The Magic of Employee Motivation

I have been working in the corporate sector from the last 4 years. I usually wonder how organizations usually achieve their business goals, majorly increasing the bottom-line, on quarterly and annually basis. There are a lot of ways to do so for instance, acquisitions and mergers, advertisement, sales and so on. But the most fundamental way of doing so is to invest in its Human Resources. If you have the quality Human resource, your organization can do wonders.

In general, Multinational organizations invest a lot on their HR and by a lot I literally mean A LOT. Whether it's training and development or motivational or recreational activities - whatever way you choose, if your people are happy , they can keep your customers happy - which means strengthening of strategic relationships and more profit.

I am glad to see that my organization, that is IT and IT enabled services provider working on global level, has taken an initiative of awarding the high performers on quarterly basis. Usually, such kind of award distribution ceremony used to occur on the annual basis. Having it on quarterly basis will surely have a huge impact on employees performance. They will get to know more about their performance quality on frequent basis plus having this kind of performance endorsement by the management on qaurterly basis will keep the morale boosted.

Here are few clicks from the day

"People often say that motivation doesn’t last. Well, neither does bathing.  That’s why we recommend it daily". –Zig Ziglar

I personally think that managers and organizations should learn to motivate and appreciate their employees. There are multiple ways to do so, it is not necessary that you have to spend money to motivate your employee, but few words of appreciation can do a lot of magic! Try it and you will see the impact. I have heard few managers saying, that they don't want to appreciate their sub-ordinates and teams on very frequent basis because it might decrease the value of appreciation or some even say, why do we need to appreciate on fulfilling the core or routine job responsibilities - it is their job to perform! Well, you make sense but trust me, whenever an employee do any task - even a single task that is part of his job, it is very important to spend few minutes in discussion with the employee to appreciate on the good things and guide on the bad. It does not only increase the morale but it also inculcate learning culture in your team, department and organization.

She belongs to the Same Class

Recently my organization has celebrated Women’s Day by arranging a forum and engaging the entire female personnel to share their thoughts and ideas towards the role of women in the corporate and personal levels. I was part of this gathering as a speaker and audience of multiple females who are working at the managerial and non-managerial levels. We got an opportunity to express our views and beliefs towards the amelioration of women’s role in the society as a whole. I am going to share the thoughts of couple of my female colleagues. Their views were so strong and attention grabbing that I just couldn’t defy myself to write a blog on those splendid ideas.

One of my fellow colleagues, who is working at the managerial level and I personally consider her one of the few exceptionally professional and head strong  women that I have met in my life thus far. She commenced her speech in a very confident manner and shared her experience of working with the men for the last 5+ years. She said in order to be confident from inside and persuasive in your opinion, you should keep yourself collected and always be prepared. She emphasized on investing an ample amount of time in homework before you present an idea before your fellow colleagues particularly men. As per her experience, she has seen many male colleagues who always try to make you feel down and discouraged by striking you with the complex questions and in this way impair your confidence. I believe she was so right! A good preparation is the key to successful and confident execution.

Another lady added her viewpoints by sharing her own story when her father was going through the last stages of cancer. She and her family were able to feel his pain. In such a harsh time she didn’t let the circumstances affect her work quality. Whenever she left home for work, she always left the catastrophe at home and put a genuine smile on her face and valor to achieve more and more at work. What was the result? Her employer honored her with an extra ordinary performance award for the strength and confidence she showed and the she fought with the hardship of her life. She also raised a very interesting point, she emphasized on the seriousness level of females towards work and professionalism. She added that she has come across many females who work on temporary basis just for fun and leave the employer without delivering the quality of work expected and also leave the bad impression on the employers which create problems for rest of the females as well, who are actually serious towards their career. I would actually agree with this point, it is very important for those people regardless of the gender, if they actually want to pursue with the job or not, they should be very clear towards the objectives of their lives. Also, it is important for the employer to be able to recognize the right talent for their organization by implementing a proper and strong recruitment strategy.

Personally, I firmly believe that the female should get this thought eradicated from their mind that they are in any way different from the opposite gender in terms of achieving their goals. If they really want to have equal rights then they should get this straight in their mind that they are equal to men. I urge all my female fellows that stop thinking in a way that present you as a different species in the society. If you want equality then first you, yourself, consider yourself equal. You will be able to see the impact by default. Sometimes as a female, we start thinking to get extra favors from our employers for instance; saying no to late sittings in the offices because you’re a female, saying no to travel as per your work requirements because you’re a female, saying no to a lot of opportunities considering them as challenges because you’re a female. If you do so, it is very obvious that you will not be able to bring yourself equal to men. I do agree that a female has to confront a lot of different issues as compare to a man in this society, but again, we have the examples in front of us. All we need to do is to first start working on our thought process. Our thoughts will be reflected in our attitude and our attitude will enlighten the society that yes, this specie is equally eligible for all the opportunities just like men. Also, I would like to highlight the role of organizations and institutions here. Females, if they are working women, have to play the role of a professional along with role(s) of mother/wife/daughter/sister. The organizations should facilitate them so that the females can play their role(s) perfectly in all domains. My organization is providing a lot of good opportunities and at the same time facilitating the females employee to avail those opportunities. Nonetheless, there is a lot to be done at the individual, organizational and nation level.

