Archive for the ‘Public Sector’ Category

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Why Insisting that Employees “Do More with Less” Is a Mistake, and How You Can Stop Making It

Monday, July 4th, 2011

One of the biggest and most preventable mistakes I see employers making in response to layoffs, furloughs, and budget cuts is what I call the fallacy of “doing more with less.” The admonition to “do more with less” has become commonplace in organizations over the last two years. Do you find yourself using it yourself? If so, stop it!

Here are three reasons why adopting the “doing more with less” approach is a mistake:

    1. It’s counterproductive: surviving employees, already demoralized by layoffs and furloughs, perceive that they are being asked to pick up the slack without being compensated for doing so – and they’re right!

    2. Doing more with less is not sustainable long-term. There’s only so much you can add to existing workloads before people and systems begin to break down.

    3. Employees become disengaged, burned out, resentful, and cynical – and they will leave the organization the first chance they get.

    In addition, I’ve found that when they try to “do more with less,” people start seeing everything as a priority. And of course, when everything is a priority, then nothing is a priority.

Here are two ways you can avoid falling into the fallacy of “doing more with less:”

1. Embrace the concept of doing LESS with less

This actually increases productivity: employees know you are being realistic and they appreciate your honesty so they reciprocate with good performance. Employee commitment is likely to increase when you’re truthful about what you’re asking your workers to do. If you would like to learn more about this issue, here are two articles that go into more detail:

The Fallacy of “Doing More with Less”

How to Prioritize: Doing LESS with Less Effectively

2. Set priorities effectively, and allocate available resources accordingly

Let’s be clear about two facts about priorities that people often ignore. First, priorities are what you DO, not what you say you will do. Realistically, you can only have a handful of priorities at any given time. (That’s ONE handful!) Second, priorities involve choices about time. By saying you don’t have time to do something, such as going to your kids’ soccer game, you effectively are saying that other things are more important to you at the moment.

A few years ago, I developed a straightforward process for setting priorities. Here it is in a nutshell:

    First, identify clearly your organization’s vision or mission. Beginning with the end in mind is the first step in organizational success.

    Second, use that vision to categorize everything you do (e.g., evaluate performance, develop products and services) as critical, very important, or important.

    Third, devise a realistic formula for allocating resources based on the above three categories. For example, while you might decide to allocate 100% of your resources to items in the “critical” category, it’s probably more realistic to devote 70-80% of them to the critical priorities, 15% to very important items, and 5% to important items.

If you would like more detailed, step-by-step information about this process, you may obtain the template, Pat Lynch’s Process for Prioritizing Organizational Services and Programs, by clicking here and checking the appropriate box on the list from my web site. You will receive the link to the template immediately via e-mail.

What are your thoughts or experiences about doing LESS with less? Let us know!

© 2011 Pat Lynch. All rights reserved.

Posted in Aligning the Misaligned, Employee-centered Workplace™, Optimizing Business Results, Organizational Renaissance™, Priorities Run Amok, Public Sector | No Comments »

California Budget, Part II: Be Careful What You Ask (Legislators) For

Sunday, June 26th, 2011

In November 2010, California voters decided to stop tolerating state legislators’ annual refusal to pass a balanced budget by June 15th each year. They passed an initiative that requires the State Controller to stop paying the errant legislators when they fail to meet their constitutional mandate to produce a balanced budget by that date. And that pay is gone forever – no retroactive pay allowed.

That strategy seemed to work: for the first time in anyone’s memory, the legislature passed a budget on June 15, 2011. Everyone celebrated, most of all the legislators, who believed they had saved their paychecks.

The celebration was short-lived: Governor Jerry Brown vetoed the budget the very next day, saying that it was not a balanced solution to the state’s financial woes. In fact, he was quoted as saying that the budget that was passed contains “legally questionable maneuvers, costly borrowing and unrealistic savings.”

Personally, I call that budget the “Save our (California legislators’) paycheck” budget.

Legislators reportedly were outraged. After all, they passed a budget, didn’t they? And didn’t it show that revenues matched expenditures?

