It should be a science to figure out how to get workers to care. Managers often study how to milk more productivity out of their staff, but do they study how to make workers care? One elderly manager in the United States told me that caring / integrity is the FIRST thing he looks for in a worker. He told me that if a worker lacked skills, that skills could be taught, but that teaching integrity was not generally possible.
So, perhaps starting out with workers who care makes sense. But, a more interesting topic to discuss is how to optimize worker caring. There are many ways to get workers to care more. Making them feel like a part of the company and a part of the long range membership of the company makes alot of sense. Some executives include all workers in profit sharing and stock options. With huge companies, I personally feel it makes more sense to have workers reap a long term benefit if their particular department does well in addition to the long term wellness of the organizatin as a whole .
Another aspect that is typically purposely ignored is tying the workers into how the customer feels. Todays workplaces are segmented with the salespeople selling,, and then forgetting about the client after the sale is made. The technical staff does its part without interfacing with the customer, and the accounting department doesn’t see a human face of the client either. Having workers be more part of the whole transaction in an emotional sense seems to be practical. If programmers see a client when they are happy that things went well, or frustrated when things don’t go well, perhaps they will care more. If a salesperson is held responsible for selling the wrong thing to a client and actually talks to clients throughout the business relationship, they will have a very different attitude.
Integrating segmented companies is important in business. Departments need to be able to seemlessly communicate with each other, and all workers need to be in touch with clients in one way or the other. My idea is very unpopular with many companies who don’t want most of their workers interfacing with clients at all. Additionally,, most workers don’t want to be bothered talking to clients and simply don’t have the social skills to do so in any case. But, there must be some way to have all workers get some sort of feedback of how the customer’s life is improved by their work, or inconvenienced by their failure to do what they are supposed to.