Leverage your team’s strengths with personalized coffee mugs! Gallup says employee engagement is the lowest in seven years. You can fix this!
Splitter or Blender: What’s Your Work Style?We once thought we were savvy leaders and managers—
before COVID.We once thought that all team members working on-site was best—
before COVID.We once thought that the five-day week was perfect—
before COVID.BAD NEWS: Everything has changed and Bizarre World seems like the new normal. We all have strong opinions on what works in the workplace.
GOOD NEWS: Gallup’s new book,
Culture Shock (May 30, 2023), sets aside opinions and leverages their stunning research to propose seven
“Recommendations for the New Workplace.” The book’s subtitle immediately teased me into the 30 short, but substantive chapters.
What’s happening in this post-COVID era? The authors warn:• “Nothing is going back to normal. This is a moment of evolutionary change.”
• “The danger is that a majority of employees will now operate more like independent contractors or gig workers than employees who are loyal and committed to your organization.”
• “Employees are also now less likely to say that their organization delivers on its promises to customers.”
• “Simply put, your employees and customers know each other. Many are best friends. All the good stuff in human nature and customers is at risk.”
•
“The real fallout isn’t here yet. The real fallout will come when the storm of declining employee engagement hits the customer.”There’s more bad news! “According to Gallup, a staggering 90% of U.S. employees with desk and office jobs aren’t longing for the old workplace to return. Only CEOs are.” And this:
“…U.S. employee engagement has reached a seven-year low.”Co-author Jim Clifton is Gallup Chairman and co-author Jim Harter, Ph.D., is Gallup’s Chief Workplace Scientist. Research-based, their workplace insights are so, so important—if CEOs and managers will just stop and listen. Don’t skip this one from two insightful leaders. They’ve teamed up before to write
It’s the Manager (
read my review). And Clifton’s
Born to Build, with Sangeeta Badal, Ph.D. (
read my review), is a hopeful look at entrepreneurship.
TOP-10 BOOK. Culture Shock is already on my list of Top-10 Books of 2023. Someone on your team must read and report on this solution-filled path to our post-COVID dilemmas. Your employees and your customers will thank you.
WHO KNEW? There will never be a return to “normal,” warn the authors. “Who knew that everyone in the whole world with an office or desk job could check into
‘Hotel Zoom International’ at the same time. A spectacular digital advancement for humankind came wrapped inside a global health catastrophe.”
BRILLIANTLY PACKAGED into 30 single-topic chapters (about three pages each), the book runs just 158 pages, plus a robust appendix of another 100 pages, plus a tempting 20-page reference section. You’ll appreciate the deep research that helps you solve these pesky post-COVID issues:
•
Chapter 3: “The Business Problem.” The authors’ stunning opening: “You probably haven’t heard this:
‘Our employees and front-line managers control customer outcomes and daily cash flow more than any other single lever we can pull.’”•
Chapter 4: “The Role Human Nature Plays in Business Outcomes.” Using the “Gallup Path
®” graphic, the authors admonish:
“Customer retention is the most critical metric on a CEO’s dashboard.” They add, “…your engaged employees create your engaged customers.”
•
Chapter 5: “The Most Important Habit of a Great Manager.” Why getting this wrong “is the root cause of burnout.” The habit?
“One meaningful conversation per week with each team member.”CONFESSION! We all make
mistakes and Gallup confesses this: “Over the years, Gallup missed asking
why people who have desk jobs are required to travel miles from their home to sit in what is basically just a different chair. Like many things, we just assumed there was no better way.”
So what’s the best way forward? In-person, work from home, or a hybrid model? Chapter 7 goes deeper on
“Why the Commute?” and Chapter 8 delivers the latest surprising research on
“Is In-Person Time That Valuable?” But two chapters jumped out at me:
Chapter 10: “Splitters and Blenders: Two Different Relationships to Work.” Oh, my. I’ve built my management model around what I call “The 3 Powerful
S’s:
Strengths,
Social Styles, and
Spiritual Gifts.” Now…I’ll have to add a fourth “S” for “
Splitters and Blenders!”
A new question from Gallup:
“In your best life imaginable, would you prefer a job that is 9 to 5 where work and life are separated, or one where work and life are more blended throughout the day?” • “
Splitters might work best at home or in the office but want to maintain a strict schedule of hours in each location.”
• “
Blenders might get their work done on weekends, evenings or early in the morning before the office opens.”
But here’s the gut-check:• “Imagine managing someone and not knowing which type of employee they are.”
•
“Now imagine leading a team of people who don’t know who the splitters are and who the blenders are on the team.”And this is interesting: “Gen Z and young millennials are equally divided between splitters and blenders.” And “45% of working baby boomers prefer a work-life blend.” Plus, another warning! “Overall, blenders are more likely than splitters to be looking for another job (53% vs. 48% respectively). This presents a slightly greater challenge for retaining these employees.”
Chapter 12: “Is the Four-Day Workweek a Good Idea?” Read the full chapter to understand the nuances for your organization, but note this: “Our data suggest that a four-day workweek may be advantageous for those who do not have the option to work remotely.”
“THE REAL PROBLEM is that most employees are poorly managed.” In the U.S., almost seven in 10 employees are not engaged—or worse, disengaged—at work. “These people are spending their workday watching the clock, intentionally working against their employer or planning their escape—a symptom of an unhappy workplace.”
ALERT! “If instead of shortening the workweek, employers focused on improving the
quality of the work experience, they could nearly triple the positive influence on their employees’ lives.”
There’s so much more here—so order this must-read book and discover…• …the six skill sets of great managers.
