The power of self-discipline: How to turn it an organizational habit

Why do employees show up late for work? Why do they skip steps in a process? Learn some barriers and proven solutions to turn self-discipline into an organizational habit.

The problem that we usually encounter, especially with young or entry level and non-educated workers, is that, no matter how easy is the job, they don’t always perform as expected. They have too many ups and downs in the way they work. One day they are the employee of the month, the next day they don’t even show up.  And in most cases, they even like the job, or want to do it. Still, they are rude to customers, show up late,  don’t respect the rules or quit for no reason. That’s the time where leaders come into play and either micromanage them, punish them, or do their job for them. None of these solutions actually work in the long term, they are just “band-aid” solutions that don’t tackle the root cause.

Usually, the reason why employees don’t perform as expected is just that they lack the self-discipline to maintain a working schedule or routine. Self-discipline is like a muscle that has not been trained.

Discipline is basically doing things naturally, routinely, like a daily habit. Most of our bad habits are due to laziness or lack of willpower. Self-discipline doesn’t have to do with talent or intelligence. It actually has a bigger effect on academic performance than intellectual talent.

As per Google’s dictionary, Self-discipline is the ability to control one’s feelings and overcome one’s weaknesses. It is the ability to pursue what one thinks is right despite the temptation to abandon it.

Employees are able to set big plans for them, but they usually find things in their way to accomplish them. Sometimes there are external issues that they cannot manage that set them back (customers reactions, economic turnarounds, traffic, family issues) or sometimes is just that they are not strong enough to commit to following something no matter what. Again, their willpower muscles have not been trained enough. It is the same reason why they don’t do sports or quit smoking. People procrastinate to do things that are new to them, that are afraid of or are not sure what the outcome is. Fear of failure shows up, or questions about “why should I do this”. And then people just stop there.

As a company, you can help them see what is it within their reach to change, and what is it outside their reach but they can plan how to reduce the impact or react to it more efficiently

Turning self-discipline into an organizational habit

Strengthen self-discipline is not totally up to the employees. Companies can do something about it as well. And that is building systems that help to turn self-discipline into an organizational habit. As Charles Duhigg mentions in his book The Power of habit, “what employees need are clear instructions about how to deal with inflection points.” Those inflection points are pains, temptations, or whatever problem they encounter when they are trying to meet the routine. Companies need to work on eliminating those barriers. Robert Mager and Peter Pipe say in their book “Analyzing performance problems” “keep in mind that if they (employees) can do it but aren’t doing it,  there is a reason; only seldom is the reason either a lack of interest or a lack of desire. Most people want to do a good job. When they don’t it is often because of an obstacle in the world around them.”

Barrier #1: “It is not my job”.

Solution: Build Ownership. The first and most common answer to why a task has not been done, is usually “it is not my job”. So the first step to empowering people to do the work is splitting the work into small clear tasks so that each of the team members knows what he has to do, and is totally able to finish it. They become owners of that tasks, which give them the power to make decisions. If the owner is not clear, they may fall into the inner temptation of telling themselves that is someone else’s job, so they only focus on what is clearly theirs. Or sometimes good employees get overwhelmed with not only their tasks, but the inaction of other people that they have to cover up. None of these situations are good or fair. Giving employees more autonomy on the way their work improves self-discipline.

Barrier#2: “I did it as usual” or “I didn’t know how to do it”.

Solution: Provide Clear instructions. Create clear instructions of whatever needs to be done. I have seen “clear instruction” that simply say: mix well, keep clean or maintain. What is that supposed to mean? How do we know it’s well mixed? How do we know it’s clean? The answer can be different from employee to employee, so if there is room for a personal perspective or common sense, you may get different outcomes from the same instruction.

The task may have been performed for years by the same person, he may have changed steps through time and not even realize about it. Or the task may have been transferred to different employees through time, with no written instruction only observation, bringing changes and shortcuts with every change in control.

Common sense is the least common of all the senses. Forget about common sense. If an instruction is not being followed correctly, it is probably not written correctly. Example: You may clean with a cloth and water, or you may clean with a cleaner with bleach.  Which one is right? A cleaner with bleach may be ok for a granite countertop, but not may be ok for a wood surface. A better way to write a cleaning instruction is: clean from left to right using a blue soft XX cloth with a teaspoon of xx cleaner. Remove all the shelves and clean one by one the same way.

You can also use checklists, pictures with standards, labels, color coding or any other visual management technique to help the employee perform as expected.

Barrier #3) “It was just a human error”.

