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I apologize for the long hiatus from blogging.  I’ve been in transition for about a month in terms of work (away from an old job and into academics) as well as location (New York to Boston).  But now that I’m in and settled I am officially back.

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My high school English teacher had a particular affinity to the above phrase.  As demoralizing and harsh as it seemed at the time, it is now clear to me what he was trying to communicate.  Our teacher wanted to make us aware of how what we say affects others’ perceptions of us.  A question you ask can be more telling about you than a statement you make.  Along those lines, if you’re asking dumb questions, you’re not exactly projecting yourself in the best way.

A sample scenario in which this becomes very relevant in the workplace is during the initial months an employee is performing a new job function.  No matter how well the subject matter and your responsibilities with regard to it were explained, a trainer couldn’t possibly have covered every contingency and/or detail relating to the job.  Therefore, there inevitably comes a time when every new hire hits a road block and comes to a crossroad.  Should you ask the question of your manager or trainer or struggle a little more?

There are two schools of thought on the subject.  The first believes that you shouldn’t be afraid to ask questions and that all questions are valid.  The theory is that it’s a waste of time for you to bang your head against the wall in trying to figure something out when you could easily save yourself the time, effort, and pain by simply asking someone who can instantly provide the answer.  The second school of thought, however, states that you should struggle and work towards a resolution as much as possible on your own before asking for help, because that struggle in and of itself is often a huge learning experience, even if at the end it doesn’t yield you your desired answer.

I am a strong proponent of the second opinion.  Opportunity permitting, struggling first to find the answer yourself can give you insights into aspects of your job that you wouldn’t otherwise learn and prevents you from asking stupid questions.

Firstly, what is a stupid question?

It is one that…

• had you thought about it for 5 more minutes, you could have answered yourself
• had you looked through all available resources, you could have found the answer to yourself
• was answered for you multiple times before, but one you apparently did not feel the need to write down or remember
• someone on your level or with your experience should really not be asking (like 5-year finance associate asking how to add the numbers in two cells in Excel)
• you ask 3 minutes after asking another question, instead of waiting and bundling with your next or previous question(s).

There are many reasons why the above are signs of a stupid question coming and why they make you look stupid.  If you’re asking a question that could be answered with slightly more thought, asking it instead of thinking about it shows that you are not willing to put in the mental effort and that you lack work ethic– if things don’t come instantly and easily to you, you just give up trying.  Another signal of a lack of motivation is a question to which you can find the answer among resources at your disposal and of which you are aware.  An example of this is if you’re asking something that was answered in an instructional manual, which you failed to read, or in a clearly labeled file in the same network folder, which you chose not to browse.  Along the same lines, asking trivial questions too frequently shows disrespect for the person you’re asking them of and I’m sure it’s self explanatory to not ask questions that you are very much expected to know the answer to unless you’ve truly exhausted your own attempts to figure it out.

So, before you ask your boss your next question, check first that it cannot be classified in any of the categories above.  This is good advice both for people who are too eager to ask questions versus figuring it out and for those who are hesitant to ask questions for constant fear that they’ll seem stupid.  Asking questions is a good thing and is a vital part of your learning process.  However, it’s important to make sure that you’re asking valuable questions that signal to others that you are a thoughtful, hardworking individual.  When you ask great questions, not only do you increase the likelihood that they will be answered, but you also increase your reputation.  However, when you ask bad questions, you only encounter frustration, sarcastic responses, and doubt in your abilities.  Therefore, both the timid and the eager question-askers should check themselves.  If it’s a “stupid” question, go back and sweat it out a bit more.  If it’s not, you should ask it without hesitation.

(Let me know if I’m missing any qualifiers in the list above) .

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There’s a great article in Inc. magazine online today about employee retention.  The article gives a lot of tips–some unique and obviously thoughtful, which is nice to see.  Some of the great advice includes having regular check-ins with your employees so that you can preempt and resolve issues before they become cause for termination or resignation, never burning bridges, and always making sure that an employee is challenged so he can make mistakes, learn and constantly grow. Some of the advice, however, made me think about its practicality.  While all of it is good in theory, some just don’t translate well into the real world.

Have a trial period – This is really good in theory, but not so much in practice.  While I agree that a trial period is great not just for the company to evaluate the employee but also for the employee to evaluate the company, the question is, “what happens if it’s not a good match?”  You have spent countless hours and dollars recruiting this person, went through the trouble of hiring him, rejected other potential candidates, and have dumped some time into his training.  Now that you want to be rid of him, you’ve sunk a ton of resources already and the other candidates that you were considering probably have found other jobs already.  That means you have to start from scratch.  While there are companies that can afford to do this, many can’t.  On the flip side, what does it mean for the recent hire?  He has to start from scratch too (and he may also have turned down alternate job offers to work for you – job offers that are most likely no longer available to him).  What if he is one of those who dropped everything and/or moved a thousand or more miles to take your job?  Being let go after 3 months would be catastrophically demoralizing.  The same goes for if he’s not thrilled with you.  He’s sunk so much into the decision that it’s impractical to leave.  I know that having a trial period sounds like a good hedge to your hiring mechanism, you have to think about the possible fallout.

