Encyclopedia of Marketing. Reasons for low company performance

Vladislav Utenin Candidate of Medical Sciences, general manager"Effective marketing technologies"
Excerpts from the book “Business in Slow Action”, Alpina Publishers

The first task is to make the obstacle conscious.

Sigmund Freud

Analysis of the activities of commercial and government organizations in the Russian Federation from 2003 to 2009. identified a similar problem, one of the key reasons for which is the presence of ineffective actions in daily work, forcing the company to incur significant, usually hidden, costs. At the same time, the effectiveness of the organization as a whole is an integrative indicator, which consists of the effectiveness of individual processes and tasks solved in daily activities.

The management of an organization is not always ready to admit the existence of existing inefficiency, since employees, on the one hand, do not always have the necessary knowledge, that is, the answer to the question “ how get the job done more efficiently." On the other hand, due to personal reluctance to change anything in the existing way of professional life, because any optimization implies change - changing existing stereotypes and openness to new things. Any such changes are perceived by most people as negative factors and even threats to personal safety. This phenomenon is called “resistance to change.”

The state of such a company can be characterized as imaginary well-being, existing against the background of acute organizational failure. This situation creates risks (especially in strategic terms) for the successful and sustainable existence of the company. Even with a slight change in external and/or internal environmental factors, threats arise for all levels of the organizational structure - from ordinary personnel to top management and owners. This is confirmed by research from leading auditing agencies, for example, according to PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC, 2009), a survey of 40 largest (!) companies revealed that 60% of representatives Russian business believe that their company was averagely prepared for the crisis; 22% admitted poor preparation for the crisis.

The reasons for the decrease in the organization’s efficiency, identified as a result of research, surveys and analysis of audit results, are given below.

Reason 1. Lack or shortage of qualified specialists with experience organizational work and building organizational structures. This is due to the lack of widely available practical courses and management education. There is also an insufficient volume of teaching of the discipline “management” in the educational standards of the Russian Federation. The existing organizational technologies are mostly borrowed from foreign experience and are not always applicable in the Russian environment, which has its own historical characteristics.

People with practical experience and skills in the field of management are catastrophically insufficient to satisfy the demand of domestic organizations for specialists of this kind. Considering that organizing work and coordinating activities are direct functions of top management, this factor becomes critical.

In principle, the scheme of any organization can be reflected in the form of a three-level model (see Diagram 1), where the top level is the owner level, the middle level is the management level, and the bottom level is the level of ordinary personnel.

Scheme 1. Levels of organization.

As can be seen from the presented diagram, the needs and goals of each level are fundamentally different. The main task of management in this structure is to organize work in such a way that the goals of the upper and lower levels correlate with each other and are in balance. Thus, the top manager, when implementing his own mission in the organization, plays the role of a buffer, being “between a rock and a hard place.”

Reason 2. Lack of a clear understanding among the owners (proprietors) of organizations, what exactly they want to receive as a result of the organization's activities. As a result, not every organization has a clear understanding of what is product her activities. For this reason, in most cases, the company’s work goals are either absent altogether or formulated in such a way that it is impossible to carry out the management and control function. The absence in organizations of specific and measurable goal setting, known to employees, leads to the fact that staff do not realize what contribution each individual makes to the activity and how exactly it affects quality product.

The lack of a formulated concept about the product and the company's goals leads to confusion in communications within and outside the organization, misunderstanding by staff and the owner of its purpose in the market and, consequently, misinterpretation of the organization's value to consumers.

Reason 3. Lack of planning system in organizations, or more precisely, a planning culture. As a rule, at each level of the organization there are a large number of plans that may not correlate with each other or with the company's goals. This complicates reporting and also makes it difficult to quickly assess how the tasks and activities being performed relate to the company's goals. In addition, the absence in the plans (and, consequently, in subsequent reports) of measurable indicators, maximally expressed in numbers, gives plans and reports the format of subjective lyrical literary works, which do not reflect the real state of affairs.

It is important to know that planning is one of the main functions of a top manager, designed to ensure the required result within a given time frame.

Reason 4. The absence of a staff motivation management system in organizations or the presence of an ineffective motivation system. Surprisingly, in most companies, employees do not know for what exactly they receive rewards (!), including in the form of money. Staff do not see the connection between their own earnings and the goals of the organization. As a result of the presence of demotivated personnel in organizations, a lot of actions are carried out that have the nature of IBD*.

Remember: managing staff motivation is a key function of a manager!

* - imitation of vigorous activity.

Reason 5. Lack of tools for assessing the effectiveness and quickly monitoring the actions performed. This is true both for each employee, department or division, and for the organization as a whole. This is especially pronounced in government agencies, where the concept of efficiency is not always present, although it is often found in commercial organizations.

Performance assessment becomes especially relevant in critical situations for the organization, for example, in times of crisis, when existing methods and methods of work no longer meet the requirements dictated by external environment and the market, that is, they become ineffective.

PwC (2009): 73% of representatives of Russian companies noted that in the current situation (economic crisis), the importance attached to the implementation of the right approach to performance management is increasing; 61% note that in a crisis situation it is necessary to adjust the set of indicators for managing the company’s performance.

