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I Quit!

Jul 18, 2011 » by Jody

Get this. Your son’s team is in the College World Series this year. You’re the Dad.

Last year you missed your son pitching when his team won the National title.

This year you’re not about to miss him pitch in the College World Series.

But your company says, ‘You know you don’t have any vacation days’.

So you QUIT.

There’s so many things wrong with this scenario I don’t even know where to start.

Take a moment to read the reader comments from this Sporting News article.

I guess this company is not interested in . . .

  1. The customer. How many sales will they lose – or customers – who learn about why this sales associate felt forced to quit?
  2. Family. Obviously not important.
  3. Retention. Nuff said.
  4. Attraction. I certainly wouldn’t apply for a job there.
  5. Morale. The company set a great example for other employees – policies must be followed no matter what. If anything happens in your life you couldn’t plan for and you don’t have any vacation time left, TOUGH LUCK.
  6. Results. Could Dad have met his sales targets and attended the games? Or is it more important to track vacation time to the nanosecond lest we all go nuts and think we can take 365 days of vacation every year and still get a paycheck?

But the company is more interested in . . .

  1. Rules & policies
  2. Controlling time off

None of us really know the entire ‘back story’ about what ultimately pushed Dad to quit his job – what precipitated the straw that broke the camel’s back.

But I think we can all agree on one thing.

Going to watch his son pitch in the College World Series was more important than anything else. Period. And he had to sacrifice his job to make it so.

But at least he stopped sacrificing his LIFE.

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  • Dave Needham

    It is sad that the paradigm of “time at you desk=productivity” is still so prevalent. Trust, the ability to set clear expectations, and providing meaningful feedback are far to rare in management.  Currently experiencing a culture of “Let’s have a meeting to review what you did in the last two days…plan on about an hour for the meeting and them another two days redoing it because I could not articulate what I wanted…I can only tell you that what you produced is not it.”  Such a waste of time, talent, and energy. 

  • Anonymous

    3. Avoiding setting precedent?

    I’m a huge fan of ROWE in principle, but this blog is sooooooooooo “employee power!!!” focused. 
    For one, this is 2011. Extremely motivated employee’s become entrepreneurs. Secondly, “stick it to the man!!” kind of employee’s are probably the ones that will be let go due to lack of self-discipline in the event of that ROWE takes a hold of their organisation. Probably should add a foot note to posts like this indicating that salaried members of organisations that continually value personal > professional lives will fail to thrive in a ROWE environment. Not everyone has what it takes to get fourty hours of traditional “output” done in 10. 

    I’ve mentioned your movement to many clients of mine (i’m a technology consultant, not management/HR blah blah), all employERs, and they’ve ALL been very interested but question one is “how do I make it work in scenario”, not “where can i find blog posts designed to instill grassroots uprisings from my employees”.

    Just a thought.

    • Dave Needham

      Harry,

      I can certainly understand how the focus may seem on the “employee power” side of it AND I would maintain that the idea of ROWE is not Personal is greater than Professional, the idea is that Personal is Equal to Professional.  And while I agree, many people have chosen the entrepreneurial track (including myself) those who do not are not inherently unmotivated AND they are not deserving of organizational subjugation.  Why must employees who want to be respected as people (with personal lives as well) choose the entrepreneurial route?  And I agree, in ANY environment, employees who neglect the needs of the business and fail to produce results will not be successful.  Alas, my contention is, these people are harder to spot within an organization if you are measuring performance by their presence, aka Presenteeism.

      In regards to how do you make it work, ROWE is not a switch you flip like a technological solution, it is a cultural shift from focusing on what people are doing at any given moment to what are people producing in terms of results.  One culture is more about control, the other is about leadership.  The challenge is most managers have never been trained on how to give clear expectations, provide feedback, and trust their employees judgement – a key competency for the success of any ROWE, IMO.

      And, I could be wrong…

      • Cali Ressler

        @David@David:disqus  – not wrong at all.  In a ROWE, people place value wherever they want.  Personal, professional, mixture of both, personal one day, professional the next.  The point is that people do whatever they want whenver they want – as long as they get the work done. 

        I do love how you distinguish the culture of control and the culture of leadership.  Sometimes there are very subtle differences – and the subtle differences can play the biggest role in keeping the culture of control stable.

  • Anonymous

    Wait a minute.

    Sure, we can all agree that “you can’t go to see your son in the World Series because ‘you know you don’t have any vacation days’” sound pretty brutal.

    Let’s turn this around and ROWE-ify it, however. Then it might say something like:

    “You can’t go to see your son in the World Series because *your current RESULTS do not justify the overhead of maintaining your active position while you are out of the office.*”

    I’m not saying this is what’s happening, but it’s certainly possible that Dad has not completed enough work to justify the cost of having him out of the office. The reality is that when an employee goes on vacation—even an UNPAID vacation—there are still expenses to them company. They have to keep paying insurance and benefits. They have to keep his desk open and his email account active. They need to handle his calls and cover his work.

