EMPLOYEE LOYALTY AND WORK PLACE CONTEXT

William Anderson, Director of Engineering at Forbes raises vital issue about employee loyalty. He raises two important questions

1. What is loyalty to the organization?

2. Why does the Loyalty Die?

In his thought provoking insight, he says, Loyalty is not about length of stay. Many employees

stick around even if they find workplace bad for them.

I think there could be two reasons

• The Employees have no choice due to their lack of knowledge, skill, experience or attitudes.
• It is believed that all workplaces are same, hence hang on instead of facing uncertainty believing the proverb - Known Devil is better than unknown Angel.

Then what is loyalty?

It is finding solutions at workplace and contribute for the growth of the organization even

in adverse conditions. Of Course without cursing & complaining about the organization, policies

and the boss.

It is the ability to focus on the responsibilities rather than finding excuse for non-performance.

Results may not be favourable but the sincere efforts matter in a long run.

The second issue is Why does the loyalty die?

The possible reasons are as follows

• The firm don't live up to their promises to the employees and hence there is lack of trust. The Employees have feeling of being exploited.
• The feeling among the employees that there is lack of support to them in difficult times, honest efforts are not being recognized and in many cases sycophancy thrives instead of performance.
• There is a lack of integrity among the employees and focus on personal goals and achievements rather than organizational growth.
• The feeling of unable to deliver or failing to make any change that ultimately leads to the frustration and outburst.

The solution may be found in works of a genius, Prof. Sumatra Ghoshal, he says the smell of the place must change for the purposeful actions to take place. He gives following matrix to change the smell of the place.

Existing Workplace v/s Context Desired Workplace Context

Contract (Existing)  -  Trust (Desired) 

Control (Existing) -  Support (Desired)

Compliance (Existing) - Discipline (Desired)

Constraint (Existing) -  Stretch (Desired)

Dr. Sushant T. Joshi