The lack of means to quickly implement the control function leads to the fact that most managers experience overload with current tasks and time pressure due to the inability to effectively organize the process of managing subordinate employees. As a rule, existing control tools in an organization do not allow fast carry out processing and analysis of the received data. In a situation where the manager receives a significant amount of multidirectional reporting from subordinates, executed in various forms and software that do not allow them to be combined into a single whole, the manager is forced to understand the variety of forms received by him independently.

Don't forget that monitoring and evaluating performance are the most important functions of a manager.

Reason 6. Lack of professional (corporate) standards in organizations. This problem relevant for companies that have standard processes and procedures in place and regularly perform them. In the absence of corporate standards, each employee taking part in a specific sequence of actions can make his own, not always necessary, contribution to their progress. As a result, a complex, unique system of work organization is formed. If an employee(s) involved in implementing such a process leaves the company, risks arise that can paralyze (!) the work of the organization. In addition, difficulties will arise when training newly arrived personnel. In the absence of professional standards, the company is engaged in training new personnel, as a result of which “recruits” become carriers of unique exclusive knowledge and, having “unlearned” and gained experience, leave their alma mater*, confidently heading to competitors.

* - alma mater (“nursing mother”, Latin).

Reason 7. Lack of a system for working with personnel in organizations, including the lack of a system for onboarding new personnel and loyalty programs for employees. In the organizational structure, as a rule, there is a personnel department, but the question is who is responsible for exactly control staff, for their loyalty, can confuse the manager.

In a situation where there is no personnel management function (and the human resources department is primarily called upon to carry out legal paperwork for employees), this task falls on the top management of the organization. Of course, every manager must have a clear idea and answer to the question of how the department entrusted to him lives. However, he is not always able to track and retain information about what is happening in the head of each of his subordinates and what the psychological characteristics of the behavior of his people are. The result is that each employee is left to his own devices; his loyalty is not controlled by anyone. But loyalty is one of the key components of the staff motivation system.

The lack of a system for adapting new personnel also forces each newly arrived employee to engage in corporate self-education and “self-adaptation” to the characteristics of the organization. In this case, especially in large organizations, an uncontrolled adaptation process left to chance can lead either to the sudden departure of a new employee from the company (in this case, the resources spent on attracting him turn into direct costs), or to the formation of “clannishness” , when one of the employees takes a new team member “under their wing.”

Reason 8. Misunderstanding of the role and purpose of the marketing function in the company's activities. Below is a list of the most common problems in the construction and operation of an organization's marketing system.

• ineffective organizational structure of the marketing service, which does not clearly indicate the functions and role of the service in the company’s activities
• ignorance of the market share occupied by the company and lack of understanding why the company needs this knowledge
• lack of answer to the question “who and why are the organization’s real competitors?”
• inaccurate positioning of the company and product, which does not allow the consumer to understand the difference between the company’s product and the competitors’ product
• lack of standard information materials about the company (for example, press releases, presentations)
• lack of tools for managing external and internal information flows
• lack of understanding of the role and meaning of the company brand and/or product
• lack of described target groups and their needs
• lack of description of the organization’s product, its properties, advantages and benefits for the consumer
• lack of tools for assessing the effectiveness of the marketing communications process (in particular, advertising) and assessing the effectiveness of the marketing service as a whole
• lack of tools for managing consumer loyalty.

Thus, all of the above problems can be grouped into two areas: problems in management practice and problems in marketing practice. But building an effective system for the operation of these two components, necessary for any organization, is impossible without an ideological understanding of the essence of the organization and the market, as well as taking into account the peculiarities of the functioning of an effective structure.

A whole section “effective work” has been introduced. I wrote, for example, about how and then and more recently - how to force yourself.

However, these articles, although they are directly related to productive work, nevertheless consider specific issues. Therefore, today we will have a thorough article talking about the most important, fundamental principles of efficiency. I have long wanted to write it in order to collect all my experience in this area and, as it were, tie a knot for memory.

1. First of all, you need to take care of the very possibility of effective work in terms of the body’s capabilities. More specifically this means:

— correct mode of work and rest (breaks from work, switching to other things, relaxation). You should not work continuously for more than an hour. It's best to fight fatigue before it occurs. Work for an hour - rest for ten minutes. By the way, mental work generally becomes about a third less effective if a person works for two hours without a break.

— healthy sleep and daily routine. Everything is simple here: sleep at least 8 hours (for most people), alternating activities during the day.

— a sufficient amount of movement, sports, fitness every day (if the job is sedentary). It’s also clear: health benefits, rest, and improved blood supply to the brain.

2. Mode and intensity of work. My experience shows that the best results are obtained by working in a “smooth”, calm mode. There is no need to twitch and force yourself to fulfill Stakhanov’s norms. You shouldn't relax either. The mood should be... working =)) That is, you need to approach the matter in a businesslike manner, without rushing and without stalling.

3., concentration on the task you are doing at the moment. This is generally a problem for many people - they get down to business, but then one thing distracts, another, another... If a person works at a computer connected to the Internet, then there’s a problem - he’s tempted to check his email ten times an hour, go to ICQ, read the latest news... As a result, a lot of time is wasted and the desired mood is lost. Distractions are a fight!

