How many of your team the moment they step into their office shift into someone more similar to the employee-prototype of THIS company? And how much does such behavior cost the employer? What about the hiding employee? How much does this cost them?
How many people are hiding out there?
A lot actually. More than we think. A recent study conducted by Deloitte internationally shows that 61% of the employees cover dimensions of their personality or values in front of their coworkers and managers, just to fit into the company culture.
How much does this cost?
A lot. For the employer, on one hand, they come with efficiency and productivity costs: imagine how much time and energy are allocated daily to maintain a fake picture of the true self and then think of the fact that all these are deducted from the energy required to perform an actual task. Although important, these represent only part of the costs. With employees covering their true selves, companies are facing serious and long term loss on group performance and future opportunities.
On the other hand, these come with a cost for the hiding employee as well! Mental health, although difficult to monetize, wears people down and leads to frustration. An employee who wears different masks to fit to a certain compelling profile loses themselves in the first place.
If people uncover only one part of their personality at work every day - the one that fits to the image of the Employee - two resources that are vital for a company are lost simultaneously: critical thinking and team creativity.
Decades of organizational research confirm that social diversity is more innovative than homogeneous groups. Diversity of opinions, but especially of inputs, is essential for any kind of innovation or new solutions. And when it comes to team decisions, too much sense of similarity leads to undesirable side effects.
Research shows that homogeneous groups, with a high level of similarity, are much more confident in their decisions even when it turns out that, in fact, their conclusions are wrong most of the time. It's not the similarity or matching an ideal of the perfect employee it takes for a business to be agile, innovative and successful in the 21st century. It's the outsiders who can test the thinking biases and demand a systematic analysis of the hypotheses that limit the search for solutions.
Where is diversity?
We don't say the real treasure is at home or in you for nothing. Fortunately, the much needed diversity is, actually, already there, in the teams and in each employee. It doesn't take an expensive recruiting process to bring it into the organization. All it takes is for the 61% of employees who minimize their differences from the group to be encouraged to express their own opinions and personalities, building a culture of inclusion in the face of diversity.
Social media and organizational transparency
major change in organizations. Social media has suddenly opened the door to leaders and employees' personal spaces. The world is still divided between the electronic mail and the new social communication habits. In recent decades, electronic mail has moved from a specialized communication channel to the most popular one until it has become less tolerated (the "No new message inbox" concept) nowadays. However, the electronic mail is still essential in many work environments and has remained a strong channel when it comes to employee engagement. Its competitors, on the other hand, are much more appealing to the younger generations - the social apps, the chat channels and chatting are more flexible and funnier. But, whatever technology you may choose, relevant information should be delivered to those who need it.