Hire people who live close to the office — According to the article, long commutes are detrimental to work-life balances.  I definitely believe this is true and people obviously look for work within a certain radius of where they live (if they’re not looking to relocate).  However, I have had jobs that I’ve loved that I commuted 2 hours each way for and I have had jobs I’ve hated that took me 20 minutes to get to.  I think the point Inc. is trying to make is that while people might like the job 2 hours away, they won’t be able to do it forever and will therefore leave.  Therefore, hiring people who live close increases retention, which is technically logical.  My point is that if someone is completely in love with their work, moving closer might not be out of the question.

Have untraditional vacation policies — I think this works depending on how “untraditional” they are.  The scenario described, of having a pool of days that doesn’t expire, might actually work really well.  I come from an environment that doesn’t have a vacation policy (and people can take what they need, provided their manager approves) and that works terribly for most people because of the guilt factor.  If there’s no limit all of a sudden, people keep wondering if they’re abusing the privilege.  Therefore, it’s really important to think about informal implications.  It may be a good marketing ploy during hiring, but those hires might feel duped later.

Administer personality tests during the hiring process — From personal experience with this, I think it’s a terrible idea.  I know that this is well intentioned: you want a non-traditional way to see whether your potentials have the “soft” qualities you’re looking for.  In reality, there’s no way you’re going to get this from administering these tests.  Firstly, this is true because people will rehearse for them as they do for interviews.  If you’re hiring smart people, they will do their homework.  They will come to the interview knowing what your firm is about, what qualities you’re looking for, and what tests you’re going to be giving them.  They will then answer the questions how they think you want them to be answered.  While it’s possible to tell with some candidates that they’re trying too hard, it might not be with most others.  Secondly, and thusly, publicizing your intent to give personality tests sends a very specific message about your firm — that you’re fluffy and naïve.  Most people have a negative opinion of personality tests because they are rarely reflective of your true self.  Whether you’re consciously prepping for them or are answering them from the perspective of the person you want to be, you’re never really revealing your true personality.

Setting goals with rewards — This seems more like bribery than motivation to me.  If you’re hiring good people, the rewards you should be offering them, and which should be sufficient for them, are career-related (progression, promotion, compensation, responsibility, recognition, etc.).  While I admit that it’s possible that I’m not the norm employee that is being described here, I know I wouldn’t bend over backwards for an iPod at the end of the quarter.  I absolutely believe in setting goals.  100% believe.  However, the rewards that should be attached should be professional development and progression goals, not stuff.

Are there other methods that people have tried with sucess or failure?

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It seems like most companies didn’t really worry about contingency plans and such before the 9/11 attacks.  Now, there are small consulting companies on top of small consulting companies that grew up around the business of planning for contingencies.  It’s surprising that it takes a major national catastrophe to get companies thinking about what happens if the office building is no longer there, employees are missing or unavailable but business has to go on.

While major catastrophes are thankfully rare, minor ones happen all the time.  A female employee could go into pre-mature labor, a power-outage could strike your city, a vital employee could give 2 weeks’ notice, or your network could get hacked.  Is your company and/or department prepared for those cases?  The honest truth is that most companies aren’t.  When push comes to shove, you want to be able to say, “Aha! We have Plan B for this.  Let’s go ahead and implement it,” as opposed to, “F*CK!! What the hell do we do now??”

What’s the problem with “crossing the bridge when you get there” and dealing with those issues if and when they come up?  Well, when something unpredictable does happen, most people are not really in a position to think rationally.  Disasters (big and small) have a tendency to cause chaos and indecision, among management inclusive.  A time of great distress may not be the best time to make really important decisions.  Managers are also not the only ones who will be frazzled by calamities.  When something unexpected occurs, one of the initial concerns among the working populous is, “What does this mean for me?”  In a time of distress, the first thing you want to do is to comfort and reassure your employees and the last thing you want to do is laden them with responsibilities that they didn’t see coming. Again, having a plan gives people a sense of security and causes them to react faster if something were to occur.  What you also have to consider is that, depending on the event, the people who know the job best are gone or unavailable, leaving people who need to fill in to struggle.