Well, not exactly. The Governor had promised voters a “gimmick-free” budget this year, and in his view, this budget did not pass the “no smoke and mirrors” test. In fact, his assessment of a gimmick-laden budget was backed up by the State Controller’s analysis, which found that while the budget committed the state to spending $89.8 billion, it only provided revenues of $87.9 billion, leaving a shortfall of $1.85 billion.

Oops.

Now legislators are REALLY mad: the Controller’s assessment came with the news that because the budget was not balanced, their pay and per diems would be suspended until they pass a budget that does meet the “gimmick-free” criterion. One Los Angeles Assembly member was quoted as saying, “I now have to explain to my wife and daughter that we won’t be able to pay the bills because a politician chose to grandstand at our expense.”

Welcome to the world of tens of thousands of Californians, whose financial situations are fraught with uncertainty each year when the legislature engages in its own form of grandstanding when it chooses not to meet its constitutional mandate of passing a balanced budget by June 15th. Institutions that rely on state funding, for example, have been forced to pass their own budgets without knowing how much money to expect from the state – if any. In the past few years, the state actually decided to issue IOUs in lieu of cash because the budget had not been passed. How well do legislators think that asking one’s landlord or bank to accept an IOU in place of a rental or mortgage payment will go over? Now they have an opportunity to find out themselves.

There are at least two related lessons to be learned here:

    1. Be very specific when asking for what you want or need.

    In this case, the voter-passed initiative said the budget must be balanced. Alas, it apparently did not define the term “balanced” in a way that made it crystal clear to legislators that their constituents would no longer tolerate their annual “smoke and mirrors” approach, but instead must pass a budget that actually balances when held up to the light of day.

    2. Be careful of what you ask for.

    By putting legislators’ pay at risk (as it relates to passing a balanced budget), voters caused lawmakers to focus on passing a budget. This seems to be a good thing, doesn’t it? Unfortunately in their haste to save their paychecks, the legislators neglected to take care of a few critical details. According to the State Controller, for example, the budget relies on a variety of fees and taxes to raise revenue – but lawmakers didn’t pass the legislation necessary to collect that revenue. Apparently the initiative should have said that intentions don’t count – there actually must be mechanisms in place in order for the budget to be balanced in reality.

So we’re back to smoke and mirrors. At least the legislators are not getting paid to not produce a balanced budget, which may jolt them back to reality. In the mean time, Californians across the state are suffering – again – because lawmakers –again – aren’t doing their constitutional duty.

I can’t wait for the next step: perhaps an initiative that makes the failure to pass a truly balanced budget by the constitutional deadline a terminable offense? No waiting till the next election either: no balanced budget, no job.

What’s your suggestion for getting the message across to politicians?

© 2011 Pat Lynch. All rights reserved.

Posted in Aligning the Misaligned, Priorities Run Amok, Public Sector | No Comments »

California Budget, Part I: What a Difference Accountability Makes!

Sunday, June 26th, 2011

What a difference accountability makes! Compare these two statements about the California budget process. They were made nearly a year apart by the same California Assembly person:

    “The budget?” (Dismissive wave of her hand.) “We [Democrats and Republicans in the state legislature] just have philosophical differences.”

    “I’ll do whatever it takes to get a budget passed on time.”

The first statement was made by the Assembly person to attendees at a meeting of a Long Beach City Council person in 2010, about two months after the legislature continued to be in violation of the constitutional deadline for passing a balanced budget. (They finally passed it 100 days after the deadline.) She was quoted as making the second statement to a newspaper reporter one week before the constitutional deadline for passing a balanced budget in 2011.

What got the Assembly person’s attention? In November 2010, after years of frustration and serious economic hardship foisted by irresponsible legislators on Californians who rely on the state for funding (e.g., state employees, vendors, contractors, school districts, colleges and universities, health care recipients, welfare recipients), voters finally stopped tolerating the legislature’s annual illegal activity by passing an initiative that requires the State Controller to stop paying legislators their daily rates and per diems for every day they fail to meet their constitutional duty of passing a balanced budget by June 15th each year. The initiative further specified that there would be NO retroactive pay or per diem. Going forward, legislators are accountable for actually doing the primary job for which they were elected – i.e., to pass a balanced budget on time every year that identifies the state’s priorities.

