Every piece of equipment in your office comes with a document that explains what it does, how it does it and how to trouble shoot it when it doesn’t do what it should when it should. In some cases you get a warranty that allows you to get your money back should it not live up to the promises made by the producer/provider.
Every piece of equipment in your office except the one thing that really adds value to your company and is wholly responsible for making your company money and making your company successful.
You’re guessed it—I’m talking about the coffee maker.
Seriously, I’m talking about employees. The humans that show up, do the work, complain about the ambient temperature and talk about Suzy in the steno pool. (I’m not dating myself, just channeling some Mad Men references.)
Employees are our company’s lifeblood. While we still rely on machines to enable our success, it is predominately driven by the innovation and thinking of our human machines.
And we are woefully undereducated when it comes to the care and maintenance of those machines. If you google around you’ll see that a big part of today’s thinking about how to maintain and manage our human machines is to keep giving them incentives and perks to get them to work harder and harder. Unfortunately, that is akin to trying to win a drag race by adding more gas, plus nitrous oxide, plus rocket fuel to a damaged engine in the hopes you can get to the finish line before the car blows up.
via The Human Maintenance Manual – Fistful of TalentFistful of Talent.