4. Emotional mood. Here everything is more interesting: it is ambiguous and, most likely, individual for each person. For example, I work best in an upbeat mood with a bit of the spirit of competition with myself - can I do it better and faster? It was said above that the mood should be even, but even in terms of the intensity of work, not emotions. Approaching work coldly or with negativity is perhaps unwise.

But excessive emotions are also harmful. It will be ideal if you observe yourself in what mood you work best, fix it in your memory and train yourself to evoke it every time you get down to work. It's complicated. But effective.

5. Conscious approach to business (I don’t like the word “motivation” - it doesn’t recent years there's too much going on). You must imagine why and why you are doing this or that and why it is important to you. The reason here could even be “to get rid of it.” This is quite a sufficient reason to motivate you to work effectively (that is, work when you do everything quickly enough and with a minimum of resources - time and effort).

6. Optimization of individual details in work. It is always better to sharpen the saw first, and only then start sawing: learn effective working techniques, and only then actually work.

I remember a joke (it’s unclear why about students):

“What is the difference between a student and a monkey? But if you need to get a banana from a tree, the monkey will first shake it - if the banana does not fall, then he will think and think and go look for a stick. And the student will think and think and say - why think about it, you need to shake it!”

Take your cue from the monkey!

7. Optimization of time management. I have already written about how to save time on little things: .

The percentage of “workaholics” among IT specialists is incredibly high: they can spend hours discussing the solution to a problem, sit at the computer for days, go without vacation for years, moving from project to project. However, for some reason this dedication may not have any effect on the efficiency of the IT department team.

Improving staff efficiency- a subject of concern for almost every IT service manager - both a small company and an industrial giant. The personnel motivation system is often built by trial and error, and the number of errors is quite large. How to optimize motivational models? How to make people want to work in this particular organization, to work to achieve business results?

In IT services, a situation often arises when people are well motivated to work on a project, understand the goals and objectives of the work, clearly see the horizons, are aware of their areas of responsibility and work with full dedication. In everyday work, the picture is often significantly different: people do not think about the ultimate goals of their work, and do not feel the incentive to do it as well as possible. It turns out that the team completes the sprint distances quickly and harmoniously, but the achievements at the stayer distances look much more modest. Since managers are often unable to change the situation, the search for external influences begins. Any explanation is used - from the general state of the Russian economy, which, like an ocean in a drop, is reflected in organizational features individual companies, to specifics Russian mentality, which, of course, sometimes allows you to “go fast,” but only due to the fact that before that you “harness” for a long time and slowly. However, no matter how reassuring and reliable the explanation may seem, it does not solve the problem.

In order to understand the reason for this phenomenon, it is necessary to consider the real, and not the declared, organizational principles of the company in general and the IT department in particular.

Formula for success

People think about creating or improving a motivation system when there is a need to increase the efficiency of employees, more rational use labor resources. Managers often describe the problem something like this: “People work great, love their profession - to the point that they are ready to give the company their personal time, own initiative working overtime. They - good professionals. But in general, the IT service is not working as efficiently as it could be, time and labor resources are being used irrationally.” Often the feeling of ineffective use of labor resources arises on an intuitive level and is not supported by any indicators. Managers often see a way out of this situation by changing the system of personnel motivation, which, as a rule, means increasing salaries.

“Increasing the efficiency of a company or its division is not limited to the creation of motivational schemes. The effectiveness of people depends not only on motivation, so it is necessary to consider it in combination with other significant influencing factors. The approach to creating an effective personnel work system that we practice is quite often used in the West, but has not yet become widespread in Russia,” says Dmitry Voloshchuk, consultant in the “Personnel Performance Management” department of Ecopsy Consulting.

Within this approach, efficiency is considered as a derivative of three elements:

• Efficiency = competence / organizational barriers x motivation, where competence is professional knowledge and skills (and in the case of an employee in a leadership position, also managerial skills). Leadership qualities are an important component of the competence of IT service employees, since in a business environment, a significant part of which is organized on a project basis, most specialists from time to time take on a managerial position - project manager, head of the project office, etc.;
• motivation is a system of material and non-material incentives based on people’s values ​​and guidelines;
• organizational barriers are attitudes and features of the organizational structure that prevent people from working with full dedication for the benefit of the company. These may be inorganic work rules, standards that make it difficult for employees, gaps in the organizational structure, lack of regulations and procedures - for example, procedures for responding to problem situations, and so on.

Based on the formula, we can consider the activities of employees in three dimensions - professionalism, motivation and corporate environment. “In order to understand the degree of efficiency of a department, you need to look at what point in this three-dimensional coordinate system it is at: how great the competence and motivation are, and what the organizational barriers are. Only after this can we draw a conclusion about what steps need to be taken to increase efficiency,” says Dmitry Voloshchuk.

The level of professionalism of IT specialists can be measured using professional tests or based on the assessment of their immediate supervisor. The situation is more complicated with their managerial skills and competencies - often IT specialists do not undergo any training in management skills and implement their managerial functions based on their own ideas about them. Moreover, a common situation is when the best IT specialist becomes the head of the IT service, regardless of whether he has the inclinations and skills of a manager or not.

