Category Archives: Blog

What’s Behind Employee Knowledge Hoarding And How To Fix It

I’ve observed a growing problem in today’s workplace where employees hide, hoard or simply don’t provide information to others in their organization. It’s disruptive and contributes substantially to the lack of productivity. Although employers have tried multiple solutions to the problem — meetings, team building, knowledge management systems — the issue remains largely unresolved.

Human beings are a complicated bunch, and, as it turns out, there are multiple reasons that can cause this breakdown in the flow of information from person to person, level to level or team to team. The fix depends largely on determining which specific issues are driving the behavior in each particular instance.

Individual Motivations

Individual motivations at work may be something as simple as the lack of time to communicate the information to the requestor. For example, if a certain colleague is constantly requesting information, it can be a serious drain on the time of the employee who is being asked. Frustration ensues, and the thought becomes, “If Dave in accounting doesn’t know how to do his job, why should I keep helping him at the risk of my own productivity stats?” On the other hand, an employee may hoard information for personal gain or power. Clarice in sales may have decided that if she doesn’t share her hard-earned knowledge with others on the sales team, she will continue to be the star and the most valuable player, who is immune to layoffs. Neither scenario benefits the organization as a whole. So, what’s the solution?

Authors of the Harvard Business Review article “Why Employees Don’t Share Knowledge with Each Other,” point to their research to help explain why people hide information or share it: “We found that more cognitively complex jobs — in which people need to process large amounts of information and solve complex problems — tended to promote more knowledge sharing, as did jobs offering more autonomy. By focusing on these aspects of work, managers can encourage employees to share more and hide less.”

A Lack Of Trust

Trust can also be a contributing factor as to why employees withhold information. To combat this, management may need to actively recognize and reward the contributions of those who exhibit the desired behavior. They also need to work to eliminate the various barriers at their company that are restricting the free flow of information. It might be that different members of a team are in very different time zones and find it difficult to communicate in a meaningful way. Or it could be that there’s a deep-seated rivalry between teams that are, in theory, supposed to be cooperating instead of competing.

In the book The 7 Fundamentals to Create and Sustain A Successful Knowledge Sharing Organization, author Patricia Pedraza-Nafziger says, “To encourage employees to share the knowledge gained through experience requires building trust and an understanding of how their knowledge will be used.” Be upfront and honest with employees. Explain the benefits of knowledge sharing, and remind everyone of shared goals.

Organizational Hierarchy

Another interesting study, “Helping Others Most When They Are Not Too Close: Status Distance as a Determinant of Interpersonal Helping in Organizations,” found that people in an organization were more likely to provide information if there was moderate distance between their positions on the organizational chart.

As the study’s abstract explains, “Scholars examining interpersonal relations in organizations have long known that status matters, but findings regarding the link between status differences and prosocial behavior have been equivocal.” In other words, you’re more likely to share information with individuals who are moderately distant from you in status because the feelings of potential competition or power status are diminished.

In my experience, one of the best ways to combat the employee knowledge hoarding tendency is to reward employees who participate in the consistent sharing of appropriate information and make clear the benefits of doing so. Management also needs to be responsive to recognizing those employees who are draining the productivity of others by requesting information that they should already know. It should be addressed by more training or perhaps a performance improvement plan.

In the end, it is the role of leadership in the organization to ensure the free flow of important information is actually happening on a day-to-day basis. Effective collaboration can move the needle for your company and improve the bottom line.

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This article has previously been featured on Forbes

Employee Motivation: It Really Does Matter

If you’ve ever been stuck in a job with no direction or motivation and have felt extremely discouraged, you’re not alone. Unfortunately, there are many employees who find themselves caught in the same situation. Managers and supervisors are often not taught how to motivate their employees. Regrettably, several management personnel are only advised on the performance-improvement-plan form of management. But often, the carrot produces better results than the stick.