Given that legislators’ pay now is at risk, was anyone surprised that in 2011, legislators suddenly began to turn their attention toward the budget? By essentially mandating a pay-for-performance requirement related to the budget, voters created a situation in which it now is in everyone’s best interest for legislators to pass a balanced budget on time. And it seemed to be effective: for the first time in anyone’s memory, the legislature passed a budget by June 15th. Whew! Legislative paychecks were saved. Accountability works!

Or does it? Stay tuned for Part 2….

© 2011 Pat Lynch. All rights reserved.

Posted in Priorities Run Amok, Public Sector | No Comments »

Budget Cuts: Why Fire Departments and Police Departments Need to Change the Question

Sunday, May 29th, 2011

As city, county, and state budgets are being discussed and finalized around the country, one thing is clear: those who allocate resources are asking the wrong questions. As a result, recipients of government services are being short-changed because resources are being misallocated.

During city/county/state budget negotiations, the primary questions generally are:

    1. How much must we cut so that our city/county/state has a balanced budget?
    2. How much must each agency cut so we can achieve this outcome?

The problem is that these are the wrong questions. Instead of focusing on money, politicians and administrators need to begin with the end in mind – i.e., the services to be provided. Here are the questions they should be asking instead:

    1. Is this service something that (city/county/state) government should provide?
    (If it is not, stop it!)
    2. If it is, what level of service do we (decision-makers) choose to provide?
    3. What is the best way to provide this service?
    4. How much are people willing to pay for it?

Using public safety (i.e., fire departments and police departments) as an example, here are the questions decision-makers should be asking:

    1. Should the government provide public safety services?
    2. What level of public safety do decision-makers choose to provide?
    3. What is the best way to provide this service?
    4. How much are people willing to pay for it?

When the conversation is all about cutting the budget, then guess what becomes the #1 priority? (You are correct if you said “cutting the budget.”) Focusing on cutting the budget can lead to dysfunctional behaviors (e.g., proportional sharing) and outcomes (e.g., ineffective resource allocation). (Elsewhere I explained why the tactic of proportional sharing as a budget cutting tactic is an ineffective way to allocate resources.) As a result, the public loses. In terms of public safety, for example, there may be fewer fire fighters, emergency medical personnel, and police officers available to respond to calls. Fewer civilian staff as well as outdated equipment and infrastructure also are consequences of cuts to public safety budgets. Together these results mean longer response times in situations in which seconds or minutes matter. Are longer response times okay with the public? If so, then there’s no need to change the question. But if public safety has taken a hit because of misdirected questions and stakeholders are not okay with longer response times, then it’s time to insist that decision-makers stop asking and answering the wrong questions.

The bottom line: if you want different answers, you have to change the questions you ask. If the public is at greater risk due to budget cuts and the heads of fire departments and police departments are not okay with that, it’s time for them to re-direct the conversation by changing the questions. While re-focusing the discussion won’t change the reality of scarce resources, it can ensure a much more effective resource allocation process.

What are you waiting for?

© 2011 Pat Lynch. All rights reserved.

Posted in Aligning the Misaligned, Optimizing Business Results, Priorities Run Amok, Public Sector | No Comments »

8 Obstacles to Public Sector Success

Wednesday, May 18th, 2011

In my experience, public sector agencies and government entities (i.e., cities, counties, states) face eight common obstacles to their success. See how many of these issues you have experienced, either as a provider or a user of public services.

1. Lack of a common “big picture.”

The biggest obstacle to success for any organization is the failure of leaders to articulate and/or communicate the “big picture” – i.e., the value that the organization provides. Without this information, it’s impossible to set effective priorities, which means that one person’s claim on resources is just as valid as another’s. How can leaders allocate resources effectively when there is no overall direction to guide them?

2. Leaders’ inability or unwillingness to establish and enforce priorities.

One of the critical responsibilities of all leaders is to set and enforce priorities. In the public sector, setting priorities often is challenging because of the complexity and variety of stakeholders whose interests conflict with each other, and sometimes are diametrically opposed. In some cases, leaders simply don’t know how to set priorities – a serious deficiency, but one that can be remedied. In other cases, public sector leaders are unwilling to set and/or to enforce priorities because they know that some stakeholder group(s) will be unhappy with them. Too often, for example, we see scenarios in which politicians demand “proportional sharing,” or equal budget cuts across agencies. Or they identify some priorities, only to change them when confronted by stakeholders who wanted a different outcome. How can an organization be successful when its leaders shirk one of their most important responsibilities?

