Media Centre
Recruit – Recognise – Reward - Retain
The paradox of competition has been in sharp focus over a weekend of football finals. Intrinsic in it is the notion of winners and losers.
Superimpose this on the corporate landscape and the comments made by Jonathon Biggins (SMH, Good Weekend Magazine “What’s my secret?) makes ironic sense. Biggins, whose book The 700 Habits of Highly Ineffective People has just been released paints the picture of the company conference, 200 eager delegates glued to the PowerPoint presentation from a sales guru. With the theme from Rocky swelling in the background the presentation concludes with the exhortation “Every one of you can be the top sales rep for the quarter if you want it bad enough!” The truth of the matter is that only one can hold that glittering prize and 199 losers have just been created.
Shift that focus to one where people are motivated on an individual basis, where winning is achieving self satisfaction and attaining self identified goals, and you have a an organisation of winners. Figures released by the Australian Bureau of Statistics in September confirmed that the labour market continues to be tight. In this “competition for talent” many organisations have already recognised that the key to positive engagement and retention of staff is in the realm of making people feel good about themselves and their working role.