This Week’s Streak: Be Your Own “Undercover Boss”
After watching an exciting Superbowl game, I tuned into CBS’s new reality show called “Undercover Boss” – because evidently I just don’t get enough screen time. I was especially interested in tuning into “Undercover Boss” after seeing the CEO of Waste Management, Larry O’Donnell, interviewed by Jim Cramer on “Mad Money” on CNBC. Jim liked “Undercover Boss” so much he kept plugging CBS.
Larry wanted to see what happened in his company where the rubber met the road. He knew in order to increase, in his words, “efficiencies” – not to lay people off – but to keep and possibly add jobs, his company needed to be streamlined. He wanted to find out what was and what was not working on the front lines.
What I found was that as a COO, Donnell put a human face to corporate leadership. He also encompassed leadership in his concern for people and his ability to empathize was apparent – you could read his face and see how deeply this experience was affecting him. The lightbulbs were literally just going off in his head.
I do not think he found what he was expecting to find. Since he mentioned the word “efficiency” at the top of the story he was looking for inefficiencies that could be corrected in order for people to be more productive. What he found were model employees who were being set up for failure instead of success. He found effective employees who were being penalized for working hard.
Some of the things he noted as he shadowed various front line employees were “effectiveness” issues such as: the importance of employee morale, employees not feeling micromanaged, employees doing the job of one person versus more than one person, the opportunity to take a break to find a bathroom when on the road versus peeing in a can, making work fun while getting the job done, the importance of establishing relationships with customers, showing people you care, putting names and faces together, and not being docked for being a couple of minutes late.
As a result of the show, two employees were hired after one woman, who was doing three jobs, got promoted and hired two people to take her place. It will take a while for Waste Management to collect enough data to see trends, but what we did see was an empowered COO and empowered employees. The icing on the cake for me was at the end of the show. A middle manager named Kevin finally, and genuinely, smiled which showed that he, too, was beginning to step up to the plate as a leader – someone who works hard and puts the human element into their work.
The irony was that the employees were leading within their capacity. They were all doing outstanding jobs in spite of their work environment. The corporate leaders and middle managers were the ones who were not leading to their capacity. This show is about leadership, at all levels, pure and simple. It really is not about efficiency or effectiveness per se. Leading is not about having others follow you; it is about going first and setting the example. Ironically, the front line employees were exhibiting more personal leadership at the beginning of the show and everyone came full circle by the end of the show.
Check-In on your last Request: What did you do? Did you get everything done by the time you set for yourself? If not, what would you like to do differently?
Request (Give me a Yes, No, or Counteroffer): Will you tune into “Undercover Boss” at 9 p.m. Sundays CST on CBS or visit the CBS website for further information?
Inquiry (something to ponder): What does leadership mean to me?