3. A dearth of courageous leaders.

I define courageous leaders as people who focus relentlessly on the big picture, even when they pay a personal price for doing so. Although such leaders are a critical success factor in all organizations, public sector agencies and units in particular desperately need individuals who are willing to focus on the greater good, setting priorities that serve the big picture, and allocating resources in ways that support those priorities. While it’s easy to point fingers at public sector leaders and label them as self-serving individuals who are only looking for ways to be elected to their next jobs (or to keep their current jobs) – and there are many who fit this description – let’s not forget that the public also bears responsibility for the lack of courageous leaders. Specifically, accepting mediocre or poor performance or results enables the behavior that caused it in the first place. We are setting organizations up for failure when we don’t support and nurture courageous leaders.

4. Ineffective resource allocation.

Successful organizations use their resources wisely. The ability to allocate scarce resources effectively requires these critical success factors: (a) a clearly articulated and communicated big picture, (b) specific priorities that support achievement of the big picture, and (c) courageous leaders. In short, the things that need to be in place for effective resource allocation are precisely those that public sector organizations often lack.

5. Inexperience in questioning assumptions.

Because assumptions have expiration dates, it’s good business practice periodically to assess the assumptions that serve as the foundation for decisions and practices. Yet public sector leaders often fail to do this. My experience is that they tend to layer things on top of each other, seldom taking the time to ask whether what’s underneath still is necessary for the success of the organization.

6. Willingness to settle for mediocrity.

Acceptance of mediocrity runs rampant in the public sector – e.g., mediocrity of service levels, of employee performance, of politicians’ decisions and actions. For years, the public has looked down upon those who work in the public sector, decrying the mediocrity – yet accepting it. Having worked as an employee and as a consultant for years in public (and private) sector organizations, I know that this embrace of mediocrity is not limited to outsiders: it’s all too common within organizations as well. When mediocrity is the standard by which performance is gauged, how can organizations possibly be successful?

7. Accountability run amok.

Imagine that accountability is a continuum, with “no accountability whatsoever” at one end and “extreme micromanagement” at the other. Now imagine situations in which you have stakeholders who reside at or near the “no accountability” end, and public sector leaders who work mostly at or near the “extreme micromanagement” end. What you have is a recipe for mediocrity at best, and failure at worse.

8. Bureaucracies that block organizational success.

The words “government” and “bureaucracy” often are used interchangeably. One result of layering things (e.g., regulations, programs, processes) on top of each other without considering whether any have outlived their usefulness is dysfunctional behaviors and outcomes. For example, RFPs (requests for proposals) from government agencies and entities tend to be hefty documents that can run well over one hundred pages. Whatever the size, my experience is that the actual description of the project is dwarfed by the blizzard of forms that document the myriad of requirements with which successful bidders must comply. (My favorite “You’ve got to be kidding me!” example of such a compliance issue is the City of Los Angeles’ insistence that contractors sign a document attesting to the fact that neither they nor any of their ancestors ever owned slaves.) How many stakeholder interests are being served poorly or not at all because of irrelevant restrictions and rules? And let’s not get started on how many people are required to process all this paperwork – before any real work can begin. Bureaucracy is a death knoll for success.

How many of these issues resonate with you? What will you do to address them? In a future post I will share some of my own suggestions about how to minimize these obstacles.

© 2011 Pat Lynch. All rights reserved.

Posted in Aligning the Misaligned, Optimizing Business Results, Organizational Renaissance™, Public Sector, Uncategorized | No Comments »

How Public Safety Professionals Are Shooting Themselves in the Foot

Sunday, May 1st, 2011

When the Long Beach Press-Telegram reported recently that Long Beach’s Chief of Police had vowed that the police would “get the job done” regardless of what they were tasked with doing in the face of drastically reduced resources, I had two immediate and contradictory reactions. As a Long Beach resident and business owner, I felt relieved to hear that the police still plan to provide “…the best possible service for the people who are accustomed to that service.” As an expert in resource allocation, however, I thought, “You’ve got to be kidding!” By publicly promising to maintain the normal level of safety no matter what, the Chief essentially gave the City Council the green light to take resources away from the Police Department and give them to other agencies. In short, he metaphorically shot his department in the foot – unless the Police department has been greatly over-funded, and recent budget cuts merely reduced its budget to an appropriate level. Somehow I doubt this is the case.