Organizational barriers vary from company to company. Endless mandatory memos that must be written for any reason, complicated approval procedures, outdated corporate standards and much more can hold back the development of the organization. “People find it difficult to look at their activities from the outside and take steps to optimize them - there are so many current operational priorities and absolutely no time for a critical look. As a result, the importance of organizational barriers is often underestimated. Meanwhile, experience shows that simple steps to improve business processes can free up 20–30% of employees’ useful time, says Dmitry Voloshchuk. “In addition, if a person is engaged in “monkey work,” this demotivates him.”

Theory and practice

Roman Zhuravlev: “The management practices of IT services in companies do not form any system.” Like any other process in the IT management system, personnel management must have clearly defined goals, clearly related to the goals of the IT department, agreed, in turn, with goals and priorities of the company. To achieve these goals, tasks, main activities, and procedures must be defined. Responsibility for the implementation of both individual procedures and the process as a whole must be distributed. The necessary resources must be allocated and the availability of the necessary competencies ensured. It is advisable to identify and learn to evaluate measurable indicators of the effectiveness of the personnel management process. It is important that human resource management activities include phases of planning, execution, evaluation and improvement.

“As a rule, the management practices of IT services in companies do not form any system,” says Roman Zhuravlev, director of the IT training department at IT Expert. - Processes, even if identified, interact ineffectively. The goals of the IT function are not defined or are not related to the goals of the company.” The main activities in the field of personnel management are carried out, according to him, something like this:

• planning: quantitative - within the quota for staff expansion, usually annually. The quota calculation is not based on anything. In the field of training - within budgets - on the one hand, vague ideas about the prospects for infrastructure development - on the other.
• personnel selection: sources are not systematized. The activities of the relevant department at the company level do not produce results when it comes to IT service personnel. Professionally oriented selection is carried out haphazardly. Selected based on expert assessment Heads of IT departments, employees are sent “to personnel” for registration and formal checks.
• training: in full accordance with planning, that is, randomly. (Detailed calendar plan can not only be drawn up, but also observed. However, the question “Why are these particular people and these particular programs in it?” belongs to the category of rhetorical.)
• motivation: employees involved in projects are financially motivated to complete the project on time. Employees engaged in operational activities are motivated to retain them within the framework of a corporate-wide incentive program (salary, bonuses, social package). The IT manager gets involved in special cases, such as when a key employee tries to leave the company.

The described practices are not at all similar to the recommendations set out in modern IT management models, such as COBIT, MOF, which determine the need for effective personnel management, including planning, selection, training, development, motivation, rotation and dismissal. The reasons for this discrepancy, according to Roman Zhuravlev, are:

• low level of maturity of management processes in most Russian companies;
• uncertainty of the status and goals of the IT service in the company;
• insufficient training of IT service managers in the field of management;
• lack of adapted personnel management techniques that take into account the specifics of IT services.

“Under such conditions, in most cases there is no practical need to “optimize motivational models.” They will remain models,” notes Roman Zhuravlev.

“The most important thing is to integrate the motivation system for a specific person into the overall goal-setting system of the company (or division, if we are talking about an IT service), says Elena Sharova, deputy director of the corporate management systems department at IBS. - Each individual employee must understand his role in the overall “working mechanism” and see his contribution to achieving overall success. And the motivational scheme should be directly related to achieving the business goals of the department and the company as a whole.

In the process of setting the overall strategic goals of the company, they are decomposed to the level of individual performers. Each employee must, on the one hand, have a list of clear goals and objective criteria for achieving them, and on the other, see how his work contributes to overall success. All this creates the most important psychological effect - a feeling of involvement in a great cause. Without it, it is almost impossible to interest an employee.

It is very important that the rules of the game are initially set, not only from the point of view of motivation, but also the organization of work in general. It is necessary to clearly establish what the employees’ areas of responsibility are, how we work, how we communicate, how and who will control the work, how we will punish. Work rules (and motivation rules in particular) should not be a “black box” - they should be transparent and understandable. The less subjectivity, the better.”

Sources of inspiration

Elena Sharova: “Each specific employee must understand his role in the overall “working mechanism.” “To build an effective management and motivation system for the IT service, Roman Zhuravlev emphasizes, it is important:

• clearly formulate the goals of the activity - the IT service as a whole, its individual divisions, and individual performers. Agree on high-level goals with company management and bring them to the attention of employees;
• make reinforcements dependent only on the overt results of IT activities. Rewards for other people's successes do not motivate people to do better. Bonuses and other incentives based on company performance may contribute to the loyalty of IT employees, but not to improving the quality of work;
• determine intermediate points of activity assessment - semantic or temporary. The year-end bonus encourages you to work better in December. The results of interim assessments should be prompt and obvious. Prize for good job in the first quarter, paid in September, is perceived as a late repaid debt;
• make the management and motivation system adequate to the complexity of the organization, ensuring simplicity, fairness and accuracy of assessments. Take into account the features of different methods of managing activities. Use data from automation systems for IT management activities (records of work performed, reports, protocols, etc.);
• Remember that IT employees are different. The customer support operator, programmer and network engineer have different characteristic features personalities prefer different objects activities, organize their work differently... And efficient system management and motivation must take these differences into account;
• provide opportunities for professional growth. For IT specialists, it is usually a priority over the career one. The opportunity to learn ensures the relevance of the professional level, maintenance and improvement of qualifications;
• try to establish effective interaction with the HR department. Often he does not help the CIO because neither side understands what the general tasks, and not because these problems have no solutions.

