Embracing the Age of Ambiguity
In conversation with Dr Suba M and Professor Sir Cary Cooper CBE
Suba
Hi everyone. I am Suba and I'm the Associate Medical Director at Aviva Health and Protection and I'm so excited to be speaking with Sir Cary Cooper, who is a Professor of Organisational Psychology at Manchester Business School. Welcome Cary, hope you're well?
Cary
I'm very well. Thank you Suba. It's great talking to you again.
Suba
Thank you. Today I want to do get your opinion and try and have a bit of a conversation about this Age of Ambiguity report that I have read. One key thing that struck with me about this report is just how much ambiguity we're all managing. I mean, we've got a blurring of home and work life. We're juggling multiple responsibilities and there's this constant pressure, at least what I feel, to live your best life. And in the survey, we found that about more than half of the respondents felt that their boundaries between home and work are blurred. So, in your opinion, do you think this ambiguity that we're experiencing is just a personal reaction to how things are working out? Or do you think that is a societal shift that is exacerbating what we're paying attention to? And as a result, how we are reacting to all of this change that is around us?
Cary
Well, it's quite interesting that even pre COVID people were talking about work-life balance was a big issue. Almost all the employee survey showed it. In fact, I had done a book which was published in May would you believe, I was very lucky, called Flexible Work. It was a scientific study. It was an edited volume across the globe saying, well, what do people want in work in the future? And what they were talking about is work-life integration. They wanted to work much more from home but go into a central office from time to time. What they didn't want of course is what we got during the first lockdown and everything else. Which was all about 100% working from home, home schooling and all that. What they wanted is a blend. They wanted to work substantially from home if they could. And there's a lot of people who can't, if you're a bus driver, you're a pilot, you worked in a paced assembly line.
Cary
You can't do that. You have to actually go to the coalface as it were. But what people actually wanted was work-life integration, some autonomy over their job. And if you look at the studies on stress, the people who have more autonomy and control of their job, in other words, I want to work. I want to come in from time to time to team build, to schmooze, to socialise with my colleagues, etc. But I don't want to work exclusively from there. Those people have more job satisfied, had less sickness absence and were more productive. The ambiguity that we've been experiencing is actually actualising what people wanted more and now employers realise - guess what? They can do this, but they don't want to do it exclusively.
Suba
Yeah. And do you think there's a difference between different groups of people who either want to embrace that ambiguity? Or some people are saying, "Well, I quite like my routine. I've always liked coming in and going back." How do employers deal with that? I'm assuming everybody reacts in a very different way, right?
Cary
Yeah, absolutely. For example, take young people coming out of university, college, FE wherever. They need for their own development and for their own social development, need to be with other people. Those people are going to want to be more in a central office environment in the future. And they need it because they need to be exposed to mentors and people who come in. Even if they only come in from time to time, they're learning from them. And they have real strong social needs. They meet their partnership work incidentally – so that's another point.
Cary
Those people will need to... and then there are other people who live in a box go to work in a box called a train tube or whatever, then go into another box called work. And they like the box type orientation. Come back, buy a box and go home with a box. And they don't like the environments mixed. That is a small proportion of people incidentally, but there are people like that and they will need a central office environment. The future I think, will be work-life integration, people working substantially from home. And I think the report shows that. But there are different models and there will be different people who need to be in a central office substantially.
Suba
Yeah. And one of the things that I thought about, and I've personally experienced it working from home, it feels a bit like living at work. And I know in this report we found 60 odd percent were working beyond their contracted hours at least once a week. And this integration is a fantastic concept, but do you think that then, can quite quickly shift into that never being able to switch off? Because that isn't that box that compartmentalisation sometimes supports you from getting burnt out and things.
Cary
Yeah. We're going to have to learn how to do this. I mean, this is a new thing for us. But also here's the implication for me Suba which I think is really important. And employers have to think about this. And that is about the line manager from shop floor to top floor. This is the critical dimension. The line manager before had people in front of him or her, but this has changed now. How do I manage people? Some people are in an office. Some people work remotely. How do I identify when they're not coping very well? Because mental health is the big issue.
Cary
Pre COVID the last report by the health and safety executive found 57% of all long-term sickness absence was due to stress, anxiety, and depression. We know that, we were seeing that happening for a long time. And entering a recession we're going to get more of that. So, the issue is how do I manage and build teams when people are working in different places? How do I recognise when some people are not coping? Because when you're together and you can look at, and you're a line manager, and you can see that Fred is usually very robust in these meetings, he's very withdrawn.
Suba
Yeah.