I’m not picking on the Long Beach Police Chief; he just happened to be a local example of what I’m hearing and seeing in law enforcement and fire service agencies. In both these professions, members tend to downplay the significance of their roles in keeping people safe while routinely putting themselves in danger. “It’s just my job,” they often protest when grateful recipients of their services try to express their thanks. As a result, over time the public began to believe them, and subsequently was lulled into a false sense of security because these public servants make what they do seem almost easy. Few people stop to think about what is required to keep our law enforcement and fire service protectors at the top of their respective games so they can perform at high levels at a moment’s notice. Thus when City Council members or other decision-makers adopt deeply flawed policies like proportional sharing instead of stepping up to the plate and making the tough decisions they were elected or hired to make, there is relatively little resistance from the public about whether the resources are being prioritized appropriately. As a result, we witness scenarios like the one in which a Los Angeles City Council member vowed to save the jobs of the City’s calligraphers (employees whose job is to produce the pretty certificates that Council members like to hand out to constituents) at all costs – even though “essential” jobs such as those of teacher, police officer, and fire fighter were on the chopping block.

The fact is that when law enforcement and fire service leaders continue to assure the public that all is, and will remain, well despite fewer and fewer resources each year, they are doing a serious disservice to the public and to their own employees. While service levels may be maintained in the short-term, they are not sustainable over time: employees get burned out due to overwhelming work loads, and critical, life and death decisions are made by people who are tired and stressed out. When equipment malfunctions, when (or even if) it can be repaired will depend on factors such as when overworked mechanics can get to it, and/or how long it takes for the parts to arrive after someone realizes that no one ordered them since the clerical personnel who handled the ordering were laid off, and/or whether the money to pay for the parts can be found somehow.

In short, the “things will continue to be normal” mantra is a charade that must stop. Decision-makers and the public need to be educated about the trade-offs that result from allocating fewer resources than required to maintain service levels.

Here’s my advice to leaders in law enforcement and the fire service, and to public sector decision-makers: stop it! More specifically:

    1. Leaders in the fire service and law enforcement: I’m sure you believe you’re doing the right thing by assuring the public that you will keep us safe. And I think you are sincere when you say you will do everything possible to make sure that happens. But the truth is that you can’t, at least not beyond the very short term. And in your heart of hearts, you know it too. So please: stop sending the message that everything is fine, and begin to educate the public about what the trade-offs will be when you have fewer resources with which to work.

    2. Public sector decision-makers: stop hiding behind the appearance of doing your jobs (e.g., by implementing ineffective policies like proportional sharing), and start making the tough decisions required to deal with current and future conditions. A good place to start, for example, is by setting priorities and allocating resources based on what is needed to achieve the relevant government entity’s “big picture” (e.g., a city’s vision or mission) rather than on what groups have complained the loudest most recently.

Public sector entities are having a tough time right now, and everyone is suffering as a result. Let’s not compound the existing challenges by setting unrealistic expectations about public safety, and then burning out good people trying to achieve them.

© 2011 Pat Lynch. All rights reserved.

Posted in Aligning the Misaligned, Optimizing Business Results, Priorities Run Amok, Public Sector | No Comments »

The Predictable Decline of the Public Sector

Saturday, April 30th, 2011

Organizations go through predictable stages or life cycles: start-up, growth, maturity, decline, and extinction. They can move backwards through these stages as well as forward (e.g., replacing a “mature” product or service with a more innovative one), and not all of them reach extinction. In order to avoid the decline or extinction stages, organizations must adapt to changes in their environments. We see various types of adaptation every day in the private sector: new products or services are offered while old ones are dropped, or companies merge or acquire others to provide a competitive advantage or enter a new market. We even see re-invention among individuals. A recent story in the Los Angeles Times noted that former (and likely future) presidential candidate Mitt Romney has re-invented himself – again. Why? What he was doing before wasn’t getting the results he wanted to achieve, so he’s trying something different. Most often we think of companies going through such life cycles. However, public sector agencies and government entities also experience them.