I hope the coming days will not be about the debate on equality in rights of men and women rather it would be towards the betterment of society by capitalizing on the intellect of individuals regardless of the gender s/he has.

Few Ingredients of Successful Professional Life

Today is the last day of my current job role. Like I mentioned in my previous post I am currently in the interdepartmental transition phase. While thinking about the last 2 years spend rather invested in this department (and under the supervision of my current Manager and with my current team :) ) , what I have learned and how did I groom myself; there are few things that are now on my finger tips as a professional and I would be more than happy to share these with the people who want to learn from others' experiences. Here we go;

Be Patient and Consistent:
The very first lesson I learned was to show patience and consistency in your job. Never get into hurry or loose hope on something. Give your best , and consistently give the best. One day you will surely get the desired results. If you do one task and you deliver the best results, don't stop there, keep the consistency level high. Celebrate your success, but the next day start working on the upcoming targets. Consistently & Patiently !!

Face the Challenges, Commit Less and Deliver More:
In order to be dynamic and to keep growing you have to confront all the challenges thrown on you by your management. Don't get choked or collapsed because of the challenges. For that, always strategize your way well before time and give your best. There is no task in this world that can't be done (Of course I am not suggesting you to do everything even if it doesn't fall in your domain or job role). Your Manager will surely not give you a task that is not part of your domain (& if he is doing so, then you surely need to have a cup of tea with him :-) ). Never get hesitated in accepting the challenges. But one good idea to adopt is to commit less and deliver more. Whenever your manager throw a challenge to you, tell him your limitations and forecast the results too, but never over commit rather commit less than what you believe you can do. Always plan what can you do?How much can you do? & most importantly, How will you do? On the basis of your analysis, share your commitment humbly. Then give your best to over achieve (apparently you're over achieving what you have committed to your Manager, in real, you are just achieving what you have committed to yourself ;) )

Go an Extra Mile:
There is no shame in going an extra mile to deliver. This way you will learn things quickly, you will get more experience and you will be able to uncover the opportunities that might not be available to you otherwise.

Learn - whatever you do:
One important key to remember, don't do a task/project for the sake of completing it rather, do it with an open mind. Keep an eye on every thing you do to complete it, what other options you have for it if you have to repeat the task again? How can you make it more productive and quick. Even if you face a failure, LEARN from your mistakes. This is what I have actually done. I faced the challenge, I made a mistake, I learned from my mistake and the next time? Bang on! I did the task in a much better way than before. So, the essence is to keep learning with whatever you are going through, a failure or a triumph! learn from your experience as well as from others' experiences. 

Keep an achievement quota on daily basis:
To keep yourself motivated, achieve something on daily basis. Make your own KPIs (Key Performance Indicators) for everyday. I started my career in this department as a telesales person, from the day I started cold calls, I kept on making a list of daily achievements -  initially it was ; 3 leads per day - this way I always have an extra energy and enthusiasm to achieve my daily KPI and in the end of the day, I always left for home with the sense of great achievement for a day. Then I implemented the same idea for Months, Quarters and Year too. Everybody loves to achieve, so why not achieve on daily basis :-). Important thing to remember here, is to keep realistic and competitive targets for yourself.

Network, Network and Network:
Networking is the buzzword today. If you are networking and you carry a strong network with you then trust me, you are going very well in your life. Whenever you start a new job, connect with your future colleagues on LinkedIn, talk to them and extract the intel. You must know who is who in your organization and most importantly, majority of your colleagues should know who are you and what do you do in the organization. It really helps. It helps in achieving your targets because there is nothing in this professional world that you will do on your own, in the isolation. So Network! 

Adhere to the Policies:
At last but not the least, you will never be in a situation of guilt if you adhere yourself to your company's policies. Day to day discipline, policies related to dealing with clients/vendors, or any other thing. If you are within the policies, nobody can point a finger at you. So, stay on the right side, stay safe and stick to the policies.

That's all for today :-) !

Coke Studio Season 6  
12th December 2013.

It's been around 1 year and 8 months since I have not written any blog post. Today while listening to Atif Aslam's latest song "Channa" by Coke Studio, I again "felt" like writing something.I am not really sure it's the song that triggering this feeling or the current transition phase and not-so-busy day has created this push. But whatever it is, one thing for sure it's good to listen your mind and write whatever you feel. 

Coke studio project has taken Coca Cola Pakistan and Pakistan's Music Industry to an advanced level of success. Although, internationally Pakistan is not branded very positively but these kind of projects can surely project a positive image of the country and the nation in the international market. This time I am seeing the involvement of some international artists in the Coke Studio, which is a very positive and healthy sign. So far, I have "experienced" only 3 music tracks i.e. Atif Aslam's "Channa", Fariha Pervez's "Jogi", Abrar ul Haq's "Booti". Out of these 3, I am totally in love with "Channa". The quality of vocal, the intensity of music and the over all impact of Coke studio have made the whole experience completely laudable.

I am posting this blog just to give a welcome to myself back to blogging ;)! I make sure to write on regular basis now. It keeps my mind and writing skills fresh. On top of that, it gives me  a unknown but pleasant feeling of satisfaction.