You get back to that goddamn cubicle & start thinking outside the box

Let’s face it raw - how many times do we empower (or let) our team to think creatively? Or do they get an environment at all that energizes them to think outside-the-box? When the project is in a firefighting state and firefighters are all around do we do enough to step back for a while & think afresh?  

 

Image Source: http://www.harpers.org/archive/2005/10/CartoonCreativity

There was this manager in a company who was do-as-I-say types. He used to confront people, show them down & drive them up the wall with even the basic things that did not required deliberation. While he had smart chaps working under him they were all confined, to a box. Little did the manager realize that while his product was doing fairly good in the market, the team could have done far better by simply unleashing his team's potential by empowering them with the width the team needed. That would have kept the competition far behind & spiked the company’s profitability 3-fold. As was his typical nature, the me-myself-I attitude of this manager kept the team at their very best low.  While the team was satisfied with the pay they got at the end of the day they were absolutely not contended with the spirit the team was into & more so the freedom they were deprived of, in the social age.

Few months later this manager went elsewhere. Another gentleman who took over this team quickly realized the morale & social-state in which the team was. While he saw the potential of the team during first few informal conversations he had with each of them, he also found out the rigidity of the environment (call it process) & the way this team was nurtured in the past did more damage than any good. The manager slept over this and later thought, “Hey, why not consult the guru?”

After a deep & profound conversation he was told to take his team offsite and break the ice. And it couldn’t have been better ever since then. The team found a renewed spirit and the necessary vigor in whatever they did – right from conceptualizing the go-to-market plan to interactions with customers to giving the feedback to the design/production team. The reach of their product magnified and so was the customer’s goodwill. Unlike the previous manager, this manager here intervened only when strategic visioning was required whereas he left all the tactical decisions for the team to take. He in fact even tweaked his office ergonomically and also demolished those cuboids giving a feeling of openness & transparency to his team. This changed the team morale dramatically and that led to become one of the most vibrant & go-getter team the company had ever seen.