    I applaud you for siding with the employee. But if we are really going to be RESULTS-ONLY, shouldn’t we question whether employees are actually producing meaningful results?  

    • http://falkenmire.com Harry Falkenmire

      For the record, i’m in a one man ROWE (medium sized company but i show up when I want, meetings are self-declared optional etc). I get no heat because results speak for themselves. Everything i’m asked to do at the start of the week is done by Wednesday, regardless of how little the organizations sees of me. ROWE works when both employer and employee understand  that the only relevant measurable KPI is quality and quantity of tasks completed. I think Cali and Jody know this, but the way this blog comes across implies that a huge problem with the current workday is that employer’s dont respect personal priorities. THEY ARE UNDER NO OBLIGATION TO AND SHOULDN’T EVER BE.
      Most employees, my social circle included, would happily do anything but work if allowed outside the corporate environment between 9-5.For example, in this hypothetical, WHY HAS THIS GUY GOT NO VACATION DAYS. THIS IS A HUGE RED FLAG. Anyone that has no sick days left probably already fails the self-discipline test required to succeed in a results only environment.

      • Anonymous

        @Harry – thanks for the comment and glad you’re sharing these thoughts. In this particular instance, we aren’t so much upset that the organization didn’t respect Dad’s personal priorities, but that they have a work culture that doesn’t seem to foster autonomy and accountability. If they did, Dad wouldn’t have asked permission to see his son and would have just focused on his outcomes. You’re right – organizations are never obligated to respect personal priorities. Although we’d argue that organizations that do probably have better customer satisfaction and productivity levels, along with great employee engagement. In a ROWE, an organization is never in the position of approving or denying requests that deal with anyone’s personal life – the organization isn’t worried about managing flexibility; they’re worried about managing results. People deliver and they do whatever they want.

        Number of vacation or sick days has nothing to do with a person’s work ethic – or whether they can deliver results (and therefore thrive in a ROWE). And *this* is why in a true ROWE, they don’t exist…people have an unlimited amount of paid time off as long as they get the work done :)

      • KellyK

        “WHY HAS THIS GUY GOT NO VACATION DAYS. THIS IS A HUGE RED FLAG. Anyone that has no sick days left probably already fails the self-discipline test required to succeed in a results only environment. ”
         
        I think that’s a huge and unfounded assumption.  We don’t know what the company’s vacation time policy is or how much time he gets. Is it a single week each year?  Three?  We don’t know if they combine vacation with sick time.  We don’t know if they require employees to use vacation time if their work location is closed due to weather, power loss, etc.  With no idea how much time off he gets or what situations require him to use it, I’d really hesitate to assume that he “fails the self-discipline test.”
         
        Someone might have no time left because they’ll take any chance to not be at work. Or, it might be that their sick and vacation time are one “pool” and they lacked the self-discipline to avoid getting strep and the flu in the same month that they already had regular doctor’s appointments.  Or it could be because they had three weddings and two funerals to go to in the past few months. 
         
        ” I think Cali and Jody know this, but the way this blog comes across implies that a huge problem with the current workday is that employer’s dont respect personal priorities. THEY ARE UNDER NO OBLIGATION TO AND SHOULDN’T EVER BE.”

        It’s not just a lack of respect for personal priorities. It’s that *combined with* being bound and determined to enforce rules that actually hurt your bottom line (see all the negatives Cali and Jody already mentioned).  Having companies care about people as individuals with lives would be great, but they don’t even have to do that to realize that the results they need can still get done without making decisions that torpedo morale and push people to quit. 

      • Anonymous

        @KellyK – completely agree on all fronts. Especially the last line – companies don’t *need* to care about people as individuals with lives, but they definitely *should* realize that results can be accomplished without making decisions that ‘torpedo morale and push people to quit’. Exactly. There are probably *lots* of people nodding in agreement as they read your comments…

    • Cali Ressler

      Robby – great thoughts and so glad you’re thinking about ROWE-ify-ing the situation.  Without knowing the full back-story here, there *are* things from a ROWE perspective that just don’t jive with the situation:

      1.  In a ROWE, Dad never would have asked anyone’s permission to go to the World Series.  With the clear outcomes/measures he knew about for his job, he would have arranged for how those would have have been completed/stayed on track (either by him, working with his team, or a mixture of both) and he would have just gone to watch his son.  This is part of the autonomy and *accountability* of a ROWE…it’s why people in a ROWE feel like they are small business owners.  No one is dictating when, how, or where they need to work – that’s up to them and they know it has to get done. 