The solution is: Understand why. Every time there is an error, perform the root cause analysis, don’t just assume it was a human error. As the article “pitfalls and pratfalls” (QP Sept 2018 http://asq.org/quality-progress/2018/09/quality-tools/pitfalls-and-pratfalls.html) explains, many investigations are closed just saying it was a human error, like procedures not followed, lack of attention or human mistake). “Human errors cannot be eliminated by simply telling operators to be more careful. Human error is more a symptom than a cause. Do not use human error as a root cause. Always ask why the human-made the mistake”. It may be again that the instructions are not clear, but also could be that the computer is not working properly so employees look for a shortcut Maybe instructions are too long that employees get lost in the explanation. Perhaps the workplace is too noisy or uncomfortable in a way that doesn’t allow for the employee to meet the requirements.

A bottling plant I visited was having rejected bottles getting to the final customers. We went to the bottling line to see if we can identify any issues. Some of the inspection points were automatic but not accurate, so some of the bottles were false positives, so employees needed to control if the rejected bottles were actually Go or NoGo. The employees that were executing the control had other tasks to do, so they usually got delayed in the control, not being able to control every single rejection. They did not have a table to look carefully at the bottle. The boxes containing good material, bad material and samples were not clearly identified. You can imagine that throughout the 3 or 4 shifts they had, mistakes were more prone to happen. So if you ask why there were mistakes, there were no specific mistakes that I saw at that time. Nevertheless there were several potential causes of mistakes that could be avoided by redesigning the workplace to make it more “error free” through the 5S methodology.

RECOMMENDED COURSE: 5S Methodology

 Barrier #4)”I thought it was not as important”.

The solution is: Keep periodic audits. When employees feel that something is not being controlled or supervised, they think it is not important, so they may stop doing it. Audits are a great way to show that to follow procedures is important. With audits you can also analyze if things are being done, how often and how effectively. The most important part of an audit is to share the results so that employees can celebrate and get rewarded, or receive feedback on what still needs to be changed.

What I have found is that audit comments need to be really clear and specific. They need to include exactly what is wrong and, if possible, how it can be fixed or what is expected for the next time. If comments are vague like “tool is not clean” or “paperwork is incomplete”, we may fall again in the “clear instructions” pitfall. If employees are not clear on what needs to be done, they will probably not fix it for the next time or may do something about it thinking it is OK now, and maybe it is still not enough.

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Barrier #5) “I am already doing it”.

Solution: Verify with a Socratic walk. Remember that everything is relative. Sometimes employees say they are doing something, but they are not actually doing it, or they are doing it partially (and this not intentional). The best option is to see it yourself and ask questions. Go to the place where things are happening (the gemba). Go and see what your employees are doing and how, and ask questions: where are the results of the last audit? which instruction are you following? Why are you doing this? Could you do it differently? What are the risks and what are the improvements in progress?  Both you and the employee can learn a lot from it. The power of the Socratic walk is that leaders are not there to correct the employees, or to tell them how to do things. They are just asking questions that may help them understand the problems the employees deal with, or they may help the employees see their own work differently. They may even realize something is wrong, but they will feel like they found it by themselves. This way we nurture the continuous improvement culture habit without hurting any feelings. Plan for Socratic walks, include them in your weekly routine.

Barrier #6) “this client was nuts” or “I was in a hurry”.

Solution: Train for Inflection points. When all the other 5 steps have been adjusted and performed, you still have the human factor of having a client that threaten your employees and drives them crazy or a manager that ask them to hurry up and do whatever NOW. How do you manage these situations? I agree you cannot control anything that may happen to your employees, but for sure inflection points will be THE moment when for sure the employee will have the temptation to forget about the book. Collect all the behaviors that your team consider are usually incorrectly handled and provide guidance on “the right way” to deal with them. You can even make employees think of how to handle them in the future. These desired behaviors can be practiced doing role-playing so that new behaviors become easily part of their daily routines. If they repeat and repeat, when they actually find themselves in the situation, they will be better prepared to handle it. Once they implement it, the rewards of getting things done the right way will help them keep on the right track.

“As willpower muscles strengthened, good habits seemed to spill into other parts of their lives” Charles Duhigg.

All of these barriers are commonly seen in all type of industries, but there is a way out. Self-discipline can be learned and practiced. We need to build an environment in which self-discipline is not as painful. The great thing is that good habits then can be applied not only at work, but into other parts of our lives.

RECOMMENDED COURSES: CARES – Achieve Agility, Safety, and Self-discipline

If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact us! We will be pleased to help you out.

Lu Paulise

luciana@biztorming.com

@lupaulise

Biztorming Training & Consulting
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