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 Everywhere I go I hear directors asking what they can do to make their employees more responsible at work. To get them to see what needs to be done over and above each individual task - and then, as it needs to be done, to just get on and do it.
But how do you get staff and managers to demonstrate individual responsibility when in the world at large we are all so often, treated like children with so much around us being dumbed down to the lowest common denominator? For, if you treat someone often enough like a child, then surely they will in time act and think like a child?
So which of these have you seen recently?
- Sign above the hot tap that says ‘this water is hot’
- Sign above the entry door that says ‘emergency exit’
- Notice on your packet of peanuts saying ‘may contain nuts’
Duh – do they think we are going to run into a closed office with no window if a fire breaks out whilst we happen to be standing near the front door? Of course not! For those of us close to it we are going to run (walk?) right through that front door, not even stopping to wave at the sign of the green man that says ‘this way please’!
I was also staggered to hear someone in a public toilets recently loudly complaining to her friend that the hot water was hot and someone really should have put a sign up to say so. Surely any adult using a hot tap would know that ‘hot’ comes in a whole variety of temperatures and the most sensible thing always is to test the water before plunging your whole hand right in. Or is it me who is mad??
You can’t blame the businesses though, as its usually down to our crazy health and safety or insurance culture or companies’ utter terror of being sued for ‘something or other’. And don’t get me wrong, I am not knocking sensible instructions or sensible signage – just instruction and signage overkill!
My 12 year old recently was making pancakes. I left him to get on with mixing up the pancake mixture and in glee he brought me his laptop to show me the instructions he had found on the internet (which even he thought were silly) “Sieve the flour and salt into a mixing bowl. Make a small hollow in the centre of the mixture and drop in the egg (but not the shell)” NOT THE SHELL? Killjoys! I reckon that leaving the shell out could ruin the whole pancake experience?!
You might though argue that for an inexperienced cook a recipe that includes beginner information such as ‘leave out the shell’ is beneficial. My argument though would be that if you always provide all of the answers and make sure that everything is presented in a foolproof way, no one is ever going to learn from experience or learn to think for themselves – and surely that is a very dangerous way to go.
Last year I tweeted about some 999 calls from Japan that used examples of adults failing to show individual responsibility such as ‘my ice cream is melting what should I do’ and ‘my hat has blown off in the wind, will you come and get it back for me’. And last Christmas many of us will have read in the press of the woman dialling 999 to report the theft of her snowman (presumably expecting the police to use their precious resources in locating it for her). Is this the way we want to go in the UK or is it time to stop so much dumbing down and start providing the instructions required which then enable people to learn and think for themselves a little?
All of this prompts me to wonder whether a half day course on Understanding and Developing Individual Responsibility at Work would be of value… what do you think?
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