Employee Engagement: The New Meaning of Gamesmanship

Employees love to be involved in the business and one of their biggest concerns is the health of the business, because it determines the security of their jobs.

Many companies hold “all-employee” or “Communication” meetings on a regular basis to share results or to discuss topics relevant to all employees, such as safety.  For the managers, it means sharing data (which some hate to do) and time away from what they perceive as more important tasks.  For the employees, it often means an hour of incredibly boring statistics and lecture from the management.

It can be difficult to see how well employees absorb what they’ve been presented, but I’m certain employees retain little of what they’ve seen and heard from these meetings because they’re overwhelmed by the masses of numbers that have been thrown at them.

I tried a different approach at one company.

To present my sales and business development numbers, I structured my presentation around the concept of the game show, “Who Wants to Be a Millionaire”.

We gave a few employees from the floor the opportunity to be “contestants” so they could answer questions about business development.  There were several questions along the lines of “How many new customers did we develop in the latest quarter?”  Each question had 4 possible answers.

Our contestants had support opportunities like “Lifeline”, where they could have a friend help, or “50/50” whereby two incorrect answers were eliminated.  Programming to do this in PowerPoint actually wasn’t all that hard, and it was more than adequate to re-create the gameplay.

When we did the presentation as part of our quarterly communications meeting, the employees ended up getting right into it.  Contestants had the audience shouting out what they thought was the right answer, and it really recreated the atmosphere of the TV show in our cafeteria.

Even though our segment was only supposed to run about 10 minutes, it was the segment the employees voted as most interesting.  They had some fun.  They were involved in the presentation and everyone got to participate in some way.  Best of all, they remembered the statistics we had presented.

Presenting data to employees can be a waste of everybody’s time if the message gets ignored because the way it’s being presented is overwhelming or just plain boring.  To some, it may be hokey to use the game show approach (and it probably isn’t appropriate for some topics), but the WAY in which the information is presented can have a dramatic impact on attentiveness and retention of that information.  If work can be fun, it no longer is drudgery.

Music at Work

On weekends, I play in a band, and have been doing so for about three years.

A lot of people might think this is a frivolous way to spend my free time. Given the image of the music business, many might think we're into drugs, sex (as well as rock 'n' roll).

The truth is that my band is made up of guys like me. We're all in our 50's. We all enjoy music. And none of us have any expectations we'll be raking in Grammy awards and seeing gold albums on our walls.

Another truth is that playing in a band is, in many respects, like running a business. Here's how.

TEAMWORK

Unless you're a very talented musician like Frank Zappa, in a band, it's really important that everyone be playing the same song in the same key, at the same tempo and at the same time. Otherwise you have cacophony (a musical term for chaos).

Each member of the band has his/her part in the piece.

Drums provide the rhythm, tempo and time signature that everyone else depends on to keep together. Bass provides a foundation for musical structure of the piece. The other instruments (and I'm including voice as an instrument) fill in the melodic and rhythmic components of the piece. Usually, the onther instruments will perform solos in turn - each having an opportunity to express their interpretation of the melody of the piece.

Together, it sounds wonderful - better than any part individually. However, if someone doesn't do his/her part properly, the musical term is "train wreck."

COMMUNICATION

Communication on stage - or in a jam session - is critical to the success of the performance. When we watch jazz musicians play, it difficult for most of us to understand what's going on and how/why different players come in at different times.

Uusally, before starting, the players agree on an arrangement and in which order everyone will solo. While we've all heard songs where someone shouts out something like "Play it, Johnny!", most musical cues are a form of non-verbal communication. They could be the nod of a head, a particular sequence of notes that indicates the conclusion of a solo or just looking eye-to-eye at the next soloist. The non-verbal cues make the whole performance look seamless when done properly.

The basic structure of the song - melody and chords - provides a framework for soloing, and some of the cues, but direct communication between musicians is what really makes it all work.

Music also requires good listening skills.

As you're playing, are you playing in the same key as everyone else? Is everyone hitting the same point in a bar at the same time? These listening skills help the musicians adjust how they play so they all are synchronized.

POSITIONING

Most people think that a band plays by picking songs and just getting up and playing them.

However, there's an element of positioning in any band. Will the focus be on blues, country, rock, jazz, folk or some other genre? There has to be consensus among the players on what style of music will be played and, once this consensus is reached, the common interest in the genre helps inspire and unite the musicians.

In our band, we have regular meetings to discuss adding songs to our repertoire. We might reject some as being too country or too heavy for what we consider to be our style (and skill). Songs get added when we all feel we like the tune and/or beat and would be fun to perform.

The analogy in business would not only be positioning, but also strategy.

PRESENTATION SKILLS

In sales, marketing and politics (among others), the ability to get up in front of an audience and deliver an engaging presentation is a critical way of connecting with the audience.

So, too, with music.

A good performance depends on preparation or, in musical terms, rehearsal. Our band rehearses weekly for about 3 hours and we systematically run through our repertoire of songs we perform as well as work on songs we WANT to perform. It takes us about six weeks of rehearsal to do our entire catalog.

In our rehearsals, we make certain we have the basics of the song down pat, but also work out our solos so, while each performance might be a little different, we've each established the basic approach we want to take to our solos.

By rehearsing like this, when we get up in front of an audience, we all feel comfortable about what we're going to do.

All bands work off a set list. Think of this like a playlist - a sequence of songs to be performed. We put the songs in a particular order so we have something at the beginning that's familiar and gets the audience's attention. Similarly, the closer of each set will be a song strong enough to leave the audience wanting to hear more. We'll vary the tempo of the songs in between so the mood doesn't become monotonous.

THINKING on your FEET

When we listen to a studio recording, we are hearing a finely tuned version of the piece, whereby each bar is usually recorded over and over again until a perfect "take". Every time you listen to that recording, you will hear exactly the same rendition - note-for-note.

In a live performance, the basic structure of the piece may be pretty close to the recorded version, but the solos will most likely be different.

The solo represents an opportunity for the performer to express his or her own unique interpretation of the piece. While the performer may have a rough idea of how to structure the solo, each performance is different. That interpretation can be influenced by the performer's mood at the time, cues from the other musicians and by the audience response. In some respects, the solo is the opportunity for a performer to demonstrate true musicianship - more than just an ability to play by rote.

We sometimes have had guest performers join us onstage for a number or two, and the injection of a new group member creates a whole new dynamic for the performers.

If the guest artist is a singer, the other musicians have to follow the singer's lead and style - which can be very different from those of the singer they normally work with. Adapting to a different performer requires using those listening and communication skills I mentioned earlier. This usually is helped by the basic structure of the song (chords and melody).

When a performance like this comes off really well, it is as much a tribute to the musicians' communications skills as to their musicianship, and it usually makes the performance more interesting to the audience. It builds confidence among the team members that they can handle forces that could be potentially disruptive.

CODA

For the members of my band, the band is an outlet for our creativity, but also an oportunity to connect and enjoy playing with each other. It's also something we can all see us continuing into retirement.

So, the message I want to leave you with is that an individual's hobbies can help them develop skills that are useful of which can be applied in their jobs. Hobbies make us more interesting as people by adding dimension to our character. Explore these with your staff.

Ron