Many agencies and government entities today arguably are in the “decline” stage of the life cycle. The world has changed, and most public sector entities have not. Although current economic conditions did not cause the decline, they did bring it forcefully to people’s attention. Procedures, programs, processes, rules, regulations, systems, organizational structures, and policies, many of which are decades old, are not working any more. Individually and collectively, these organizations no longer are able to support the outcomes they initially were created to achieve. Without substantive change, public sector (government) organizations will continue their current downward spiral.

What will it take to reverse this decline? Here are some suggestions to get started:

    1. There must be a compelling and common “big picture” (i.e., vision or mission) that people can buy into. There is a serious dearth of such pictures once you get beyond the agency level. For example, how many cities have a clearly articulated vision?

    2. There must be a commitment to transformative change; incremental change is not sufficient. The current challenges did not arise overnight, nor will they go away quietly or quickly. Change takes time and requires an acceptance of prudent risk-taking.

    3. Begin with the end (i.e., the big picture) in mind; that must be the starting point. Then ask, “Given where we are now, how will we reach the desired end?” Examine closely what is being done, how it is done, and why it is done, then make purposeful choices about how to move forward.

While reversing course is not easy, the rewards are great. And considering the alternatives – e.g., mediocrity, service failures, inefficiency, wasted resources, despair, anger, frustration – one cannot possibly suggest that not trying at all is a viable option.

© 2011 Pat Lynch. All rights reserved.

Posted in Optimizing Business Results, Organizational Renaissance™, Public Sector | No Comments »

The Euphemism Called “Proportional Sharing”

Thursday, March 31st, 2011

A euphemism is a vague word or phrase that is substituted for an expression that is considered to be harsh, offensive, or blunt. For example, some public sector leaders use the phrase “proportional sharing” as a substitute for describing what they really do when they decide to cut every department or agency’s budget by the same flat percentage. I suppose that “proportional sharing” is meant to evoke an aura of fairness about the decisions that leaders make about allocating scarce resources – perhaps a sense of “we’re all feeling the pain equally.” While such a process may sound fair, in fact it is not. The reality behind “proportional sharing” is that officials are failing to live up to their responsibility for setting priorities and allocating public resources effectively. To learn why this is the case, and what can be done about it, read my article Why “Proportional Sharing” is an Ineffective Resource Allocation Strategy, posted as a guest column on Alan Weiss’ Contrarian Consultant blog. And let me know what you think.

© 2011 Pat Lynch. All rights reserved.

Posted in Aligning the Misaligned, Optimizing Business Results, Priorities Run Amok, Public Sector | No Comments »

Why “Fixing the Problem” IS the Problem

Sunday, March 20th, 2011

Dramatic increases in public sector pension liabilities at a time when state and local governments have seen their revenues shrink drastically have resulted in an explosive backlash against public sector unions and the workers they represent. At the very time that high levels of unemployment increasingly have forced those who have lost their jobs to seek government services, they are being told that those services are being cut because of huge payments required to fund the pensions of public sector employees. This news has turned a spotlight on public sector pensions and served to demonize public sector employees.

Some states are taking advantage of this backlash to curtail or dismantle completely public sector workers’ collective bargaining processes. While discussing public sector pension reform efforts, the executive director of the California Labor Federation recently was quoted as accusing partisan lawmakers across the country of undertaking a “…strategy that goes beyond simply fixing the problems as we know them.” Presumably he wants them to stick to the pension funding issues and leave everything else alone – i.e., maintain the status quo.

Aspiring to the status quo is a big mistake. Simply “fixing” public pension systems is like treating the symptoms of a recurring illness and ignoring the underlying cause. While the symptoms may go away in the short-term, they will recur – often at a much more severe level. The cause itself must be addressed and a workable, long-term resolution achieved. There is overwhelming evidence that the status quo is not working any more. It’s time to stop merely “fixing” the problem and begin working toward eradicating its source.

Unfunded or under-funded pension liabilities in the millions and billions of dollars are grabbing headlines because they drastically reduce the amount of money available for state and local government services. As serious an issue as this is, in fact it is a symptom of a larger and more complex problem, namely the process by which public sector employees are compensated. That process is dysfunctional, which means that a continuation of the status quo is not sustainable.