Bread, knowledge, soulful atmosphere!

“If you compare the entire motivation system with an iceberg, then salaries, bonuses and other material benefits are what lies on the surface, what is visible and relatively easy to compare,” says Nadezhda Shalashilina, HR director of the Lanit group of companies. “But non-material motivation is the underwater part of the iceberg, which is much larger and deeper, and you can’t immediately see it, although it makes up the majority of the block.”

However, for most people the main motivating factor is material motivation. But this factor, according to Elena Sharova, needs to be worked subtly and competently: “Financial compensation is not just buying a person’s qualifications, it should motivate him to achieve specific goals and encourage him to grow. The frequently occurring “ritual” salary increase by a certain percentage each year does not in any way motivate people to achieve success. Employees perceive it as a fact and do not see the connection between the salary increase and the growth of their qualifications. And more capable employees are not motivated for rapid professional growth, because they do not see how their earnings depend on the quality of their work. Thus, an objective assessment (in monetary terms) of an employee’s abilities should be formed taking into account the employee’s contribution to achieving project goals (if we are talking about project management) and the opportunities for his professional growth.”

One of the effective mechanisms of material motivation is personnel certification. During the certification process, goals for the year related to professional and career growth are discussed with the employee. The certification form records not just his responsibilities, but also the development plan - in what new role you need to try yourself, what skills and competencies should be developed in order to step into new level. For work purposes, the foundation for the development of certain skills is laid for the year. An increase in qualifications, development of skills and competencies is followed by a change in compensation.

The second tool for building motivational schemes is motivation by goals. “Goals must be clear, and clear indicators for their achievement must be set so that there are no discrepancies,” emphasizes Elena Sharova. - The principle is that a better result guarantees a greater reward. There is always a bonus fund. We just need to give meaning to bonuses, which in different companies are traditionally issued annually, quarterly or monthly, we need to tie them to the achievement of specific goals. This mechanism should not be a “black box”, but should be understandable and objective.”

“Given the undeniable importance of the monetary factor, non-material motivation, in my opinion, is the most reliable way to retain highly qualified specialists, especially in conditions of personnel shortages and rapid salary growth,” says Nadezhda Shalashilina. “And all because it is non-material motivation that gives people common values ​​and goals, passion for their work, opportunities for development and self-realization, recognition and true pleasure from work.”

In the IT industry, it is generally agreed that the main factor of non-financial motivation is professional and career growth. Therefore, it is necessary to plan how the employee will grow both professionally and career-wise, over the next two to three years, says Elena Sharova. “This is where the credentialing tool comes in again,” she continues. - It is during certification (if the company has an existing and not a formal procedure) that the goals of the employee’s personal growth are developed and they are aligned with the general goals of the company.

To ensure consistency between the company's strategic goals and the goals of individual employees, IBS has adopted the principle of conducting certification “from top to bottom” - first management, and then down the job ladder. Thanks to this, general top-level goals are decomposed into specific goals for each employee. In accordance with work goals, the employee is given development goals - what needs to be learned, what to master. Moreover, in order to show the employee development opportunities, we always set somewhat more ambitious goals in the certification than required by qualifications. This stimulates and motivates him to develop, gives him confidence that he has many prospects and the opportunity to constantly learn new things.”

Among other important factors of non-material motivation, one can note the importance of the leader’s personality. “Obviously, the leader and the atmosphere he creates in the team mean a lot - the company’s mission is transmitted through the leader, he must ignite hearts. But still, the organizational structure, especially if we are talking about an industrial scale, should not rest on the personality of the leader, but, first of all, on some culture, regulations, rules of interaction and development plans,” says Elena Sharova.

According to a survey conducted by Ecopsy Consulting on the topic “What primarily keeps talented employees in a company?”, 44.78% of respondents answered that what keeps them going is a constant professional challenge, the opportunity to solve interesting problems, and in second place (17. 91%) turned out to be the identity of the immediate supervisor. The high level of income did not rise above the third step (16.42%). “People are people. The material component is important, but the conditions are more important - professional and personal. No one is ready to work with people who are unpleasant to them and to pour water from empty to empty,” sums up Dmitry Voloshchuk. - The topic of non-material motivation is still poorly developed by Russian companies, largely due to the fact that the potential of material motivation has not been used up. Competition for specialists is largely due to this resource. But since we are already in a situation where candidates form the market, and the demand for them is much higher than supply, the issue of non-material motivation will be acute in the coming years. When wages reach a ceiling, other resources will begin to be sought. And here the Russian market will follow the Western path: most likely, this will be motivation, which is costly for the company, but is given to employees in the form of intangible benefits: a social package, opportunities for free education and recreation, payment for a number of family needs - life insurance, payment for children’s education and etc. These practices are well developed in the West and will soon begin to be actively implemented in Russian companies.”

