Imprecise Questions

Yesterday The Sun ran a research-based headline “1 in 5 Brit Muslim’s sympathy for jihadis”. It quickly came in for a lot of criticism. I don’t want to dwell on the politics, or general journalistic reporting of research. But much of the criticism focussed on specifics of the research. If you want to read about that, you can.

What interested me was the phrasing of the statements they were asked to agree with: “I have a lot of/some sympathy with young Muslims who leave the UK to join fighters in Syria”. For a long statement, it’s imprecise. Many picked up that they may go to Syria to fight against jihadis. But for me the real issue is the use of “sympathy”. That could mean they support them. It could mean that they feel sorry for them. And it could mean they see why radicalisation can happen for vulnerable young people. 

I reckon some of the responses covered all of those sentiments – but we’ve no way of knowing in what proportion – or why.

And that’s the problem with a lot of employer research too, engagement surveys being the obvious example. Now, they have a fine line to tread: questions specific enough to be meaningful, whilst keeping a manageable number of questions.

But it’s no coincidence that a lot of my projects start where other research has left off. Without a level of precision, all they can hope to do is to identify where there is a problem. But they often can’t tell you precisely what the problem is, or why.

You’ve got to start somewhere, but if you’re dedicating time and energy to listening to employees, make sure that your questions are precise enough to get you valuable insight. Or build in the time to get deeper into the bigger findings.

Golden. Delicious?

Marketing is powerful. Don’t let anyone tell you it’s not.

Allow me to re-hash a story about beer. Brits started holidaying in Europe from the 70s. And drank lager there. They wanted to drink lager at home too. So brewers brought it to the UK. But not at 5+% ABV. No, Brits wanted to drink pints (and pints) of it. So they made it weaker. Naturally, it tasted terrible. So they needed very good marketing: “Probably the best…refreshes the parts…I bet he drinks…” And for 30-odd years we chose to drink terrible beer. That’s powerful.

And Hugh Fearnley-Whatsit got me thinking about another old marketing story. When the common market opened access to Europe, we got Golden Delicious apples. And it usurped a lot of traditional varieties. Ask anyone, in a rational moment, what’s the better tasting apple, and a Cox kicks its backside. Golden Delicious is an inspid apple. Neither tasty nor juicy. Often unforgivably mushy. But they have something going for them. Consistency. For all it lacks in anything you might actually want from an apple, on the supermarket shelf it’s always the same size and colour. As a variety, it’s got its own in-built marketing. As shoppers, we like that standardisation. 

But thinking about marketing employers, we often don’t want volume of customers (employees / applicants) – we want quality. When you look at your employer reputation it’s easy to pitch a broad appeal, to fail to differentiate. It’s easy to match the other apples on the shelf. Your ambition should be bigger. You should aim to dig out your unique characteristics and circumstance, to market how your heritage, culture, vision combine to create a unique working opportunity. Wouldn’t we all rather be an Egremont Russet, a Red Pippin, a Worcester Pearmain? And wouldn’t the discerning candidate choose them?

Don’t settle for being a Golden Delicious – find your unique qualities.

People Are Problems

They’re not productive

They don’t take initiative

They can’t perform

They won’t challenge the norm

They’re not having fun

I don’t come to work to have fun

They refuse to be engaged

They’re too poorly managed

They’re not present

They’re too present

They really resent, that

They have too many e-mails, if

They didn’t have the e-mails, then

They could communicate

They don’t want to stagnate

They can’t collaborate

They just won’t innovate

They want to work flexibly

(Where the hell is everybody?!)

They don’t get the strategy

They don’t know “what’s in it for me?”

And did we mention the customer?

Oh.

We forgot about the customer.

That was what I took away from #CIPD15 last week. OK, it would have been a short conference if people were simple. But each person that I spoke to or listened to, added to this idea:

People are Problems

People are the most complex and fallible component of the organisational machine.

And they are irrational. At least customers are predictably irrational. But employees spend so long at work, there are so many assumptions about how we should work, and it all relies on human-human interaction. The predictability goes, the problems start.

But what I also heard a great deal of was:

People are Solutions

Talk to them. Get their feedback. Get their ideas. Try their ideas. Measure the effect of their ideas.

They’ll identify the problems in a heartbeat. Give them a few more and they usually have the solution too. It’ll help you help them simplify, to work through the problems, and get back to the customer.

[With special mention and thanks to Professor Cary Cooper, Glassdoor, Plum Consultancy, Brand Ethos, Octopus, Certus]