybrid world. By designing work or jobs that people actually love helps to make a cool environment along with providing all kinds of satisfactions and necessary features for their employees. Nowadays people who are in the head of the power show   many kind hearted natures that nourish the employer’s heart. They designed their jobs according to people’s choice of what they actually love and will enjoy fully. While money is a key factor, people redesigned jobs according to their preference (Yip, et al. 2018). This is a very important factor to notice the desired market palace and according to that design the most suitable job for their employee. By what way people will be attracted to an organization’s, this is fully the responsibility of that company to plan according to their motive and follow a regularity to observe that marketplace to design works.

People centric jobs

When a job is designed with a lens of people-oriented people truly enjoy them as well as they can easily reach their full potential. Although some thoughts are discussed to challenge the design of a role. This paper has elaborated so many difficult parts to generate or focus the point where people actually love to stay. The critical part is that expression of creativity and innovation working with short term projects to meet the organization criteria. Simultaneously another important part is to apply appropriate policies to take the advantages of untapped skills. In order to advise quantum work it is highly recommended towards employers to use employee based design thinking  methodologies along with use  of  advanced technology AI based designed jobs that seems to be more enjoyable for people (Kelleher,  et al. 2019). By designing jobs that people love most have to set boundaries to gather clear concepts regarding that.  By practicing mindfulness is also very important and key factors for an organization to do work calmly and stay cool all the time. As doing people centric jobs this is very important to highlight what one needs to do to feel in charge of their employee.

Importance of Technology

Technology has a vast role for designing more enjoyable jobs based on a particular specialized field and targeted zone .By use of powerful designed thinking organizations focus on the point where all workbench supports the talent acquisition of an organization is mainly people centric. By using automation tools and AI technologies manual tasks are removed easily. Hence  the  expected results is very satisfying where  users are super motivated to finish their work with all kind of  perfections, get more time to finish higher value tasks, make a  strong bonding between employee and work (Cesar and Meier 2018).Therefore several techno company  uses the  advanced modern AI algorithm  to match with their projects in  their existing  workforce with absolute seamlessly. By using exciting technology employers or any learnable persons can easily develop their necessary skills and find opportunities for betterment of their future. Basically technology is now part of the daily lives of people who are associated with work. By the involvement of new advanced technology this is really very important to know the demands of employee to finish the task and is necessary to make the requirement of the demands of their findings to take helps from others. Use of technology brings innovations in tasks and helps to   decide the evaluation of AI tools in daily lives to keep people engaged with innovative work. Use of another advance tools make easy any task that helps to complete any urgent project with in a minute easy. All these attract people towards a technologically advanced company to draw the attention of common people and generate awareness. Use of robotic technology is important enough to grab the attention of common people and technologically advanced employees.

 

 

Evaluation

In a brief discussion this paper is evaluates that the level of discretionary effort, critical thinking patterns are activated with proper time duration. As people are more passionate about what they actually want to do and they actually love people are more concerned about that. The utmost truth fact is that if a person is not happy, passionate about their work, responsible companies will never create any extra value, effort, innovations, and ideas for them. This paper also detailed about the loss or finance value that has a direct or proportional impact on the bottom line, at the same time helps to future growth of the company (Rigby and Ryan 2018). Changing the entire working strategy seems to be an insurmountable task. The special tricks behind attracting employees or people towards a particular organization are described as designing jobs that people actually want, which seems like a very good or ideal place to start work. Removal of the mundane along with introduction or addition of new technology to engage better and at the same time all this will help to motivate people in the office space.

Conclusion

To conclude the analysis here, it can be established that all the requirements are accomplished precisely. The paper has analyzed a cover story “Designing work that people love” by Harvard Business Review. All the arguments that the story has made are analyzed well in the paper. Some relevant theories and models are used such as different leadership styles, Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs and others to critically analyze all the factors. The implications on the business and non-business organization are defined elaborately as well.

Reference List

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