Consider the bosses you’ve had in your career. Who were the good ones, and who were the bad ones, and — most importantly—what was the difference? After some contemplation, you’ll begin to see why the good ones were able to motivate you and make you passionate about coming into work.

Although it’s difficult in the corporate world to find employee satisfaction that is meaningful and lasting, as management, it’s your job to see to it your employees feel appreciated, which in turn will result in better teamwork, better attitudes and an eagerness to contribute.

Gregg Lederman, in his book CRAVE: You Can Enhance Employee Motivation in 10 Minutes by Friday, explains, “Strategic employee recognition is a management discipline that goes way beyond ‘being the right thing to do.’ Recognition should not be viewed only as a feel-good, altruistic endeavor. No, it’s a management discipline that should garner significant ROI.”

What makes Susan feel rewarded and valued won’t be the same as what motivates Kari or Chad. People are individuals, and being recognized in a way that is meaningful to them shows you care enough about them as individuals to acknowledge them as such. In my years of working with people in leadership positions, I always emphasize the importance of knowing enough about your employees to understand what they value individually as a reward. My advice is: If you don’t know, just ask. Most people are more than happy to relate what makes them feel appreciated.

If you are a supervisor or manager of a group of employees, it’s very important to understand that they aren’t robots. They require a human touch and frequent motivation. As a leader, it is your job to provide that. If you don’t, you’re going to find yourself constantly trying to fill the same positions over and over as unmotivated people get discouraged and quit.

In their book The 5 Languages of Appreciation in the Workplace: Empowering Organizations by Encouraging People, Gary Chapman and Paul White offer, “When leaders actively pursue teaching their team members how to communicate authentic appreciation in the ways desired by the recipients, the whole work culture improves. Interestingly, even managers and supervisors report they enjoy their work more! All of us thrive in an atmosphere of appreciation.”

My clients are often surprised how far a little bit of encouragement propels their employees and organization. In my experience, ignoring or discounting the importance of employee motivation often leads to disengagement.

In the HBR article “4 Reasons Good Employees Lose Their Motivation” (registration required), authors Richard E. Clark and Bror Saxberg offer this advice: “Carefully assessing the nature of the motivational failure — before taking action — is crucial. Applying the wrong strategy (say, urging an employee to work harder, when the reason is that they’re convinced they can’t do it) can actually backfire, causing motivation to falter further.”

They explain that these reasons fit into four categories: values mismatch, lack of self-efficacy, disruptive emotions and attribution errors.

Basically, the first one, values mismatch, means the employee isn’t connected with the value of the task and therefore is disinclined to perform the task. With the second “trap” (as they refer to it), the lack of self-efficacy points to the feeling that the employee is afraid they aren’t capable of performing the task, and so they are fearful of appearing incompetent.

I’ve seen that when employees are overwhelmed with negative emotions, such as frustration or anger, they feel overcome by disruptive emotions, and it interrupts their ability to be motivated enough to perform a task. When the managers I’ve worked with take the responsibility to recognize these signs and remove hindrances that are holding their employees back from their true potential, things change for the better.

It’s important to understand that the work your employees are doing needs to make a difference in some way and for you to help them see it, too. Otherwise, your employees will grow restless and feel automated. It’s up to you to inject some passion and help them to see how valuable they are to the organization. Let your employees know on a frequent basis that they are welcome any time to come to you for feedback and sincere communication, and you will reap the benefits of a motivated workforce.

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This article has previously been featured on Forbes

How To Prepare For Your Performance Review

Giving a thorough and fair performance appraisal requires a lot of skill and a fair amount of work by your manager. If you are an active participant in the process by providing your manager with accurate details of your accomplishments spanning the timeframe — a highlight reel as it were — you’ll be doing yourself a big favor.

As a leadership coach, I’ve developed a few tips for how you can prepare yourself for your next performance review:

Share accomplishments with your boss.

