{"id":16556,"date":"2023-10-06T11:51:19","date_gmt":"2023-10-06T11:51:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mysourcefunding.com\/leadership\/why-more-workers-feel-replaceable-before-their-bodies-are-cold\/"},"modified":"2023-10-06T11:51:20","modified_gmt":"2023-10-06T11:51:20","slug":"why-more-workers-feel-replaceable-before-their-bodies-are-cold","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mysourcefunding.com\/?p=16556","title":{"rendered":"Why More Workers Feel Replaceable Before Their Bodies Are Cold"},"content":{"rendered":"
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No employee wants to feel like a number that can be easily replaced. But as the divide between employers and employees widens, worker loyalty is rapidly fading. When I turned to Gloria St. Martin-Lowry for answers, she told me, \u201cThey\u2019d replace you before your body\u2019s cold.\u201d The president of HPWP Group asked, \u201cHow\u2019d we get so disposable?\u201d She went on to share the story of a Google software engineer who dedicated twenty years of his life to the company only to be laid off by email with no personal goodbye. And she says there are hundreds of similar stories.<\/p>\n

Treating Employees As A Commodity<\/h2>\n

Just last month Fortune reported that the CEO of Frontier Airlines claims workers have gotten \u201clazy\u201d as a result of the pandemic, complaining that people are still allowed to work from home. Allowed<\/em> to work from home? This view of workers as simply a set of hands to do the work comes amid sweeping return-to-office mandates, as employees across the country are ordered<\/em> back to the office. \u201cWhen you view people as a commodity, it is only natural to treat them as such, St. Martin-Lowry observes. \u201cPeople are seen as interchangeable, and you can always hire another set of hands when you need to. I have heard numerous leaders say that turnover is just \u2018a cost of doing business.\u2019\u201d A survey from Boston Consulting Group (BCG) shows that these blanket mandates often result in higher levels of employee dissatisfaction and attrition; yet many employers are cracking down, arguing that in-person collaboration is crucial for a thriving workforce.<\/p>\n

Employee Reactions To The \u2018Disposable Phenomenon\u2019<\/h2>\n

The workforce\u2014especially younger employees\u2014has retaliated against hard-lined demands with passive reactions from \u201cquiet quitting,\u201d to \u201cloud laborers\u201d to \u201ccoffee badging\u201d to keep from feeling disposable as companies ramp up return-to-office mandates. A recent report shows 90% of companies plan to implement return-to-office policies by the end of 2024, and nearly 30% will threaten to fire employees who don’t comply. But employees aren’t giving up the return-to-office war any time soon with nearly seven in 10 employees reporting they’d rather look for a new job than return to the office, and 66% say they\u2019re ready to leave jobs if mandated to five-day workweeks.<\/p>\n

I also turned to David Chadwick, CEO of RealResponse, for answers to the \u2018disposable employee phenomenon\u2019. He believes the overarching factor is employers who turn a deaf ear to worker issues and the employee\u2019s inability to share concerns, suggestions or complaints without fear of retaliation from the company. Workers start to feel replaceable, and they vent their resentment on company chat groups to air grievances because they don\u2019t feel safe to direct their concerns to the corporate honchos. And that has a trickle-down effect across the entire organization, Chadwick points out. \u201cBy demanding a return to the office, employers are not \u2018shooting themselves in the foot necessarily,\u2019 but they are definitely having to navigate a newfound sensitivity as remote work options are becoming more of an expectation from employees\u2014especially among younger generations who tend to expect employers to adapt to their needs and are becoming less likely to settle.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Solutions To The \u2018Disposable Phenomenon\u2019<\/h2>\n

What solutions can employers implement to mitigate the \u201cdisposable phenomenon\u201d among the workforce? \u201cThe bottom line is that employers are beginning to see (or are just now drawing the line) that fully remote work is unsustainable in maintaining productivity levels across their workforce,\u201d Chadwick told me. \u201cThat\u2019s why many companies are landing on an office\/remote hybrid model.\u201d He states that many employers recognize that going back to five days in the office won\u2019t appeal to current or prospective employees, but he points out that employers have alternatives.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere are several methods in place for employers to collect and aggregate employee feedback, and that communication channel will only grow in importance as workplaces revert to older modalities,\u201d he explains. \u201cIt is critical that employers are aware of their employees\u2019 concerns surrounding return-to-office mandates and other matters. Employers must recognize that employees react differently depending on their own unique circumstances, so it is just as important to be sensitive to personal situations and to try to alleviate their concerns. Communicating the return-to-office policy should be handled strategically and thoughtfully.\u201d He insists that many employers have added insult to injury, sharpening employee strife because they have not consulted with workers before implementing return-to-office mandates. \u201cBut with the proper tools, employers can make more informed decisions based on feedback from employees, and subsequently employees feel respected and heard, even if they disagree with the decision.\u201d<\/p>\n

There\u2019s a reason why Matt Mullenweg\u2019s employees don\u2019t feel disposable. The founder and CEO of Automattic told me his company has employed a distributed workforce versus under-a-single-roof requirement for 20 years. “It works for us because it allows us to recruit the best talent in the world,\u201d Mullenweg explains. \u201cAutonomy and productivity can be achieved at home. You have to instill a culture of trust, kindness, open communication and transparency. What people are getting wrong about distributed work is that they aren\u2019t doing in-person meetups right. We invest in focused, personal time together. Our meetups aren\u2019t like team off-sites, which big companies already do. We travel to beautiful places together and spend time bonding. It helps us build trust and makes it easier to collaborate.\u201d<\/p>\n

Cameron Yarbrough, co-founder of people development platform at Torch, agrees that knee-jerk demands for a full return to the office are stultifying. \u201cThe logic, such as it is, of \u2018this is the way we’ve always done it\u2019 ignores the transformation in leadership styles away from the old military-industrial Command and Control approach that many leaders are still clinging to, and towards a trust-based style,\u201d he argues. \u201cWe need better ways of managing that take into account how modern technology has transformed the way knowledge is shared, how people now want to work together and how their performance is best measured and managed. The reality is that without capable, human-centered leadership, you will create an unhealthy company culture that will be counterproductive, encouraging your best people to leave and ending up needlessly part of a trillion dollar problem.\u201d<\/p>\n

Yarbrough emphasizes that it\u2019s the leader\u2019s responsibility to meet employees where they are by creating a culture of accountability, providing clear guidelines and establishing effective communication channels. \u201cThis will all deliver greater organizational effectiveness, but sadly it is easier to blame workers for things like wanting to work where it suits them than it is to put these leaders and structures in place.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Read the full article here<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

No employee wants to feel like a number that can be easily replaced. But as the divide between employers and employees widens, worker loyalty is rapidly fading. When I turned to Gloria St. Martin-Lowry for answers, she told me, \u201cThey\u2019d replace you before your body\u2019s cold.\u201d The president of HPWP Group asked, \u201cHow\u2019d we get […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":16557,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"content-type":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[76],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-16556","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-leadership"},"yoast_head":"\nWhy More Workers Feel Replaceable Before Their Bodies Are Cold | Brandiary<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"No employee wants to feel like a number that can be easily replaced. 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