In what may ultimately prove a landmark decision on workplace privacy, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled this week that government workers have no right to privacy when using employer-owned communications devices. The case stemmed from a suit brought by an Ontario, CA police officer whose extremely personal text messages (not all of which were directed to his wife) were exposed during an audit of the business vs. personal usage of his city-owned device.

My first thought was, what on earth was this guy thinking when, rather than quietly reimburse the City for the personal messages, he opted to file suit on grounds of unlawful search?

My second thought was, and is, that, though the Court restricted its ruling to government employees using government-owned devices, the ruling will undoubtedly spill over and have a chilling affect on private enterprise as well, and not necessarily in the expected manner.

Employees have been extensively using employer-owned wireless devices and communications networks for better than a decade. During that time there has been something of an uneasy truce as we have each allowed the line between business and personal time/pursuits to blur. To an ever greater extent, workers (at all levels) have permitted more frequent invasion of what has traditionally been their private, off-duty, personal space. It is no longer unusual at all to have one’s off-duty time peppered with business related messages, queries, and conference calls. Once the sole realm of managers who ostensibly were being paid for such interruptions, today, workers at all levels and pay grades are involved. In turn, employers have seen, and largely acquiesced to a greater co-mingling of personal with professional activities in the workspace.

Though there has been (and always will be) some tension in this arrangement, if we (manager types) are not careful, the Court’s ruling could be the straw that breaks the camel’s back, and disrupts what is otherwise a pretty good thing.

Some managers and organizations will use the Court’s ruling as an excuse to more aggressively police and restrict non-sanctioned use of company devices and networks. Doing so would be a mistake. How?

By and large, we have been the beneficiaries of this arrangement, where, within reason, we get free (yes) access to team members, regardless of whether they are technically on or off duty. In a world where speed of thought, response, and execution reigns supreme, this advantage is worth a lot to us. The very second that our workers decide to either turn the device off, or demand compensation for the time when it is turned on, thus making them accessible, we have lost a lot of ground. This is a decision that each of them can make at any time, quietly, and without notice. When you get down to it, we face a simple high school physics problem… There are more of them than us. This is no time to get stupid.

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A thought leader in the arena of leadership and employee engagement, Bill Catlette is a seminar leader, keynote speaker, and executive coach. He helps individuals and organizations improve business outcomes by having a focused, engaged, capably led workforce. For more information about Bill, his partner Richard Hadden, and their work, please visit their website at www.contentedcows.com, or follow him on Twitter at http://twitter.com/ContentedCows

As a sign of just how co-mingled our private and business lives have become, the U.S. Supreme Court will soon hear a case regarding the privacy (or lack thereof) of personal text messages transmitted by a California police officer over a device owned by his employer, the City of Ontario. According to an article in USA Today,  “Ontario city officials are appealing a lower court’s decision that a police department violated a sergeant’s constitutional protection against unreasonable searches when it reviewed his texts, some of them sexually explicit.”

For decades, everyone pretty well understood the de facto standard to be that “work time was for work.” Translation – whatever took place during working hours on the employer’s premises/property, or when conducting business for the employer was expected to be work related, and that there were very few, if any, rights to privacy, or even ownership of one’s thoughts and ideas, if conceived at work. At the same time, one’s off duty hours were their own, and but for an infrequent, quick phone call, if you wanted to interrupt someone’s time off, you were expected to pay for it.

And then along came Jones, ‘er the cellphone, the laptop, globalization, always-on connectivity, and the expectation that workers of every stripe could be reached out to any time, anywhere. And reach out we did (and still do). Though unspoken, until now, the operating premise has been that is generally okay for workers to carry on personal business at work in an amount roughly equivalent to the degree that they are called upon to involve themselves in work activities during their “off hours.” It’s an uneasy truce, but a truce nevertheless.

To date, there have been only two lines in the sandbox: 1) That there should be no appreciable extra cost associated with the cross-over activities, and 2) That the law is still the law, and normal standards of decency still apply. In other words, whereas it’s probably alright to take a few minutes to order a new pair of shoes online at Zappos.com from your employer’s computer, it’s not okay to engage in online gambling or look at salacious images.

So where do we go?

As for the court case, my bet is that, despite a right-leaning bench, the Court will side with the cop, if only for the reason that employees were required to reimburse the city if they exceeded allowable text character limits.

More broadly speaking, I see organizations going in a couple of different directions. Some will undoubtedly take steps to further delineate via policy, what the rights and expectations are. Given the untrusting, transactional nature of the relationship in many workplaces, the new deal could bring about further unbundling of the relationship. In an increasing number of cases, the devices (phones, pagers, pda’s) will be owned by the worker while the voice/data plan will be reimbursed by the employer. With regard to the broader co-mingling of personal and business activities, some of these organizations will prescribe varying time limits that they and their employees can “bother one another” during the course of the day.