      2.  You are absolutely right – we definitely must question whether employees are producing meaningful results.  In a ROWE, this is a question that is asked all the time and it’s asked by both managers and employees.  If meaningful results are not being produced, performance issues are addressed.  Let’s say Dad was on a performance plan.  It’s still up to him to deliver whether or not he attends the World Series.  If he continues not delivering, no job.

      3.  In a ROWE, people work as a team.  Everyone is focused on an outcome and they work together to achieve it.  It’s possible Dad could have done some work while at the World Series – or if not, the team (along with Dad) figures out how they will continue toward the outcome.  Then when Joe or Sandy wants to be at the birth of a new grandchild or spend time on the lake, Dad will have their backs too.  This is why customer satisfaction increases in a ROWE – because it’s not just one person serving the customer.  It’s a team that’s all on the same page.

      Win-win for customers *and* employees. 

      • Anonymous

        The phrase “asking permission” is loaded with subtext. Does it imply Dad is working in an authoritarian culture? Or is “asking permission” a simplified way of saying “informing others of planned personal commitments to facilitate a discussion about coverage to ensure the team is able to meet projected milestones?”

        It’s true, that when my employees “ask me for permission” do to something, I feel a little out of place. I’m not interested in deciding what is permissible. Rather, I’m interested in what actually gets done. They aren’t asking for my approval, they are really just trying to find out the impact of their choices. The choice of words is subtle, but important. It changes us from an environment steeped in power to one focused on processes and outcomes.

        Although the probabilities aren’t in your favor, to me the facts imply that World Series Dad might actually work for a ROWE! He looked at his work  items to “arrange for how those would have have been completed / stayed on track” and found that he was so far behind on his “outcomes/measures” that he could not afford to take time away.

        Dad might be working for a ROWE, but just at the end of his rope. Maybe his team has already been covering him with no reciprocity. Maybe his results are so flat that if he stopped work, they’d be lost. Results-Only means that results are what matter. Maybe Dad just isn’t pulling enough weight.

      • Anonymous

        @Robby – don’t we wish Dad would find his way here and just give us the whole back-story? :)   Maybe he will…never know…

        On that note, we don’t have any idea what the real situation was…and maybe none of us ever will given that Dad has turned down opportunities to interview with ESPN and other media outlets. 

        But let’s get to what “asking permission” means.  In our minds, in a work environment where employees are trusted to deliver and use their common sense, they know the impact of their choices.  They know what they’ve agreed to and that they are accountable for delivering it.  If they don’t, that’s a problem.  So to put it simply, I wouldn’t need to inform my boss about how I’m going to spend my time – or ask permission.  I might need to have conversations with co-workers about backing me up, etc.

        You’re right – the choice of words *is* subtle.  And the words become very outcomes-focused in a ROWE. 

        Speaking of word choices, one of our favorites is when managers say “I’m very flexible. I *allow* my employees to go to doctor and dentist appointments.”  This one seemingly small, innocent word lets all the power sit in one place…and sets the stage for permission asking (in the authoritarian sense). 

  • http://workcreatively.org John

    Thought-provoking comments. The thing that struck me when I read the story was imagining being put in a position where I’d have a tough choice to make. Okay, you’ve only got enough vacation days left to travel to see your son in either the upcoming regionals or in the finals, so you’ve got to choose which one in advance. If you pick the regionals, then you’ll have to forgo the finals and the chance to be there with your son for the victory of a lifetime. If you pick the finals, and forgo the regionals, there’s a chance your son’s team won’t make it to the finals, and you’ll have missed your last chance to see him play, something you’ll regret for a long time. So…which is it going to be?!

    • Anonymous

      @John – definitely a tough choice. And a very stressful one…especially since we can’t predict the future and how things are going to play out! Which is why, in a ROWE, everyone works together to meet outcomes and customer needs. One thing that we haven’t mentioned in previous responses is that in a ROWE, if one person isn’t pulling their weight, everyone knows it. They pretty much get kicked off the island. Could this have been the case with Dad? Sure. Maybe he knew he wasn’t pulling his weight and decided it was time to leave.

      More often than not, though, we see people in organizations who *are* pulling their weight and find themselves in positions like you’re describing. What you wrote actually reminds me of a situation I just heard about – a friend of mine got a new job that she was so excited about. Loved what she’d be doing – was definitely fired up to get going. Then they told her “You have to submit which two weeks you want for vacation in 2012 right now.” Her excitement plummeted. She tried to ask if she could wait for awhile longer to submit it, but “No, that’s policy – have your selected weeks turned in within two days,” So…which two weeks are they going to be?! And if someone’s wedding, someone’s funeral, someone’s birth, or someone’s retirement party happens during another week…well, maybe she can make better vacation week selections for 2013.