The Measure of Humanity
by Zoltán Dankó
Future-Proof Organization Practitioner -- Human leadership fuels high performance. If you have open mind, I help add open culture to leverage open-source - Change is risk: doing the same leads nowhere. Let's move on!
Nowadays, there are hundreds of metrics or, more popularly, KPIs to measure company performance. Even more, managers can be KPI-ed in their leadership to decide when to fire them. Usually, economic metrics are applied. If specific numbers have been moving upwards, everyone has been happy. These successes are published in the press internationally. As a result, managers are celebrated heavily – with much money.
Stress-loaded managers will undertake whatever is needed to prolong these periods as long as possible. If despite all the effort, the numbers start to decline, Armageddon knocking on the door. Shortly we see these heroic business gladiators lying on the sand of the arena. Their fate gets greeting them: firing at once. Some of them could break down mentally and bodily as well.
Leaders cannot get a high-ranking job without showing impressive IQ results. We also know that we cannot regard these results as convincing, but we need numbers to rely upon for some reason. In past years we have counted an infinite number of books telling us how important the EQ is. Armies of consultants have assaulted the stressed-out managers to inform them to show more empathy and trust. Unfortunately, a stressed manager consists usually of fears and anxieties, which neurologically cancels out any human feelings, benevolent social interaction – trust, too.
I suggest a new Q to use during the recruitment and hiring process. It will be helpful because this Q will contrast the others in many respect. I call it DQ, meaning destruction quotient. It sounds ominous, not a positive metric at all.
Let us go into the details of what it may contain and how to measure DQ. The activity and the effect of a manager cover all the business aspects. For example, what happened to the customers, services, and products during the manager's reign. These metrics will showcase the business failures and customer disappointments. These occurrences have been reported in the press extensively.
More minor publications get aired about how specific business results have been achieved. I mean the human victims at all levels of the company, the billions of overtime hours, missed family occasions, the mental breakdowns of the colleagues. Sure, it seems to be extremely difficult to gather and analyze these data. But, of course, complicated does not mean impossible.
I think that technologically it is workable to collect the data companywide.
Verbal and written interactions can be analyzed by text crunchers that can inform the leaders if specific harassment occurred and how to correct it. Over time, a giant pile of data can be assessed and generate a DQ. This way, we can contrast IQ, EQ, and DQ, and we can produce a complete picture of the manager how he/she accomplished the desired business goals.
This operative model of complete Qs may help the manager to avoid pitfalls in realtime while he/she is focusing mainly on the business side and to achieve paramount results. Still, he/she obtains a catastrophic DQ. For example, sixteen colleagues fall back upon long years of mental treatment. Not to speak of its costs and who will pay for it.
A potential counterargument to this suggestion and model could be the privacy issue. How can we obtain the necessary data for the analysis? Part of the answer will originate from the company culture. In Frederick Laloux's terminology, a red organization is based on fear and ruthless power execution. Not surprisingly, it will also maximize the DQ result. It won't change without the active participation of the management to overcome the barriers that led to the abuses and destruction. If we must not collect the data, then it is not blocked by laws but by fears.
In contrast, in self-organized company culture, the colleagues behave open to each other, putting any destructive issue on the table. Therefore, they can uphold the self-organizing system only if an honest and straightforward environment is provided. In this case, however, all the necessary data can be gathered and analyzed. Consequently, a DQ is easy to be determined for the manager.
DQ does not make sense – as a single, stand-alone piece of information. DQ's most important role will be the means to improvement and development. Humans are linear creatures. The modest realtime processing capacity of our brain cannot help us at once. The continuous measurement of DQ presents status and issues to be fixed as soon as possible. In the long run, we can recognize potential destructive deeds and change our behavior. The more member of a population will be engaged in this movement; the faster will the harmful actions be canceled out in that population for the benefit of everyone.
The measure of how a company can be regarded as developed will depend on the courage to introduce DQ or its regular operation. But, on the other hand, if we watch and appreciate the business results of a company and its managers, it obviously will balance the profit-greed and responsibility for the colleagues. A win-win outcome, right?
