Harvard Business Review October 2016

MAKE MORE, MANAGE LESS. INSPIRING PROACTIVITY IN THE WORKPLACE. BY ALASTAIR CARMICHAEL

Harvard Business Review October 2016

INSPIRING PROACTIVITY“Being proactive is about making things happen, anticipating and preventing problems, and seizing opportunities” – Sharon Parker. Every day managers are expected to do more with less. Respond to emails outside work hours, reduce costs, exceed targets, organise more direct reports and take it all in their stride. With trends in management moving far beyond a single team or task, the ability of those you lead to create solutions themselves is more important than ever before. Having a strong vision and focusing on worker self-efficacy can energise employees to be more proactive, [2] perform better and innovate more [3] while creating greater profits. [4] There are two key steps you can use to increase proactivity to reach the goals of higher performance, innovation and a higher bottom line. The first is to define proactivity in your workplace, and the second is to create a strong and clear vision for how you will lead your team while inspiring self-belief. The latest organisational research provides reassuring and quality evidence to support these approaches.

STEP ONE: WHAT IS PROACTIVITY?Proactivity is about getting things done without relying on others. It’s anticipating problems before they happen, seizing opportunities and striving to achieve goals without being told what to do. It can be seen in employees with a “Can do” attitude who are full of energy and confidence in their ability to complete tasks. This definition is inspired by a review from Strauss and colleagues [5 who state that “Being proactive is about taking control to make things happen, rather than watching things happen. It involves aspiring and striving to bring about change.” This summarises proactivity as a motivated and outcome focused approach to work. This study highlights the story of a call centre worker who identified an outdated system then took the initiative to change operating practices.

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Harvard Business Review October 2016

“CREATE A STRONG AND CLEAR VISION FOR HOW YOU WILL LEAD YOUR TEAM.” To make proactivity a well-defined and obtainable goal, managers need to work with their employees to discover what proactive behaviours look like in their organisation. This will make it easier to guide employees towards clearly defined goals such as “Identify one part of your job that could be carried out faster and how to do so” rather than vaguely instructing them to “Be more proactive.” This provides a way to measure changes in proactivity and makes it easier to see the impact of these changes.

STEP TWO: INSPIRING PROACTIVITY THROUGH LEADERSHIP Managers can drive change when increasing proactivity by having a clear vision for their leadership. Griffin and colleagues at the University of Sheffield studied 102 public sector employees in Australia over a year[2]. Results showed

that leaders with a stronger and more clearly defined vision developed higher levels of proactivity over the course of the study. They also discovered that employees of leaders with a strong vision were more adaptable and open to change. In contrast to this when a leader had a poorly defined vision the proactivity of employees decreased, and were less adaptable to change. This study also revealed that role efficacy (Your belief in doing your job) can interact with leadership to further increase proactivity.

“EMPLOYEES WILL BE INSPIRED TO ADAPT TO

CHANGE, BE OPEN TO NEW INITIATIVES AND BECOME MORE PROACTIVE”In practice this means motivating employees to change by presenting a clear and compelling vision of the future. Managers need to lead by example, not only identifying how work practices can be improved, but by

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Harvard Business Review October 2016educating others of the active approach they used to identify the opportunity. To support the development of proactivity, employees need to be encouraged to foster their belief in their ability to do their job well. [6 When this is combined with a supportive environment employees will be inspired to adapt to change, be open to new initiatives and become more proactive. This study also provides a warning that choosing not to act has consequences. If leadership does not challenge the status quo and support their employees, proactivity will suffer.

STEP THREE: WHERE TO FROM HERE?You have defined what proactivity means for your team, pitched a clear and divisive set of goals, encouraged and supported them to actively seize opportunities. What next? Measure the long-term benefits of proactivity and actively improve your approach. Using the simple steps outlined here, managers can improve their leadership style, worker efficacy through proactivity to create higher performance and profit.Proactivity can be a powerful tool for managers to allow themselves to delegate through inspiration and leadership. It’s up to you to take up the challenge, discover how you can do more with less and help your organisation gain a winning edge over the competition.

Alastair Carmichael Bsc(Hons) is a researcher of organisational and cognitive psychology at the University of

Auckland, New Zealand. He is passionate about improving employee wellbeing and organisational outcomes using the latest research evidence.

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95(1), 174–182.

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Harvard Business Review October 2016

[3] Rank, J., Pace, V. L., & Frese, M. (2004).

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[7] Steve Penfold (2013). 7 Habits of Highly

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