How to make the secret obvious

The development of a motivation system for each company is individual; it depends on many internal and external factors. “When creating a motivation system, it is necessary, first of all, to find out the internal attitudes of people and how the employees’ own goals are related to the company’s goals,” emphasizes Dmitry Voloshchuk, consultant at Ecopsy Consulting. - At the moment when a motivation system for operational activities is being developed, it is very important to understand, on the one hand, what the company expects from employees and what it is ready to motivate them for, and on the other hand, what people expect from the company.

If the system motivates one thing, but people expect another from the company, then the motivation system will not work because it is not suitable for these specific people. And on the contrary, motivational schemes must be adequate to the company’s expectations from the staff. If a company expects teamwork from a department, but the motivation system is aimed at encouraging the manifestation of individual qualities, without taking into account how a person is involved in collective work and works for a common result, a cohesive team will not form.”

People's internal attitudes are a difficult area to identify. They are made up of social, group and individual preferences, goals and traditions. But, despite all the diversity of internal motives, some characteristic features, inherent to IT specialists, can be identified.

Life from project to project

Nadezhda Shalashilina: “ Non-material motivation- the underwater part of the iceberg.” When selecting employees, managers sympathize with like-minded people. As a result, over time, the team consists of people with the same way of thinking. Along with obvious advantages, this approach has some disadvantages.

Today, the heads of companies and their departments, in the overwhelming majority of cases, are people aimed at constant professional and career growth, and the IT sector, as already noted, is distinguished by the fact that professional growth has priority. Each successive step in professional growth, as a rule, is correlated with participation in a project. Accordingly, many IT specialists have developed design thinking. When they become managers, they select employees with similar business qualities. If the work of the IT department in such a situation is organized on a project basis, it will be very effective, especially in a dynamically developing company. But if the current operational activities of employees are not marked out by clear time periods and clearly described goals, people on this “plain” quickly begin to lose their taste for life and soon go in search of new Everests. “The daily activities of such employees can be organized in the form of mini-projects, with clear goals and a clear system for evaluating results,” says Dmitry Voloshchuk. “Motivation should be built in such a way that people see clear guidelines and realize what the achievement or failure to achieve their goals will mean for them.”

Design thinking poses another danger. People who are accustomed to project work consider it necessary to get involved in the implementation as soon as possible. more projects, regardless of the real possibility of completing them. They consider project abandonment to be the main indicator of professional failure. Therefore, the IT department can be involved in many simultaneously implemented internal projects aimed at automating various business processes or improving existing systems. At the same time, the total volume of work significantly exceeds the capabilities of available resources. Accordingly, dozens of projects may remain unfinished for years. “The significant difference between an internal IT department and an independent company implementing projects on the market is that the internal department does not evaluate its own profitability,” notes Dmitry Voloshchuk. - This is the situation in most IT services of large companies. Of course, the manager would have to filter proposals from internal customers based on the resources at his disposal. But, as a rule, he himself is characterized by project thinking, and he formed a team of like-minded people. The circle closes.

In such a situation, we propose to change the value orientation - the main thing becomes not the number of projects being implemented, but the number of successfully implemented projects. This automatically entails the creation of a filter of customer proposals - only those projects in which functional departments are really interested begin to be accepted. At the same time, obviously hopeless projects must be terminated so that resources are not wasted.”

Player coach syndrome

The problem of the “playing coach” is very typical for IT services. The IT service employees are wonderful professionals with high level knowledge and rich experience. They have gone from beginner programmers and system administrators to high-level professionals, they thoroughly know the subject area and have a good understanding of what their subordinates at all levels do. However, their current work lies in to a greater extent in the field of management than in a specific subject area. The main function of these specialists is setting tasks and monitoring their implementation. But knowledge of the subject area and lack of managerial skills lead to the fact that they tend to analyze every problem that arises among employees too thoroughly or undertake to correct the shortcomings themselves. They react to any request for help or in the process of monitoring the execution of orders not as managers, but as engineers. “This is a very common problem in IT,” notes Dmitry Voloshchuk. - The department operates ineffectively because employees of higher official and qualification levels spend their time and effort on solving the problems of their subordinates. They love their job very much and are unable to give up interesting tasks subject area, because management tasks do not captivate them so much. In such a situation, it is very important to build a system of priorities in the motivational scheme. If employees are motivated by business results, they will solve the problem as a whole, without going into small details.”

Public is higher than personal

Dmitry Voloshchuk: “Motivation should be structured so that people see clear guidelines.” Another common mistake in creating a motivation system is when the system motivates people only for individual work and all indicators reflect the personal effectiveness of each employee. In such a situation, employees lack a sense of team, collective mutual assistance and support to work comfortably. In addition, in a team where everyone feels like a “star,” the team effect does not arise. Having messed things up, people unconsciously try to lobby for the priorities of their area, which slows down the common cause. There is a lack of synergistic effect from the team's work.

“It is necessary to create indicators of the collective work of the unit,” advises Dmitry Voloshchuk, “and reinforce the achievement of these indicators with a bonus system. In this case, the bonuses will be fragmented: part is issued on the basis of general indicators, and part - on the basis of individual ones. There is nothing revolutionary in this method of motivation - this is exactly how, for example, the bonus system for industrial enterprises back in the days of the USSR. But it almost never occurs to IT service managers to apply this experience to the work of their subordinate department. Perhaps, at first glance, the idea of ​​comparing the work of a person producing material values ​​with the work of a person creating intellectual values ​​looks absurd. But if you take a closer look, you will find many similarities in the process of organizing their work and their goals. We just need to build a motivation system in strict accordance with the expectations of employees.”

