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The sociological health-centric Reasonable Person Model as it applies to increasing productivity in the workplace, in annotated PDF form for presenters
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• Everyone has a mental map of how the world works – map of ideas rather than loca8ons. If these maps do not overlap sufficiently between workers, coopera8on will suffer, team projects will take longer, and produc8vity will suffer
• It is worth no8ng that this is, essen8ally, the ideal scenario; you can shape your employees mental models to fit, but only to a certain extent, as ideas and preconcep8ons are shaped by all of life – and while viewpoints and though processes need to overlap enough for shared goals, methods, and communica8on across the team, lack of overlap can bring poten8ally valuable fresh ideas in
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• Your goal is to be in the yellow sec8on of this pie chart, but leave enough leeway in those guidelines to allow for differences between employees – have enough of a procedure when orien8ng new employees that everyone has the same key informa8on about the company, their jobs, and the significance thereof, but remember that everybody’s mental map is different, and the point of orienta8on is to expand that map so it overlaps with everybody else’s; as such, you’ll need to vary orienta8on to connect where they are now mentally with where you need them to be mentally
• don’t just show employees their cubicles and how to do what is expected of them. Take the 8me to explain the organiza8on and how their work maJers to the big picture – make sure they understand the context in which their work is important, rather than just what their work is
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• Absolutely vital to orienta8on and avoidance of problems ranging from inconvenience to disaster
• Illustrated is the Mars Climate Orbiter, intended to orbit Mars and take climate data. Less than five minutes aQer entering Mars’ orbit, it fell down to Mars, disintegra8ng in the process, losing NASA $274 million in today’s dollars. Cause of failure: mostof the systems onboard had been programmed to calculate in metric, while onehad been programmed to calculate in Imperial – in essence, some of the engineers working on it were using one set of language, and the rest were using another.
• Obviously, this is a worst-‐case scenario of the consequences of failing to make sure everyone uses the same language, but it is nevertheless a vivid illustra8on of what can happen when mental models do not overlap on language. Always make sure new employees know all the relevant jargon, acronyms, and terms – give them a cheat sheet if need be, or encourage them to write their own.
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• There are fundamentally two kinds of aJen8on: directed and involuntary • Directed aJen8on, the sort needed for work, is inherently limited
• Result: Near-‐universal problem of late aQernoon exhaus8on, lethargy, irritability, need for endless stream of coffee even when technically well rested and not physically exerted
• Studies have shown that engaging in involuntary aJen8on, most par8cularly relaxa8on in what is perceived as a natural se\ng, can recharge directed aJen8on, increasing produc8vity
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There are several ways companies can provide such produc8vity-‐enhancing se\ngs • Sponsor a nearby public park • Have greenery and benches nearby your building in lieu of a larger parking
lot, if your business property is big enough to allow for such • Consider a rooQop garden if local property setup or costs prohibit either of
the others • Furthermore, try to have something nature-‐like visible from office windows. If the
distracted person in the previous slide is going to look around in distrac8on, it’s beJer to have something known to recharge his directed aJen8on in his field of view so looking around serves to get him back to work and work harder, rather than serving as a waste of 8me
• This is, of course, a func8on of where your office is, what 8me of year, and the neighborhood. Be reasonable – encourage employees to have lunch in the park whenever prac8cal, but if the weather is 20˚ below zero, any form of encouragement saying that will make you seem out of touch
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• An employee that feels like a cog in the machine isn’t mo8vated, and produc8vity suffers
• There is an important dis8nc8on between par3cipa3on and control. People want to feel like they have had a meaningful effect on their surroundings – but they also don’t want the responsibility and stress of having control over final ac8on and decisionmaking process
• This dovetails nicely with the managerial need to make decisions for the group for efficacy.
• The trick, then, is to make them feel like they have a say, without delega8ng responsibili8es to them. Be careful to be respeceul, rather than condescending, in this-‐employees are smart enough to spot transparent ploys, and will suffer mo8va8on loss as a result
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• Ties directly into the importance of communica8on I men8oned earlier. Don’t be afraid to take sugges8ons – and don’t be afraid to explain the reasons said sugges8ons may not work – make it a discussion. If your explana8on for why their contribu8on is impossible is just a sentence or two, they may come out feeling you aren’t telling them the whole story.
• Try to set aside part of at least one mee8ng a week for sugges8ons and concerns – just remember to make it a real discussion; if they’re talking to a wall, you’re hur8ng, not helping produc8vity
• Always take concerns by employees into account – don’t guarantee that you will agree with their concerns, but agree that you will listen and consider them/ Remember that Mars satellite disaster I men8oned? There were several operators who no8ced the problem once the project was heavily underway, but whose concerns about soQware compa8bility were ignored. This illustrates the win-‐win nature of listening to employee concerns.
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