Too Many Pebbles in Employees' Shoes?

The Friction Project, by Stanford’s Robert I. Sutton and Huggy Rao, is one of the most practical and meaningful management/leadership books I’ve read in a while. Why? Because it addresses the No. 1 issue that helps people either flourish or fail at work. It is also the cornerstone of high morale and employee retention.

Each of us has to apply some number of processes in the workplace to get results. If getting work done well is simple, safe, easy and valuable, our jobs tend to be gratifying and low in negative friction.

If they are difficult, complex, frustrating, unsafe and wasteful, then work is mostly high in negative friction and miserable. In the latter situation, the outcome is exhaustion, burnout and eventual departure.

One of our clients refers to this negative friction as “pebbles in your shoe.” Yet, too many leaders ignore or become oblivious to the friction factor in their organization. They get trapped by “the way it’s always been” syndrome and/or focus on friction workarounds, versus friction fixing. Ironically they often are more attracted to friction fire fighters versus friction fixers.

Sutton and Rao’s book is very practical, and full of examples and antidotes for reducing negative friction (note: occasional high friction is a good thing).

At the highest level, their research highlights three fundamental, common principles and attributes of highly effective friction fixers: How well do you apply each of these principles?

The first principle friction fixing leaders follow is: Serve as trustees of others’ people’s time. They respectfully understand that people who spend most of their work getting “pebbles out of shoes,” are wasting their own precious time as well as others. They compassionately realize this is unsustainable and do something about it. They are not posers and political hollow bunnies (a metaphor from the book).

The second principle: Leaders are powered by ownership and accountability for friction fixing. Friction fixing leaders take ownership for hunting down and crushing out soul sucking friction. They see it as their primary leadership function.

The third leadership principle: Leaders understand that organizational design is the highest form of friction fixing. Every process is designed or potentially redesigned. Every process ultimately has a human factor and impact along the way. Friction fixers design work to be People First. They constantly observe the impact of processes on people, rather than relying on remedies or workarounds, friction fixers are obsessed with doing the right thing through design as much as possible. They look to have frictionless processes give people great experiences versus demanding people to spend every day taking painful pebbles out of their shoes!

Be a friction fixer rather than a negative friction poser and hoser!

Think Big, Start Small, Act Now,

- Lorne

One Millennial View: I think we get used to removing pebbles from shoes so often, that we forget it’s possible to walk more comfortably. Maybe we’ll even justify it by telling ourselves that there are supposed to be pebbles in our shoes once in a while. However, if you just sweep the floor a little more in the first place, you’ll get out the door without a sharp surprise to slow you down.

- Garrett

Too Many Pebbles in Employees' Shoes?

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