Cary
Suba is usually really buoyant and alive and very friendly. And all of a sudden she's more aggressive in a meeting. In other words, change of behaviour. And you won't get that on Zoom so much. How the hell do you do it is the problem. And that's why I think we have to go into central offices from time to time. It's important for team building no matter what. That's going to happen. But the line manager, how do we ensure that the line managers get training on EQ emotional intelligence? Social, interpersonal skills? How do we recruit line managers in the future who have parity between their technical skills and their social skills? That's going to be a real big future issue.
Suba
Yeah. Again, it is great you've started the conversation about this. But again, another thing that really struck me while we're having this discussion, but also on this particular topic is the focus and the role of the employer. I mean, this report shocked me actually that only a third of respondents felt loyal to their employer. What do you think the employees ought to do to really shift the needle on that statistic? Because the line managers again, I think is a really important piece because when you feel that loyalty, are you feeling loyalty to your line manager? Are you feeling loyalty to your HR director? Are you feeling that loyalty to this brand? Or this organisation? How do you break that down? And what can employers actually do?
Cary
I think by the way, it's all of the things you mentioned by the way. It's the brand, it's the culture of the company. It's your line manager, it's your team, it's all of that. But what was happening pre COVID as a result of 2008 recession? What ended up happening is we had fewer people that were doing more work. They were showing more face time i.e. presenteeism, because they were worried about their jobs etc. That changed the view of HR, where all of a sudden wellbeing became a big issue. How do we create a well-being culture? Now what does a well-being culture mean? It means people feeling trusted and valued, managed to by praise and reward not fault-finding. Although they do need to get adequate feedback on their behaviour or constructive feedback when they're not performing well and all of that. Being able to work flexibly if they wanted to, this is pre COVID.
Cary
All of those things make a well-being culture. Your boss saying to recognise you and saying when you've done a good job. That requires a certain amount of social skills on the part of line managers. It means not working people long hours, not sending them emails on a Friday night when they're going home to their families. Managing the email, having guidance on email. There’s a whole range of things make up well-being. For me, the fundamental building block on that is the line manager, but it's also the culture the organisation creates. And a well-being culture says to individuals, "This is what we expect you to do when you do it, where you do it, how you do it it's fine." And giving feedback when they're not. And making sure that they're coping well, if they have manageable workloads, realistic deadlines.
Cary
So actually that's how you achieve loyalty. Because here's the big issue I think we have Suba. The big issue I think is well, the millennials and the Z Generation, that's our future, all our futures. They're going to pay our retirement for us. Now, that generation everybody's calling the snowflakes. And the reason they're calling it that, is because they move around jobs. And I noticed from my students, when they come back to me I say, “Are you still working with X? "Oh no, I left them. Why'd you leave them? Oh, I didn't want, they were not a good employer.
Cary
There were long hours or sending emails while I was on holiday. They never recognised my work. They never gave me a challenge etc and so I'm with so-and-so." Now employers think they're snowflakes because they go from one employer to the other. But you know why they do that? Because it's the loyalty issue. Because they don't feel their employer gives them the kind of autonomy, recognise them, challenges them, helps them, supports them. It's the wrong culture. Culture is the critical thing and a well-being culture retains people and certain retains the millennials.
Suba
Yeah. I mean, we've been talking about millennials and how do you motivate them? And again, this is really interesting. One thing, I mean, I had two thoughts that came to my mind when you were talking. The first thing is you mentioned the financial crash in 2008 and how wellbeing surfaced at that time. And perhaps it was there, but it wasn't necessarily at least in my view something that everybody picked up and ran with it. Initially there was a lot of focus on it and then it died down. And of course, some organisations continued with that and saw benefits of it. Do you think that we are currently in a different state? Which means that this well-being culture, it won't be a passing fad, it will actually stick? And that is something that organisations have to do rather than want to do, or think of it as an added value thing that they don't need to focus on?
Cary
Oh, absolutely. What ended up happening is you're right. At the beginning of the recession say 2008, companies were getting into health and well-being because they wanted to retain good staff. As an HR director said to me, he said, "Professor..." I said to him, "Why, you never did wellbeing stuff before the recession? Why are you doing it now?" And he said two critical words. He said, "The talent is what's really important." He says, "Regrettable turnover is my major concern." I said, "What do you mean by that? I like the concept." And he said, "We're losing. We got so mean and lean. We lost 30, 40% of our people. There's somebody in the finance sector. We lost 30, 40% of our staff. During that period of time, we’re really mean now and lean. We need to keep the people we've got and we are losing. If we lose people, that's regrettable turnover who are fundamental to us, it's going to adversely affect our job."