CIO to note

Like any area of ​​activity, the area information technology goes through various stages life cycle. At first, creators come to a new area, but over time, technologies are developed and a wide layer of artisans emerges. A clear procedure appears, a set of algorithms and templates designed to solve problems. This is necessary and inevitable. Since the IT field is quite young, creativity in it has turned into a craft relatively recently. Therefore, a typical situation today is when an IT specialist, who has reached the highest professional level, loses interest in a subject area that no longer gives him the opportunity to solve problems of increasingly higher complexity. The sacramental question arises: what to do? “There are two options: either push professional priorities into the background and enjoy life, or look for new uses in professional activities, says Dmitry Voloshchuk. - If the first option is unacceptable, then for the CIO the solution to the problem may be in changing the role, in entering managerial activities. Moreover, the IT environment is designed in such a way that a person can reach a very high career level while remaining an expert.

Today, companies have a serious need to increase the efficiency of IT services and increase their manageability. IT services have large budgets, great prospects, and great risks if they are poorly managed. The situation has reached a critical point when it is necessary to reach a qualitatively new level of IT service management. Companies have already begun to allow IT managers to participate in business management and strategic planning. Accordingly, not just specialists will be in demand, but specialists with the inclinations and knowledge of a manager. Those who know how to combine both of these roles – expert and manager – are already becoming competitive and interesting to the market.”

Elena Nekrasova

Accounting automation for any business

One of the factors for the effective work of a team is to ensure a normal moral and psychological climate in it. Its presence is evidenced by the mutual support of people, the absence of constant conflicts between them, open discussion of disagreements and other difficult issues, and reluctance to move to a new place. It is better for the team to be diverse and consist of different people.

An efficient team must have an optimal size. The more people there are, the more difficult it is for them to communicate with each other and reach agreement on key issues.

An important feature of a healthy team is clarity of goals. Everyone should have a good idea of ​​what results they should strive for, clearly understand and share the goals of the team. And then people will seek a compromise between personal and collective interests in order to satisfy their needs and contribute to the common cause.

The performance of the team is also influenced by the implementation of certain norms and standards of behavior, which include honesty, competence, professionalism, and ethical standards.

Maintaining a normal moral and psychological climate in the team is important in ensuring the effectiveness of the team.

The main signs of a favorable moral and psychological climate:

1) trust and high demands of group members towards each other;

2) friendly and businesslike criticism;

3) free expression of one’s own opinion when discussing issues affecting the entire team;

4) the absence of pressure from managers on subordinates and the recognition of their right to make decisions that are significant for the group;

5) sufficient awareness of team members about its tasks and the state of affairs in their implementation;

6) satisfaction with belonging to a team;

7) a high degree of emotional involvement and mutual assistance in situations that cause a state of frustration (deception, upset, destruction of plans) in any of the team members;

8) taking responsibility for the state of affairs in the group by each of its members, etc.

There are also 10 barriers to team work: efficient work.

1) Unsuitability of the leader.

Leadership is perhaps the most important factor determining the quality of a team's work. A leader who is unwilling to adopt a team approach or who lacks the ability to use this leadership style will suppress any team-building initiative. A good leader always pays attention special attention and shows by personal example how to bring issues to a complete solution.

2) Unqualified employees.

If team members lack basic skills, useful results are unlikely to be achieved. It is necessary to achieve a combination of professional and human qualities, which together only allow you to successfully cope with your work. The needs for certain qualities are not the same in different teams.

3) Unconstructive climate.

It often turns out that a team brings together people with very different backgrounds, with very different values and life plans. Whether employees are committed to the tasks of the team is one of the signs of a positive climate. Commitment to the team must be developed consciously, since it rarely arises on its own until each employee personally decides to devote his energy to collective goals. If disagreements arise between employees, it is better to speak about them publicly. When important issues remain unspoken, the climate in the team becomes defensive - people hide their views, preferring to be comfortable rather than natural.

4) Unclear goals.

If there is no clear vision of the goal, then as a result, individual team members cannot contribute to the overall success. Even when goals are clear to everyone, it is important to find a compromise between personal and collective interests. An effective team allows each employee to satisfy their personal interests and contribute to the implementation of collective ones.

5) Poor performance results.

Some teams have a positive climate and effective leadership, but lack the drive to get the job done. As a result, the results are low, despite overall competence. Target group work- obtain tangible results that meet the needs of the organization. Even if a team has a good moral climate, but results are poor, then it does not justify its existence.

6) Ineffective work methods.

IN good team working methods are so refined that they become an informal but strict discipline. People learn to apply quality criteria to their meetings. Individual employees acquire personal skills that are recognized and used within the team. There is a spirit of competence at the meetings and there is rarely a dull moment. The team moves quickly and maintains a high tempo, but a high level of personal attention and ease of communication ensure that all relevant issues are addressed.

7) Lack of openness and confrontation.

