Moving On Up

Whether it’s seeing retail clerks in Bangkok spending the day staring at their phones, or talking with executives in Singapore concerned about junior employees leaving after only 8 months, it’s clear that something needs to change in Southeast Asia’s workforce if companies and economies here are going to grow. My observations over the last 5 years, and numerous studies published during that time, suggest that employee engagement and workforce performance are critical issues and addressing them is important for growth. This is especially important in light of demographic changes that mean more people are retiring than are coming into the workforce, and for countries like Singapore that are tightening the use of foreign talent, the challenge is even more critical. You need stronger performance from the people you have, because you cannot simply plan on adding more people.

It’s easy to simply blame the employees, and that’s exactly what many companies do. The underlying problem, though, is that many new employees come into the workforce with expectations that conflict with the traditional organizational culture often found in Southeast Asian firms, a culture driven as much by history and social norms as by the values and priorities of the leaders. When those expectations are not met, employee engagement drops, and any sense of urgency or drive for high performance that would be useful also drops along with it. That’s not a “Millennial” problem; that’s human nature.

Some of your employees’ expectations may be shaped by how they were raised, and plenty of leaders are concerned that today’s youngest generation of workers have spent their lives being told how special and perfect they are, and then are shocked when they are told that’s not true. (the “strawberry generation,” they are called, because their feelings are so easily bruised) There is certainly something to that (though every older generation seems to think the same thing about the generation coming up behind them), but that may not be your biggest challenge, and in any case, you don’t have a time machine that helps you go back to change how they were raised, so that’s not what you should worry about.

What you CAN control, however, is your response to your employees’ expectations regarding career progression. In a recent discussion with the Designing Leaders team, a development expert from Vietnam suggested that changes in social mobility have led employees to expect to see a possible career path ahead of them when they take a job. In the past, it was often the case that if you were born into the “elite” then you could be elite, and if you were born into lower economic classes, you would stay there. So, companies could hire someone to be a retail clerk, and that clerk could expect to stay in that role forever, with no opportunity for advancement along a career path. For many people, that perception is no longer the case. Maybe it’s the increased exposure to rags-to-riches stories from around the world that results from greater information sharing across borders, maybe it’s due to an increase in educational attainment and the belief that great things can come from that, maybe it’s simply due to seeing their friends’ accomplishments on Facebook, but many of your employees no longer assume that where they are now is where they have to stay. They are looking to you to offer a path — not necessarily a guarantee, but at least an opportunity — to move up to something more.

The problem intensifies when firms try to attract local citizens who are working overseas. Many such workers are interested in coming back, and employers would like to have people with international experience combined with an understanding of local culture. Attracting returning talent, though, means meeting expectations that have been shaped by their experiences elsewhere. In addition to competitive salaries, returnees expect employers to offer career progression.

What to do? First, examine your strategic workforce plan and identify both potential career paths as well as dead-end jobs. When you see career paths, you should figure out what it takes to advance along those paths in terms of both experience and professional development. Then, in your recruiting interviews, share that with candidates so they can see what’s possible and what they will have to do to make it happen. Include that career path discussion in performance reviews and the creation of individual development plans, so employees can see their progress. The more open you are about career paths and their requirements, the more likely you are to get the employees who want to perform well enough to move along those paths.

What about those dead-end jobs? Well, if they can be contracted out, you may want to do that. But don’t necessarily get rid of them; there are still people who are happy to take on a role and never advance, and they could be perfect for these jobs. You may need to look for other ways to motivate high performance from them, or they may give you the performance they want simply because they are happy being where they are.

If you want your employees to be motivated about their work, you need to give them a reason to be. Today’s workforce is often interested in more than just today’s paycheck; they also want to see a promising future. If you cannot be bothered to describe one for them, don’t be surprised by lackluster performance in return.