Cary
That was their concern in 2008. And then there was a gradual, let's do mindfulness at lunch and let's do sushi at your desk and massages and beanbags and ping pong tables. That is not well-being. It's a change of culture. All of a sudden pre COVID the last three or four years before COVID hit, they got the message. And then it became a strategic board issue. I have a university spinoff company called Robertson Cooper. It's university of Manchester Spinoff Company. Guess what? We're getting one, two, three year contracts to work with boards to work with this chief exec to work with the senior leadership teams to create a well-being culture. That's the change. Rather than come and do mindfulness for us. They're now saying, "Help us create a new culture." It was beginning to change then this tripartite situation of COVID, the recession and Brexit will mean this is here to stay big time.
Suba
Yeah. I'm hearing loud and clear. It's not optional, it's mandatory. And it's not a series of services, but fundamental strategic imperative from the board to really walk the walk as it were with regards to a well-being culture. That's really interesting as well, because the other thing that I was thinking about when you started talking was this concept of autonomy. How much does autonomy influence how satisfied you are in your job? But also the sense of purpose? Because again, with the millennials when you were saying that they are moving around. One of the things that came up in this report was the way in which people prioritise, what the importance of doing meaningful work is. And it feels to me that that is now, it's not enough to get a salary. That there's a need for meaning and purpose. Do you think that there is shift again as a wider thing? Or is it being driven by millennials or where's that coming from?
Cary
I think it's driven by millennials actually. I think you're right when you said that. It is certainly there. We developed an instrument called I resilience made up of four… What's resilience mean? One of the four characteristics psychometrically we found that is a part of resilience is a sense of purpose. I have a sense of purpose, not just about adaptability, how adaptable are you to be resilient? Or and so on. But you have to have a sense of purpose. And I think the millennials are driving that. They're saying, "Hey, I want to do something meaningful." Even, I'm president of the CIPD, Chartered Institute of Personnel Development. It's the HR professional body in the UK, Ireland and a number of other countries incidentally as well. And what's our theme? Our theme is good work, purposeful work. And people want that. I mean, if you feel you're making a contribution to something it's like, was it John F. Kennedy was walking through a plant? Can't remember that thing. He was walking through a plant in NASA wasn't it?
Suba
Yes. Yeah.
Cary
And then he met the cleaner and he said, "What do you do here?" And he said, "Well, I help take men to the moon." It wasn't just cleaning. He had a sense of purpose. And yet he was doing what other people would call them less meaningful job. But guess what? He was a part of that process of getting somebody to the moon. And I think that's right. And we all have a role to play. And the more that we create a culture in which people feel that, and you get that feeling again, from your boss, whoever you are, wherever you are from the shop floor, all the way up. Our boss makes us feel good, feels that we're making a contribution and that we're adding value. That's the point.
Suba
Again, another shocking statistic, going back to the report, only 15% of those under 35 really enjoy their job. For me, I mean, firstly, that's incredibly worrying. But then the other thing that came to me was is it that the expectation of that purpose? Is different because it has to be really obvious to them. The story that you said about the janitor and NASA was it something that's driven by NASA? Was it driven by that individual to seek that purpose and meaning?
Suba
And what can employers actually do? Or do they have to say to each individual, look, I know you're looking at a spreadsheet, but it's up to you to find the meaning of the purpose of your work. Looking at an excel spreadsheet. I mean, I'm assuming that there's a bit of both. An employee can frame the way that they look at things, but an employer can make it easy to work through the steps of how an excel spreadsheet leads to a meaningful outcome for individuals or customers that we serve. What's your take? What works best?
Cary
I think you're right. I think it's me. It's my boss. And it's the culture it's from on high, what kind of an organisation are they creating? But what I think is really quite significant. It's partly me. Say I might naturally try to find that and try to find a rationalisation for my sense of purpose. I say, "Yeah. I'm cleaning the floor, but I am actually helping to send a man to the moon. If I didn't do this, it'd be dirt. Dirt would get in the thing. The rocket might not work." Whatever your imagination is. You get the message. And then it could be the culture saying everybody here is a part of this ambition to do X whatever X we achieve X. But I actually think the more we recognise people we manage people by praise and reward.
Cary
And we do have to give them feedback when they do things wrong, but constructive feedback. The more... come on any of us who've been in the workplace. When I was a young lecturer and everything else, or you were young and in the medical profession there was always somebody that was there making you feel valued. Making you feel important. Making you feel I can name in my career two or three people that did that to me all the way up in my job. And it made me feel that I had a sense of purpose and I was making a contribution. I think the line again, your bosses are very, very important. And particularly when they recognise what you do. You do something and your boss thinks in his or her head, "Oh, that was a pretty good job.