“Managers account for 70% of the variance in team engagement.” (Chapter 27)
• …why “only 21% of employees strongly agree that they trust the leadership of their organization.”
• …what matters more than the number of days an employee is at the office. “…80% of employees who said they received meaningful feedback in the past week were fully engaged—regardless of how many days they worked in the office.”
•
…why (gulp!) “only 16% said that the last conversation with their manager was extremely meaningful.” (See Chapter 29, “One Meaningful Conversation With Each Employee per Week.”)
• …the 7 Recommendations for the New Workplace.
(See Part 5: “Gallup’s CEO Playbook.”)WEEKLY CHAT! Chapter 29, based on a study of 2,354 teams,
“How to Make Meaningful Conversations a Weekly Habit,” will require that your managers are coached so they’ll become competent coaches. And by the way, does your organization have a
certified CliftonStrengths coach? (Note: See my two-page form from the Meetings Bucket, “
Weekly Update to My Supervisor,” which outlines how to have a meaningful weekly conversation—and includes reminders about “The 3 Powerful S’s” for both the manager and the direct report.)
ONE MORE. I gotta add this! On disengaged employees and the coming customer crisis, the authors warn that
board members “don’t pay attention to this stuff because they can’t see the connection.” Example: When the chief human resources officer (CHRO) convinces the board that employee engagement is at 80%, then the board claps, “and the CHRO leaves with the board believing 80% of their employees are engaged.” (Rarely true!) Here’s why:
BAMBOOZLED BOARDS! You must read why only 5s on a 1 to 5 scale (5 = strongly agree) should be counted. (Many HR surveys count the 4s also.) Example: How many team members would strongly agree (a 5) with this statement:
“There is someone at work who encourages my development.” (See Chapter 3 for more engagement questions.)
In addition to several brilliant examples on how the CliftonStrengths assessment keeps square pegs out of round holes (read about Jenny, Deepak, and Giselle), the authors give this startling stat:
Just one in 10 managers have been trained on how to manage in a hybrid environment! And…don’t skip the fascinating short profiles on three strengths pioneers:
Peter Drucker, Abraham Maslow, and Don Clifton.
I know…you have a lot of work ahead.To order from Amazon, click on the title for
Culture Shock: An Unstoppable Force Has Changed How We Work and Live. Gallup's Solution to the Biggest Leadership Issue of Our Time, by Jim Clifton and Jim Harter. And thanks to Gallup Press for sending me a review copy.
YOUR WEEKLY STAFF MEETING QUESTIONS:1) Does your weekly staff meeting need to change? According to
Culture Shock, “Among hybrid employees, 32% indicate that virtual meetings are less effective than in-person meetings, compared with 17% who say virtual meetings are more effective. More than half (51%) say there is no difference.”
So…which meeting formats are working for us—and what’s not working? Do we know everyone’s preferred style: Splitters or Blenders?2) The world is changing! Read
this WSJ article by Alexandra Samuel, “How Retailers Should Start Catering to Hybrid-Working Customers. A lot of us no longer work 9 to 5, or commute into the office. Yet retail businesses seem stuck in a different era.” Then ask your team members:
“Has our organization made any significant changes in our products, programs, or services—that relate to hybrid-working customers?”
Mastering 100 Must-Read Books
Part 5: The Mount Rushmore of Leadership Legends (Ken Blanchard)
Book #33 of 100: Leadership Smarts For your team meeting this week, inspire a team member to lead your “10 Minutes for Lifelong Learning” session by featuring Book #33 in
Mastering 100 Must-Read Books.
Leadership Smarts:
Inspiration and Wisdom from the Heart of a Leader
by Ken Blanchard
Books #22 through #40 spotlight 19 books I named to
“The Mount Rushmore of Leadership Legends” group—featuring Patrick Lencioni, Jim Collins, Ken Blanchard, and Peter Drucker. Part 5 features five books by Blanchard, including this tasty smorgasbord of leadership axioms and quotations.
•
Read my review.
• Order from
Amazon:
Leadership Smarts •
Download the 100 Must-Read Books list (from John and Jason Pearson)
Blanchard delivers a one-liner (in big type) on each left-hand page and his color commentary (in 100 words or less) on the right-hand page. I counted 75 “leadership smarts” from the mind of the chief spiritual officer of the Ken Blanchard Companies. Here’s some brain food:
• “The key to developing people is to catch them doing something right.”
•
“Things not worth doing are not worth doing well.” • “Success is not forever and failure isn’t fatal.”
•
“What motivates people is what motivates people.” • “People with humility don’t think less of themselves, they just think of themselves less.”
This is fresh:•
“Trying is just a noisy way of not doing something.” Blanchard adds, “Many people are interested rather than committed. They talk about trying to do something, rather than actually doing it. They make lots of noise, but fail to follow-up.”
Just open this book to almost any page—and inspire your people:• “Vision is a lot more than putting a plaque on the wall. A real vision is lived, not framed.”
•
“A river without banks is a large puddle.” (Blanchard on boundaries.)
• “All empowerment exists in the present moment.”
• “The cure of too much to do is solitude and silence.”
PEARPOD | TELLING YOUR STORY. Whoa! Ken Blanchard writes, “This is the first time in the history of business that you can be great at what you’re doing today and be out of business tomorrow.” Gallup warns about “culture shock” (see above). Are you resting on your laurels—or strategizing on the story you’ll be communicating next week and next month? We can help. Contact Jason Pearson at Pearpod (Design, Digital, Marketing, Social).
Issue No. 658 of Your Weekly Staff Meeting (Oct. 3, 2025) features a new book coming Oct. 7—describing the four seasons of a CEO. The “...