There are many aspects of public sector compensation systems to consider, including what form the compensation takes (e.g., current vs. deferred salary, types and levels of benefits) and how pay is determined and changed. In unionized workplaces, these issues are addressed through a negotiation process. Bargaining often is conducted between elected officials and labor unions whose leaders provide substantial support in the form of money and campaign workers to labor-friendly candidates during elections. It seemed easy for lawmakers to agree to generous pensions and other terms of employment whose results wouldn’t be felt for years, or even decades – long after the elected officials had retired or (more likely in these days of term limits) moved on. How can that dynamic not influence the provisions of the resulting contracts? Who is looking out for the public in this process?

Providing short-term “solutions” to long-term problems has done a disservice to the public and to the workers who agreed to the employment conditions they were offered. Let’s not forget, however, that there are at least two parties to every contract, and that both must agree to its terms. Public sector unions did not impose their terms on elected officials; both sides were parties to the negotiated agreements. Unfortunately the public has been woefully uninformed about these issues. Yet whose fault is that? How many members of the public have taken the initiative to seek out that information?

In short, there is plenty of blame to go around. But playing the blame game is counterproductive because it doesn’t change anything. “Fixing” the problem with an eye on maintaining the status quo is not a viable option because it doesn’t address the underlying dysfunction. Instead, the focus must be on (a) what government services we as a society are willing to pay for, (b) compensating public sector employees fairly, (c) creating transparency and accountability in budget processes, and (d) implementing a plan that will enable us to achieve those objectives.

It’s time to stop “fixing” the problem by applying short-term “solutions” to long-term issues. We need to go well beyond the status quo, which is not functional or sustainable, to create a process that serves employees and the public well. What are we waiting for?

© 2011 Pat Lynch. All rights reserved.

Posted in Aligning the Misaligned, Employee-centered Workplace™, Optimizing Business Results, Public Sector | No Comments »

Consequences of the “It’s Just My Job” Syndrome

Monday, February 28th, 2011

Are you one of those people who, when others thank you or pay you a compliment about your performance, reply, “It’s just my job?” Have you ever been on the receiving end of that assertion when you thanked someone who has helped you? Those who deflect people’s praise or acknowledgment short-change themselves as well as others.

Just as organizations cannot optimize their business results unless their employees are fully successful, individuals cannot optimize their lives unless they acknowledge and “own” their talents and the value they generate. After all, if you don’t believe you provide great value to others, why should anyone else believe it? I know a very conscientious handyman who does exceptional work yet consistently undercharges customers for both labor and materials. Why? He is afraid that people will not hire him because they think he charges too much. In fact, his rates are very low, and I know people who would love to hire someone with his talent and expertise at two or even three times his current rate.

What’s going on here? This individual, like too many others, does not acknowledge the value he provides. Unless he makes the first “sale” to himself – i.e., sees and honors the talents he uses to help others – he cannot communicate that value to potential customers. Similarly, those who brush off the admiration and thanks of people who experience their value essentially are denigrating their own talent and disrespecting those who benefit from it.

Public safety employees are notorious practitioners of the “It’s just my job” syndrome. Brushing off the public’s thanks for years now is having an unintended negative consequence: over time, people mistakenly have come to accept the assertion that performing law enforcement and fire service jobs really IS no big deal. As a result, during this time of exceptionally scarce resources, public safety agencies’ budgets are undergoing unprecedented cutbacks.

I’m not suggesting that close scrutiny of these agencies’ budgets is unwarranted or inappropriate. What I am saying is that after years of downplaying their value, public safety employees have their work cut out for them in terms of re-educating the public, and specifically those who allocate resources, about the complexity of their jobs, of the risks involved, and of the resources required to sustain the desired level of readiness.

The moral of this story: acknowledge the value you provide to others, and accept their gratitude. After all, if you downplay that value, how can others possibly appreciate it?

© 2011 Pat Lynch. All rights reserved.

Posted in Aligning the Misaligned, Appreciative Approaches, Optimizing Business Results, Optimizing Personal Results, Public Sector | No Comments »

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