Cary
That's super good." But doesn't say it, it doesn't help anybody. We have trouble saying it. It's really funny how we can tell somebody off when they make a mistake, but we have a particularly in Britain by the way. Certain cultures I think have real problems, Japanese have the same kind of problem as well. Some cultures have problem saying to people, "That was a really good job. Thank you very much." And I don't mean the American style have a nice day thing. I mean, where you genuinely mean and you say it at the time. I think that goes a long way in helping somebody feel that they have a sense of purpose, that they are making a contribution.
Suba
Yeah. Now, I completely agree. I mean, I've personal experience and I come from Singapore where it's very much my mom was, "look, I expect that out of you. I don't expect you to be praised or rewarded for what I expect that job to be already been delivering." That's a different in terms of culture and how people actually articulate how they feel. I suppose, one of the things that... Again, another stark statistic is that only 34% talking about value and there's only 34% feel valued and trusted by the organisation. For me, that's a gulf that should be overcome. And I suppose there's a challenge to all the employers to say, "Look, how do you get people to move from only a third feeling valued and trusted to much more than that?"
Suba
There's a whole host of things that they can do. And again, one of the things that I like is this whole idea of the fact that, I think there's an anthropologist who said, humans are unfinished animals and human nature is not something is to be discovered, but it's something that's created. And it's created by all of us. And it's designed by the institutions where we live and work. Again, there's a bit of a call to action to say look, the society that we live in is designed by us. It's how we choose to what we choose to put in. And how we choose to build up organisations is going to define the next generation. And there's a huge issue with regards to value, trust, loyalty that we all need to collectively come to overcome. I guess from that point of view, if there were three things an organisation can do what would you think that it should be?
Cary
Well, by the way I think it's really important. I mean, the figures you were showing are worrying figures in a way if only a small proportion of people feel job satisfied and don't feel very valued. One approach…I'll tell you what I think the three things could be. But one approach is, if you create a well-being culture, what you do is you ask people how it can be improved. You don't assume you know the answer to it. I don't know the answer to that question in a particular organisation, but I would ask the employees, "Hey, we find that only a third of you feel very valued. How would you feel more valued? What would make you feel more valued?" For you you'd say it would be, if you recognise my work when I do a good job and you tell me. For somebody else it might be you giving me a wage increase.
Cary
I mean, we have different scenarios. I still think a lot of this has to do with your immediate boss frankly. I think that's really fundamental to everybody's feeling of feeling valued of their job being, making it more job satisfied. It's that relationship when you know that the person trusts you, they recognise you, they give you... That I think is important. And then I think from an organisational point of view, if I was a senior manager, I'd say, how do we reward line managers who do this? If we don't, here's what we do. We promote people based on their technical skills not their people skills. Well, how do we change that? If I was an employer I would think to myself, how do we reward people who actually make people feel valued? You know that their scores are 80% not 30%. 80% of their employees of their direct reports saying, "This guy, this girl is great."
Cary
I feel really valued by them, recognised by them and so on. How do we actually translate that into rewarding that kind of behaviour? I wouldn't say three things. I'd say that thing is probably the most important thing, but it that has to be actioned by the people at the top in some form or another. But always ask your employees. If people show on an employee survey or a stress or wellbeing audit they say, I don't feel recognised. Then what you do is you bring those people together and say, how would you like to be recognised? In what way? What does that mean in practise? What does it mean? And that's the way I think it would get the problem sorted. Because you're going to find in some organisations it's by money recognition. In some organisations it's by praise just telling people when they've done a good job. Some organisations it's by giving them a larger and more interesting and challenging job not necessarily more money, but just challenged. I'm doing that, but I could do that. I know that it's above my pay grade, but I can do it. Those kinds of things.
Suba
Yeah. Is it all about being curious, right? I think sometimes organisations look at a number and think, oh god, that reflects really badly on us. Maybe let's not talk about it. Having that transparency and actually being curious about their employees to say, i'm interested, tell us how we can be better. I think that goes quite a long way as well. No, that's really interesting. I guess that comes to the end of the time that I have got with you. Thank you so much for joining us.
Thank you Cary for joining us today. I certainly enjoyed my time speaking to you. And for those of you who are interested to find out a bit more about the insights that we have gathered, please do read our Embracing the Age of Ambiguity report. Where there are many more interesting facts and factoids for you to indulge in. Thank you so much for joining us.