In some groups, a kind of conspiracy is formed when people and events are not analyzed critically. Here the free flow of judgments and comments is inhibited to create a friendly microclimate. Team members may discourage openness for several reasons: Politeness: Team members believe that social etiquette precludes confrontation. Fear of “losing face”: people feel that criticism from colleagues can lead to a decline in their authority. Reluctance to “rock the boat”: employees believe that criticism exposes weaknesses and undermines the moral climate. Lack of qualifications: team members understand the benefits of thorough analysis, but simply do not feel able to carry it out constructively; they don't have enough the required skill analyze and make personal comparisons.

8) Undeveloped employees.

Effective teamwork must bring together the skills of all employees. All other things being equal, teams with a high level of individual abilities have the greatest opportunities. Abilities may not depend on education, qualifications and experience. Other managers seem to have all the necessary knowledge and skills, but they never manage to achieve noticeable results. Others have a low educational level, and at first glance it seems that they lack management skills, but despite this, their business is incredibly successful.

9) Low creativity.

An effective team is able to generate creative ideas and implement them. Much depends on a hard-to-describe shared propensity to innovate. Some organizations have achieved the point where the work there is exciting, and in such cases life is literally in full swing. Boring repetition of meaningless tasks only increases frustration, suppresses vitality, enthusiasm and creativity. From an organizational point of view, this is dangerous, since it deprives the system creative potential and increases resistance to change.

10) Unconstructive relationships with other teams.

At work, you usually have to deal with other teams, but sometimes the quality of such interaction is low. Quite often, connections are unsatisfactory and common goals are lacking. The team leader has a special role in strengthening ties with other teams, and he can do a lot to prevent hostility and the emergence of cooperation.

Crisis events in the economy give impetus to increasing the effectiveness and efficiency of business to improve the efficiency of the enterprise. Today there are no fewer players in the market, but the money has decreased. At the same time, competition is also becoming tougher, which means that victory will go to those who manage their enterprise or organization more effectively. Here are six ways to improve your work efficiency.

We select a team

For high efficiency, a company needs a well-coordinated group of people. A cohesive team will be much better able to fulfill company goals and meet performance criteria. Strengthening the staff will be helped by advanced training, positive motivation of workers, the possibility of interchangeability of employees and the presence of a certain personnel reserve.

We improve and modernize

This method quite common, it implies modernization, like software(hereinafter referred to as software), as well as updating equipment that will provide greater productivity. It is also common to install special corporate software, which makes it possible to create a closer connection between staff and automate some of the enterprise’s processes. The introduction of automation has shown a very good increase in the efficiency of an organization or enterprise.

As for updating equipment, it needs to be carried out constantly. Just remember that this is a rather expensive process and therefore requires high cash injections, and it will take several years to pay off. In such a delicate matter, you need to carefully calculate everything.

We reduce costs

An assessment of the efficiency of an enterprise is given based on its increased profit. To increase this estimate, there are a huge number of ways, ranging from purchasing low prices and ending with the reduction of the organization's personnel. But let’s not forget that we opened our business to earn money, and not to search for cheap materials, job cuts will only help for a short period of time, in the long term, with this approach, the enterprise will disappear. Costs, of course, must be controlled, but this method of increasing the efficiency of an enterprise is rather leisurely, and if we take into account the current state of affairs, it is downright dangerous.

We are adjusting the management system

This method does not involve completely developing your own system based on your own experience, but improving an already created system at other enterprises. At the moment, there are six most popular systems: Lean Manufacturing, TPS, Quality Management System (QMS), 6 Sigma and Theory of Constraints.

Adjustment of the management system is characterized by high complexity of implementation, and, at the same time, increased performance indicators of your enterprise. The professionalism of the head of an organization or enterprise is determined, first of all, by the ability to be skeptical and evaluate his own business management system.

With a change in the owner of an enterprise or a replacement of a team of top managers, the system usually changes. New leader replaces managers because he does not expect them to make changes to his enterprise management system and it is easier for him to hire new people who are not related to the previous owner. There are also known opposite cases, when frequent personnel changes do not improve efficiency.

Let's move our brains

Another way to call it is “Do something.” In the methods mentioned above, this, in one form or another, is used. This method works like this: the owner gathers his deputies and does not let them go until they “figure out” how to increase the efficiency of the company. Most often, after such a “brainstorming”, the organizational structure of the enterprise changes: reshuffling department heads, merging or vice versa, dismembering services and other similar events that are designed to increase the speed of decision-making. The result is the methods outlined above - purchasing at low prices, dismissing employees, modernizing and changing the management system, which, by the way, can save your enterprise from closure.

Using the Theory of Constraints

The theory is to find the element limiting your enterprise. If you have realized the main problem of your organization, for example, software with a minimum of functions, then you need to purchase and install new, more functional software with retraining of the personnel who will use it. This is a simple example. Most often, during brainstorming, the real problems of inefficiency are simply not visible under the rubbish of other, less important ones. The best solutions for finding the main problem of the company are TOC tools: the logical tree of current reality or the “Thundercloud”.

Conclusion

In the modern situation, the state spends quite a lot of effort on developing and maintaining entrepreneurship. But managers of organizations and enterprises should also worry about increasing the efficiency of their business. I hope this article helped in increasing the efficiency of your enterprise.