Changing The System
I have learned
that people in retirement want good health, passion, purpose, and joy or
contentment. I discovered that people at younger ages want passion, purpose,
and joy, too. More than a paycheck.
I started
interviewing people in their early 50s. They had started out wanting money,
power, and status, but their values changed as they faced their limited time on
Earth. Now, they wanted passion and meaning as well. Even millennials, I
learned, wanted meaning in addition to money from their work.
Sadly, as I
began to ask countless people in a multitude of workshops how many of them had
achieved these things, the percentages were astoundingly low. About 15%
believed they had passion in their
lives; 20-25% had found a sense of purpose;
and only around 30% had achieved contentment.
So, I decided to
write an ongoing column structured for your questions and designed to bring
together three primary concepts: How to have an impact or create positive change,
find personal meaning, and sometimes even make money doing it. In the column,
we will spotlight new and existing opportunities for community impact – what’s
out there and what can be done to achieve these goals. We will introduce and
discuss innovative processes and new tools to balance individual fulfillment
and capital needs in the world of “causes,” plus impact investing avenues and
other ways to influence/create change.
Why start with
our own community? Because with our society’s financial and political problems
change now has to happen from the bottom up. Real change is deeply personal. Built
on clarity and trust, it depends on strong relationships.
To begin the
column, I recently had a conversation where this question arose:
Question: I
feel powerless to change the system I’m in. I can manage my schedule, desk,
board meetings, responsibilities, and leisure time. But it has stopped feeling
(or maybe it never did feel) like enough. One day blends into the next, and
eventually they all start to feel the same. Similarly, I donate time and money
to a good cause, thinking I’m helping, but the world’s or community’s problems
remain the same. The ironic paradox is that life continues to move faster, we
have access to tools that have never existed before, and yet the core of
humanity’s problems never seem to change in any permanent way. Any suggestions?
Answer: Here’s an
allegory about the nature of “powerlessness.” Three men and one woman are
tasked to get a heavy cart up a hill.
• Sam wants to pull the cart up the hill. He’s
convinced that that’s the only way to accomplish the assignment.
• Sarah wants everyone
to push the cart. She’s convinced that
success lies in everyone pushing together.
• Stephen is focused
on the issue of who’s going to get the most credit for completing the challenge.
Unless he can find a way to get nearly all the credit, he won’t help push or
pull.
• Mike is angry because
the others treat him like a second-class citizen. Consequently, he has decided to
only give the “appearance” of effort.
Sadly, they all
feel powerless and the cart remains
at the bottom of the hill. No change.
Four intelligent people trapped in an emotional bog. What’s the underlying
problem? They lack trust in one another, and thus the ability to communicate
and cooperate. They are not truly a team. When the basic essentials of a relationship break down or are missing, everyone
feels powerless.
Notice what has
changed in our society over time:
• In 1980, all measures of trust and organizational
identification dropped from a stable 60-70% to 20%. Why? Organizations
adopted a “commodity model” for themselves. Everything from the organization
itself to its parts and pensions can now be “bought and sold” like commodities.
Loyalty to employees has disappeared. No longer able to count on anything from
their employers, employees’ careers have become a hop-scotch of stress and job insecurity as they move through
multiple organizations. Trust in organizations overall has declined
significantly. One lie made under such a weakened
system and trust is lost forever.
• Similarly, if
the organization exists solely for the bottom line, if people are exploiting
the system or the customer, if the work isn’t for some social good or higher
purpose, there is little or no meaning
in the job. Under such circumstances, why should employees cooperate with one
another? Why should they feel motivated? Why shouldn’t they get frustrated and
mad? No matter how hard we try to pretend
otherwise, feelings matter.
• Now consider how few employees meet face
to face anymore. They only relate
electronically. Locked in an unending dance with their phones and computers, one
has to wonder if they might just as well be standing in front of a mirror seeing,
hearing, and sensing only their own words, feelings, and point of view. What
does that do to relationships?
• Further, there
has been a huge loss of trust in society.
• The book Bowling Alone was a study of trust.
Published in 2000, it showed a large deterioration of trust and societal
participation, using as a major example the fact that people used to bowl in
leagues and increasingly now bowl alone.
• Since then,
almost every institution of society has seen both a large drop in participation
and more human isolation.
•
One
of my own organization’s studies showed that almost 50% of employees are significantly
anxious, depressed, abusing or addicted to a substance. A lot of people around
you are in significant distress.
What can be
done?
1. Work on
yourself… Are you trustworthy? Are you empowering others? Where are you adding
to the problem needlessly? We have become a society of blamers.
2. Try to
remember that the other person is trying to find happiness, too, in their own uncertain,
powerless way.
3. Remember that
trust and relationships have to be built.
No one owes it to you to be concerned about what you want. You must earn their trust as much as they must earn yours.
4. Don’t jump quickly,
either personally or in organizations, from distrust to trust. Trust is a big
issue. It needs to evolve:
• Stage 1 – “Safety
trust”: Can I trust that I am safe
with you and this organization physically, emotionally, psychologically, and
financially? Similarly, are others safe
with you? Are you willing to tell the truth (and fact-check) or will you spread unverified
rumors? Remember, you’re just as responsible for establishing “safety trust” as
everyone else.
• Stage 2 – “Inclusion
trust”: Can I trust that I will be included
and treated respectfully in your or this organization’s inner circle?
• Stage 3 – “Acceptance
trust”: Can I trust that I will be accepted
and valued by you or this organization despite my differences, strengths,
and weaknesses?
• Stage 4 – “Inspiration
trust”: Can I trust that if I put a lot of creative energy and effort into what
we’re doing together, you will “have my back” and I won’t end up feeling used
or disappointed?
5. Learn to rise
above fear and greed in all of their subtle manifestations. They blind us from
clarity and keep us from seeing how to create change. We are all prisoners of
our own perceptions and beliefs. We developed those through our families and
life experiences, where we felt like a victim or a privileged person. Our
experiences shape us. Our fear creates rigid beliefs. Our own personality
problems create difficulties for others.
In the end, you
have to stop blaming or you’ll never get your power back. You have to find
compassion for yourself and others, so you can understand why they’re doing
what they’re doing. When you blame others, you become blind to how people,
relationships and systems actually work. Understanding
people and situations better gives you more power.
Originally published in The Montecito Journal October 2018 Vol.24 Issue 42
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