Corporate Culture Talk: Ritual and Ritual Sense Inquiry One Corporate Culture Talk: Ritual and Ritual Sense Inquiry Ii - Untenable Performance Signing Conference
The first two articles have largely completed the discussion of the main points of what I call "power display" rituals, and this one begins to focus on the second type of ritual that exists in the enterprise, which I call "recognition affirmation". A subset of this type of ceremony, honor and honor ceremony, is almost what many business managers consider to be immaterial incentives: What does one pursue in the enterprise? It's not about profit, it's about fame. However, this understanding is obviously very incomplete, and many of the company's reward ceremonies have finally become a vassal link of the bonus, which is regarded by employees as a pity for eating tasteless and discarded, and the root cause behind it is difficult to say that it has nothing to do with this wrong perception.
<h1 class="pgc-h-decimal" data-index="01" > contrast</h1>
Let's look at two true stories, one is the personal experience of a friend and neighbor I saw on Douban. This person was not long into the workplace at that time, about two or three years of work experience, not old. Her superior is a little old man with rich work experience, impatient personality, treat her very harshly, in the process of a project to her work is extremely picky, words are inevitably simple and rude, she can only endure one by one, she stayed up late overtime to adjust, miserable, but the responsibility is not completed, the sense of responsibility makes her unwilling to leave and escape.
Of course, there are also reasons for this situation, and the situation faced by this group is very serious: high customer requirements, short time and heavy tasks. But even so, if it is only as mentioned above, it is just an ordinary workplace oppression story, not worth mentioning, and the person concerned once thought that this leader did not like her very much.
The turning point was after the project failed, yes, the project eventually failed, and even such a demanding request failed to win the important customer, and the prestige and status of the superior were hit. At the project review meeting, the leaders of the next level, because they were very dissatisfied, began to anger the members of the entire working group, doubted whether the parties and colleagues were incompetent, and even considered changing the guard, dismissing them, or at least canceling the possible reward qualifications at the end of the year. At this time, the superior, who usually treated her with a stinky face, stood up solemnly, expressed his recognition and respect for the parties in a very sincere tone, described the efforts and work results of the parties he saw, and made a solemn and serious public apology for his rudeness and "incompetence".
The little old man did not change much since then, but the person concerned experienced a great shock in his heart at that time. Perhaps watching from our side, there is nothing special about this plot, it is nothing more than appeasement and protection, and it is the responsibility of the leader. But if you can substitute for the scene of the person, you can perceive the strong impact on the soul, and after months of suffering, you will be recognized. According to the person concerned, she could not suppress crying on the spot, and even after leaving the company a few years later, when it comes to the most impressive workplace experience, she still remembers this scene and is deeply grateful to her superiors.
Of course, the author does not encourage like the little old man in the story, usually harsh treatment, a key moment to apologize and smile and revenge, not to mention whether there is such an opportunity, even if there is, to achieve the effect of the above cases also has very strict conditions, such as the little old man has strong professional ability, can convince people, usually not so harsh and so on.
What I want to say is that the people in the story are obviously greatly encouraged and motivated by this action of their superiors, and in this kind of motivation, you can't find anything related to honor, and their project even failed! Recognition and affirmation is not just an honorary certification.
<h1 class="pgc-h-decimal" data-index="02" > unexpected incentives</h1>
If the above cases do not arouse the attention of all readers, coincidentally, the great Alibaba has had a similar story.
This story preached education teacher Ou De Zhang once told, is his story as Ali's well-known political commissar. At that time, he had a young man who had worked in the team for eight years, and before a team-building activity near his anniversary, Mr. Zhang asked the young man's colleagues to record a small video about some unknown small things that happened between the young man and them and his blessings. Of course, the last thing that was recorded is basically work-related. Teacher Zhang especially emphasized and required that it must be a small thing, not the kind of obvious thing that everyone can see, such as performance, because small things/details are particularly reflective of intentions.
Then in the team building activities, the team suddenly played this video to the young man, and the young man who watched the video directly hugged Lao Zhang and cried bitterly, saying that he did not need to motivate him within three years, and it was obvious that this incentive was very successful.
After watching this story, you may immediately want to go back and arrange for employees to record videos, right? Don't worry, we have to figure out why it's useful to do it, and then we can understand how to use it.
<h1 class="pgc-h-decimal" data-index="03" > the time and real effect of the ceremony</h1>
The above two examples are very typical "recognition affirmation" ceremonies, if used well, the most people touched and cry rituals, but also the most motivating management tools. Someone has to say, no, you obviously said in the first part that ritual is a repetitive act, where are the actions in these two stories that are repeatable? Maybe the second team-building activity can be repeated, but it is not a repetition for a certain person, and he can't send a small video every year, right? The inventory of small things is used up in one go.
Yes, so, before I get into the specific elements of ritual, I'd like to revise a little bit about the definition of ritual. The first is the statement about repetition, it should be said that the ceremony is indeed not always repeated, think about it, similar to the graduation ceremony, the wedding ceremony, the most important ceremonies in life, are not repeated (unless you re-read and remarry...). ）。 But it is clear that not all one-time major events can be called rituals, and it is true that more rituals are repetitive, such as New Year's Day, birthdays, holidays, such as annual summary work and so on. So what should be corrected is that repetition without repetition cannot determine whether some behaviors are rituals or not, and rituals have a more essential basis for judgment.
We say that rituals must carry a certain meaning, and the essential characteristics of rituals are hidden in this sentence. The ceremony divides the entire river of time into two parts, pre-ceremony and post-ceremony, and the meaning of the ceremony must make the participants of the ceremony different after the ceremony than before after the ceremony.
After the wedding ceremony, the psychological state of the newlyweds changes from unmarried to married (although the law has long changed), and after the graduation ceremony, the state of the person changes from a student to a social person. Other ceremonies are also similar, after the performance signing conference in the previous article, the responsible people of the department have changed from a state of no performance responsibility to a state of commitment to performance. These transitions can occur without ritual, but with rituals, they make the transitions even more vivid and impressive.
So when should the ritual be embedded? The answer is ready to come – when a state change is needed.
Rooted in meaning, proclaiming and certifying a certain state of change in the person participating in the ceremony, this is the time and real role of the ceremony. The so-called living life out of the sense of ritual is not to force yourself to follow a set of procedures, but to give yourself and the person you want to influence at a time when the state of life should have changed.
<h1 class="pgc-h-decimal" data-index="04" > the timing of recognition and affirmation</h1>
Why state the above conclusions before analyzing the "affirmative" ritual? Because this kind of ceremony is the most direct and effective for employees. The display of power is intimidation, humor and ease is the adjustment, only recognition and affirmation is the best appeasement and retention of employees in a long working life. So how can we not take advantage of all the opportunities that may occur in this ritual?
From the above two stories, it can also be seen that the ritual of "recognition and affirmation" is very time-sensitive, and the contrast between the harsh superiors appears when the project results are finalized; the video of the collection of small things is played on the commemoration of the eighth anniversary, after which they one ends the torturous project memory, and one begins the ninth year of work, and the state of self-awareness has since completely changed. Therefore, one of the most important elements of the ceremony of recognition and affirmation is the choice of the point in time, and this will usher in the first controversial place about such ceremonies - many management experts say that praise and recognition should be timely, and employees need immediate feedback. So is it about instant feedback, or delayed gratification? Let's break it down in the next article.