Realizing that it’s good for people to regularly unplug from their jobs, some organizations will take a step back and actually encourage workers to just turn the damned thing off when they’re at home and don’t want to be bothered, and instruct their bosses to leave them alone.

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A thought leader in the arena of leadership and employee engagement, Bill Catlette is a seminar leader, keynote speaker, and executive coach. He helps individuals and organizations improve business outcomes by having a focused, engaged, capably led workforce. For more information about Bill, his partner Richard Hadden, and their work, please visit their website at www.contentedcows.com, or follow him on Twitter at http://twitter.com/ContentedCows

In a post on January 13, we wrote about the epidemic of worker dissatisfaction in the US, as reported in a Conference Board study. In that post, we offered some initial thoughts on why workers are so unhappy these days, why it matters, and what to do about it. The first two reasons we gave were:

1. Workers have a diminished sense of meaningfulness in their jobs.
2. One word: micromanagement.

Here are 4 more reasons (with some suggested solutions), and a concluding thought:

Undifferentiated rewards: As companies have shrunk their merit budgets and bonuses, AND as the stock market is down for an entire DECADE (thus reducing the value of option grants), we have experienced tremendous reward destruction and compression in which the distinction between “stars” and “slugs” (Bill’s terms) has become negligible. Thus, we’ve experienced a drop in satisfaction that touches all, including our best performing people.

What to do: When you see good performance, reward it. Then and there. Start with “Thank You.” Then, find a way, and a big enough way to get the person’s attention. Rather than adding to fixed payroll expense, consider gifting an award trip, extra time off, or some other gift that really means something to the individual. Worry less about being consistent than sending a message that excellence is meaningfully rewarded.

Pocket pain: Specifically, health care. Concurrent with less-than-exciting (or nonexistent) pay increases, U.S. workers are paying more for health care, owing to a non-system that has seen costs more than double over the last decade. Employers who offer health care benefits have no choice but share the increasing cost. While currently proposed legislation solves some of the problems, it does little for the biggest problem – controlling costs. Take that, plus the increasing number of workers who have no health care benefits at work, and you’ve got a workforce paying higher premiums, higher out of pocket costs, no realistic solutions on the horizon, AND the increased worry that accompanies having no safety net. Yikes.

What to do: Turn off the TV! Get the facts. Read, starting with Regina Herzlinger’s Who Killed Healthcare?. Discuss the matter with your own physician. Consider establishing, along with like-minded neighboring employers, a private or co-op clinic, as organizations like SAS and the Pebble Beach Company have done. Heavily incent workers, using both positive and negative consequences, to better manage their health. Advocate forcefully for better public policy.

Diminished employment options: The recession, paired with the continued unbundling (and offshoring) of work have drastically reduced the number and scope of available jobs. Moreover, any stigmas or pangs of guilt on the part of management associated with reducing “heads” in the workplace have disappeared. Witness simultaneous announcements by United Parcel Service last month that the company was, 1) increasing earnings guidance due to favorable business conditions, and 2) Doing a restructuring that would eliminate nearly 2,000 jobs. People who once were assured that, even if they didn’t like their current job, could quickly find another now aren’t as comforted by their options.

What to do: Tune in. Let your people know where they stand and how the business is doing – truthfully and regularly. If you’re through making cuts, say so. Monitor and nurture your employment brand as carefully as you do your cash. That may also mean managing people out of the organization (with consideration and decency) who have unplugged and are merely hanging on because they don’t see any options.

The dumbing down of the workplace: The first shoe to drop whenever earnings take a hit, or the economy contracts, falls on the organization’s training budget. We are now in the 3rd year of greatly diminished funding, to include training for managers. To wit, people now find themselves in the unenviable position of working for (and with) less skilled managers. Not a happy thought.

What to do: Take this opportunity to get the jump on your competition. Begin selectively restarting your development activities, with a careful eye for the real priorities. If you can’t yet afford systemic efforts, fund development initiatives (i.e., executive coaching) for worthy staff. Incent workers (using time off or a skill acquisition bonus) to invest in their own development plans, rather than just “taking whatever comes from corporate”.

One last thought – and pardon what sounds like a negative tone here: Dissatisfaction isn’t confined to the workplace. The decade of the 00’s is one that most people in the U.S., if not elsewhere, were glad to put in the rear view mirror. We think it’s safe to say that many (if not most) of us feel less well off, less secure, and yes, less satisfied than at any time in our lives. To think that these feelings don’t make their way into the workplace is delusional.

