Care drives everything
I don’t know a single person who would put 100% of his abilities into a work if he’s there only for a paycheck.
But I do know plenty of people who really care about the job they do, and whenever needed they’ll make themselves better educated, learn new skills, adjust personality, and all these in private time just to be a better performer in a workplace.
In general people don’t care about work if they don’t have to and most of us prefer to do bare minimum which will just preserve us from getting fired. This attitude changes drastically when one starts to care and sees the bigger goal in his actions.
It’s not that we human beings don’t care by default (although it’s true for some). I worked with many young people who immensely cared at the beginning of their career, but being exposed to constant ignorance and abuse just stopped.
To me lack of care comes from burnout and is a defense mechanism created to avoid emotional pain. If you care a lot and you’re abused, ignored and not appreciated it hurts a lot. It’s easier to not care in the first place and avoid any emotional relation with the work we do.
The thing is that you can’t make max out employee’s performance if he doesn’t care and if he doesn’t bring feelings to a workplace. More than this – most of great people can’t live in a state of careless work so they’re leaving broken inhuman organisations. Continue reading “Care – the most powerful quality in a workplace”