Any way you slice it, you’re better off putting in a contingency plan when everything is hunky dory and this is how you should proceed:

1. Publicize your intent to make a contingency plan.  Other than the moans and groans of temporary additional effort, I can’t imagine you’ll face any resistance.  Most people understand that all sustainable companies must have one.  Make sure you specify that as the reason when you do go public with the announcement (there are always a few people who will think you’re doing it to see how many employees you can eliminate).
2. Create a “if this person is out/unavailable for short/long periods of time, this person/people will fill in” plan.  Once you’ve thought this through, it’s important to make that list public.  It’s important primarily so that people aren’t surprised and that if and when something happens, they are prepared and can step up quickly.  However, it’s also important because employees could provide valuable feedback on the plan.  If you think I should take over accounting if the accountant goes on leave and I can’t add 2 and 3, it would behoove you to be told this in advance.
3. Begin cross-training immediately.  As soon as you have a rough contingency plan in place, start cross training employees on each others’ functions.  This has three benefits: it teaches employees the job they would be expected to cover in advance, increases the pool of people who can do any particular job, and increases employees’ knowledge and usefulness.
4. Make sure people performing their current primary functions create detailed documentation on their job process (that’s not half-assed).  The documentation should be used as the method of training and the employee being trained should be able to use the documentation to walk through the process without too many head-banging-against-wall questions.

I know — all this is extra administrative effort but look at it this way: if your top 20% of employees were stuck at sea on a boat together, would your company be able to function just as effectively as if they were there?

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I’m not going to talk about how holding your employees back is “evil.” I’m only going to talk about how doing so is irrational, both for you and your firm.

So, why would any manager hold an employee back?  To come to their defense on this, many managers do it unconsciously.  Cultivating an employee’s career is actually a very active process.  You have to make sure he always has challenging work to do, that you praise him for jobs well done to bigger-wigs and that you give him constructive feedback when he does something wrong so that he can learn and grow from it.  By not caring about whether your employee is challenged, not acknowledging his contributions and achievements and simply letting mistakes slide, you’re holding him back even though you may not mean to.  That being said, there are unfortunately people who do it consciously.  Some managers do not want to shift good performers out of their chain of command because they want to be the ones who benefit from their work.  Some managers do not want to promote superstars because they are under the impression that by promoting people from beneath to the same level (or possibly above), they are putting their own position in jeopardy.

Whether you are holding a good employee back by accident or on purpose, it’s only a matter of time before this starts to back fire.  As a boss, you’re expected, both by your managers and subordinates, to be a mentor to those who work for you.  If an employee, after performing well on a consistent basis and taking active steps to make that known to you, sees that you aren’t showing concern over or are standing purposely in the way of her best interests, she will do one of three things.

1. Put up with the abuse but make sure everyone knows it. This is usually done by non-confrontational people.  Unless it gets really terrible, these employees will continue to perform (though not nearly as well as before) and continue to put up with your neglect just so they can say, “see, look what I have to deal with” or “my boss is worse than anyone’s.”  Obviously, you have no idea who could be on the receiving end of the complaining and even if it may not be someone with direct control over your job, your reputation will undoubtedly suffer.  Additionally, your firm is losing the potential maximum output of this employee.  If she feels like her good work is not getting rewarded (or is even being punished), she’s not going to be willing to continue it.  Therefore, both you and your firm lose.
2. Side-step you or go over your head to be noticed by someone else in the firm. This is usually done by people who cannot imagine continuing to work with their own boss but overall love and respect their company.  The first thing your boss will do when your employee comes to him and asks about “positions elsewhere” in the firm is ask her why she’s thinking about this and if she’s discussed this with you.  That will put her in an awkward position but ultimately signal to your boss that you’re the reason for the transfer.  That’s obviously not good for you.  The other possibility is she makes a new contact with another manager on your level and arranges a transfer.  This could potentially be good for the firm, but it’s still bad for you (because the transfer will again highlight that you could not take full advantage or give enough credit to a worthy employee).
3. Just leave.  This is usually done by employees who are either too fed up with everything to bother looking within the company or were simply unable to find alternate arrangements internally.  Your group will lose a great performer and your company will lose a valuable asset.  Lose, lose.

How to fix it:

First, assess yourself.   Do you actually have your employees’ best interests in mind?  If not, why?  Do you have control issues?  Are you afraid that by increasing someone else’s value you are decreasing your own?  If so, all these feelings lie with your own insecurity.  You need to understand that 9 times out of 10, you will be rewarded for consistently grooming and promoting top performers in the company.  GE’s rotational program became a hatchery for the company’s leadership team and it’s the primary reason the firm attracts so much young talent.

Second, make an effort to help.  You should be discussing your employees’ career goals on a regular basis.  Try to think about what you can do to develop your team at least once a week (once a day if your job allows).  If you can’t come up with helpful things you can do, ask your employees.  I’m sure they’d tell you to volunteer them for some project or give them certain type of work to do.   Regardless of whether your actions get them their desired promotions or career path changes, making an effort is half the battle.  Eventually, if you continue to work together to develop one another, both of you will win from the arrangement.