That said, maybe it’s time to “reboot” this whole idea of leadership and motivation in the workplace. Not to throw it out, but to “reload the program”, under a new set of conditions, a new reality, for a new and better future. It is for that reason that together with our friend and colleague, Meredith Kimbell, we have been working for the better part of a year on a new book, Rebooting Leadership, due for publication in May of this year. Watch this space for more.

Meanwhile, buck up, and Godspeed!

Recently, as we’ve been about the process of completing our upcoming book, Rebooting Leadership, several leaders have mentioned to me various things they are doing within their organizations to update their leadership habits in response to new “conditions on the ground” as politicians like to say. Some of them make perfect sense, like amping up recognition efforts and giving front line leaders more discretionary authority to solve employee and customer problems.

That said, as we go about the process of adjusting to the new normal, we would do well to remember that there are some “iron laws” relating to the human psyche, and in turn, a person’s willingness to trust, engage, and commit precious discretionary effort. One of those laws has to do with climbing on someone’s bumper (calling them out or reprimanding them) in public. You just don’t do that if you want to retain a person’s respect or commitment… ever.

I was reminded of that this morning after reading an analysis of the 2010 Super Bowl by Indianapolis Colts President, Bill Polian on the team’s website. Speaking of his team’s loss, Mr. Polian said, “Our offensive line, by our standards, did not have a good game. They were outplayed by the Saints’ defensive line. Our special teams, in terms of handing the ball – both in the return game and on the onside kick – were outplayed by the Saints. Therein lies the result. It had nothing to do with strategy or preparedness or toughness or effort.”

In fairness, Mr. Polian did single out a few players for praise, his diagnosis of the cause of their loss seems correct, and his remarks weren’t especially harsh. Yet, it’s one thing to do a no holds barred after-action review in the team’s locker room, but something entirely different to do it in public. There is absolutely nothing to be gained by inviting an audience for that type of discussion.

So, as we go about the process of adjusting to an uptight, always-on world where everything seems destined for public consumption in one venue or another, let’s take care to respect the precept that what happens in the locker room stays in the locker room.

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A thought leader in the arena of leadership and employee engagement, Bill Catlette is a seminar leader, keynote speaker, and executive coach. He helps individuals and organizations improve business outcomes by having a focused, engaged, capably led workforce. For more information about Bill, his partner Richard Hadden, and their work, please visit their website at www.contentedcows.com, or follow him on Twitter at http://twitter.com/ContentedCows

Tuesday evening, I hosted an executive coaching client for dinner and a Memphis Grizzlies game at FedEx Forum. Our dinner server was a fellow by the name of Ben, who has waited on me at most, twice before. As we were being seated, Ben approached and said to my guest, “My guess is that Mr. Catlette is going to have a glass of Merlot, what can I get you to drink?” I whirled and looked at him in amazement, wondering what other information might be stamped on my forehead. Ben smiled and volunteered that he tries to pay attention to his guests, and make them feel special. Mission accomplished.

Not unlike my son, Will, who tends bar at the Savannah airport and has a following of regular customers (at an airport bar!), Ben has learned that it’s the little things, like remembering a guest’s name and their preferences that lead to  good outcomes. The very same thing holds true for those of us whose job is to lead others. Before we can expect people to follow us with any degree of fervor, we must first take an interest in them… their likes, dislikes, ambitions, apprehensions, etc.

In the age of the disposable worker, this type of care and attention seems counter-intuitive. Speaking of his new sales reps, one office products sales manager admitted to me that, “we don’t really even get to know their names, as most of them won’t be here very long.” I’m willing to bet that a lot of the good performers leave for precisely that reason. Not bothering to know someone’s name, or things that are important to them doesn’t make them feel very special.

Thankfully, this is something that is not constrained by economic forces. We don’t need a positive GDP growth rate to make people feel special. Nor does it require any particular talent. Every one of us can do it. We’ve just got to care enough to take an interest, listen, observe, and then act on what we’ve learned.

I think you’ll find that if you take that extra step, you’ll soon notice that you’ve got more people around you who are willing to go the extra mile.

Godspeed!

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A thought leader in the arena of leadership and employee engagement, Bill Catlette is a seminar leader, keynote speaker, and executive coach. He helps individuals and organizations improve business outcomes by having a focused, engaged, capably led workforce. For more information about Bill, his partner Richard Hadden, and their work, please visit their website at www.contentedcows.com, or follow him on Twitter at http://twitter.com/ContentedCows