It’s important to remember that your supervisor or manager is likely as overwhelmed as you are. Time is a limited resource for all of us. Your bosses already have their deadlines and statistics to meet, so writing accurate and fair performance evaluations for your team is no easy feat. Because of this, don’t expect your manager to have noticed every single one of your many accomplishments.

In his book I Am Not Average: How to Succeed in Your Performance Review, Brian Poggi explained that in every organization, there are people who are the “glue.” They continue to raise the bar on their contributions and the value they bring. So use your annual review to brag on yourself. If you don’t, who will?

One of the kindest favors you can do for your supervisor (and ultimately for yourself) is to prepare an accurate and well-worded list of accomplishments for the past year and submit it on time or — better yet — early. Believe me, your conscientiousness and forethought will be recognized and very much appreciated. As a boss, there is almost nothing worse than trying to chase an employee down for their list of accomplishments. If they can’t be bothered, why should the boss care? The employees who will end up getting the most love (read: attention and care on their evaluation) are the ones who understand the priority of getting that annual accomplishment list turned in on time.

When you make this list, remember several important things:

• Bosses love numbers. Give accurate, quantitative information whenever possible.

• Review your job description. Give facts and figures to illustrate how you’ve met those requirements.

• Review last year’s review. How have you improved? How have you addressed any past issues?

In Inc., Jayson DeMers wrote, “Take inventory of all the accomplishments you’ve had over the past year (or the evaluation period) and list them out. Use objective data whenever possible — that means verifiable numbers.”

Although your boss might be constantly busy with the office door shut, take the time to check in regularly. Don’t make it long and tedious. Hit the highlights, ask the questions you need to ask (such as, “Am I headed in the right direction on the Crocker account?”), then get out of their way.

Address areas of concern.

The most uncomfortable part of any performance evaluation is usually regarding how you plan to rectify any deficiencies or concerns. It’s usually coupled with how you’ve improved from your last evaluation and how you’ve addressed any issues that were previously presented.

If you have any issues that you feel need to be addressed, bring them up, but be prepared to offer solutions. No one wants to hear about a bunch of problems in your working environment or your job when you don’t even have an idea of how to solve them. Don’t simply dump your problems on your manager.

Do your research before asking for a raise.

If you feel and can prove your service has been exceptional and you want to state your case for a raise, be sure you’ve researched current salaries for equivalent positions in your area. Without that information, you won’t have much traction.

Use your review as a guide for the rest of the year.

Ideally, you should start preparing for your next performance review only a few days after your previous one. Take some time to divorce yourself from any emotional connections to the evaluation. Re-read any documents you received in a quiet environment and consider the points that were made. Did your boss want you to step up more? Did they suggest you take the lead on an important project? Did they want you to stop turning in your reports late?

This is a perfect opportunity for your professional growth. Make notes, and put them in a coherent system — whether that system consists of notes on your calendar for the next year or is a cheat sheet you can glance at once a week. This system is your “study guide” for the next year. If you find yourself slipping back to your old ways, use your notes to snap your attention back to the matters you should be concentrating on. It’s your manager’s job to help your career growth. But if you ignore that advice, you’ll only have yourself to blame when the next mediocre review comes around.

When setting your goals for the next year, I’ve found it can be helpful to heed the advice of HBR’s Guide to Performance Management, which explained that people can sometimes become overwhelmed by complex goals. So, it can be helpful to break a large goal down into smaller, short-term pieces. According to the guide, “Setting monthly or quarterly goals, rather than annual ones, can narrow the focus enough to make the target achievable while still having a big impact.”

If your boss offers goals that are constructed in too big of a chunk, suggest a breakdown that is bite-sized.

In conclusion, if you want to advance in any organization, you’ll have to work for it. Take the time to put the effort into your performance review, and your dedication, attention to detail and desire to ascend in the organization will be readably apparent to your manager — perhaps distinguishing you as an up-and-comer.

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This article has previously been featured on Forbes