To describe my New Year’s Resolution requires a short lesson in biochemistry. Briefly, Cortisol is the “stress” chemical and Oxytocin is the “love” chemical. Among knowledge workers, the former is a productivity and creativity killer, while the latter is a productivity and creativity booster. In a small, growing, knowledge-based company, I want my colleagues to be producing at their peek. And even if I do not work with them directly, I can have a positive (or negative) impact on their performance.
As a volunteer coach for kids’ sports teams, I became an expert at reducing Cortisol and raising Oxytocin. It was easy to praise kids when they did something great. And the fact was everyone around me would praise them in those situations even if I didn’t. The challenge was to proactively communicate my belief in players when they made mistakes and to create a culture in which their teammates did likewise. Morale, not natural talent was the primary driver of performance on my kids’ sports teams, and the same has been true everywhere I have worked.
Business environments—especially dynamic business environments like startups and high-growth companies—ask a lot of their knowledge workers while often simultaneously operating to undermine their ability to be creative and productive. Some of it cannot be avoided. Business is stressful and it is not for the weak-hearted. But Cortisol and Oxytocin can have their respective negative and positive impacts long before the knowledge worker reaches the end of his or her proverbial rope. With that said, plenty of good can be done by fully reversing the old school business culture of fear and insensitivity. This toxic business culture dates back centuries to managing slave labor working in mines and harvesting cash crops. Sadly, fear and insensitivity do make unskilled and low-skilled labor more productive. Fear and insensitivity also make people with poor work ethics more productive. But among knowledge workers with a strong work ethic, the opposite is true.
Years ago, the company I worked for then hired a young, promising software engineer I’ll call Bob. Bob was a recent graduate from a competitive university who had good grades and interviewed well. It was a stressful job that required working on real-time production systems for large global financial institutions. Roughly four months into his new job, Bob made a mistake that was felt directly by our largest client. And while his manager kept it private, Bob confided his error to me, and the fact that he’d received a dressing down from his manager. If I could go back in time, I wish I’d done more than simply tell Bob that I was sorry it happened. I wish I had taken the time to let Bob know that mistakes—even big ones—happen from time to time. I wish I had reminded Bob of the skills he had brought to our company that got him hired over the scores of other candidates. I wish I had told Bob that I believed in him. Lastly, I wish I had told him that how he felt at the time was the only true hindrance to being a great employee moving forward, and that it was absolutely essential for Bob—who was particularly sensitive—to not let his mistake put him in a downward spiral. But as time moved forward, Bob continued to make mistakes. They were never as severe as his first mistake but they happened to him more frequently than they did to his peers. It was the first sign of Cortisol overload. His colleagues began to trust him less which almost certainly lowered his Oxytocin levels. As Bob’s downward spiral unfolded, his manager confided in me that every time someone on the team took a sick day, like clockwork Bob would take a sick day not long afterward. At the time, his manager thought Bob had an attitude problem. I now know that prolonged high levels of Cortisol weaken the body’s immune system. Eventually, Bob was fired. And most people concluded we had gotten rid of an untalented, unproductive employee. But today, I think the more likely story is that we had taken a talented individual, worked to lower his Oxytocin levels and raise his Cortisol levels and simply saw the natural result.
As I enter into the New Year, I am very pleased with the intelligence, creativity, work ethic and professionalism of my colleagues. But I know we work in a highly stressful environment and have very demanding customers. I know it is not enough for me to value them; I need to show them and tell them I value them. When an inevitable mistake happens—especially when I feel the consequences of the mistake—it is not enough for me to believe in that particular colleague; I need to tell the colleague that I believe in him or her and my behavior needs to show I mean it. Lastly for myself, I need to proactively reduce the Cortisol and increase the Oxytocin in my own body. By staying focused on the long term goals, enjoying the love of my family and the respect of my colleagues, and disciplining my mind not to waste time worrying, I’ll be doing for myself what I plan to do for others in 2013.
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