What Happened To The "Whistle While You Work" Mentality Inside Of Our Organizations? Is Working Hard Dead?
It's time we bring back working hard to organizations around the world, but how do we actually do that?
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What does it mean to work hard?
It can be a subjective criteria but I think there are a 5 common themes we can identify:
Consistently doing more than what is expected of you (Marc Randolph, the first CEO of Netflix told me that one of his rules is to do 10% more than what is asked).
Having a positive attitude about the work you do.
Showing dedication and persistence to achieving a goal.
Doing the work in an ethical and honest way.
Demonstrating a growth mindset where you learn new things and apply what you learn.
What does this have to do with Snow White?
Snow White is in the news quite a lot lately and while I don’t want to focus on the remake I do want to focus on one of the songs from the original film. "Whistle While You Work" is an iconic song from the original 1937 film which was composed by Frank Churchill, with lyrics by Larry Morey.
In the original film Snow White sings the song while she is doing household chores, specifically cleaning up the house of the Seven Dwarves. For context, the movie was released as the United States was recovering from the Great Depression.
The song represents having a positive attitude towards work (even if it’s something you don’t want to do), teamwork, overcoming challenges and adversity, and working hard.
What happened to this inside of our organizations today, specifically in white collar work? It feels like it’s missing and dare I say, that people don’t want to work anymore let alone work hard.
Over the past few years I’ve heard countless stories from various leaders who told me that the candidates they interviewed wanted to make more money than their bosses boss, they wanted bonuses, equity, perks, benefits, and then on top of everything, they also didn’t want to show up to the office?
How does that make any sense?
We are also seeing disturbing trends on social media like bare minimum Monday’s, lazy girl jobs, Sunday scaries, loud quitting, and a host of other such nonsense which in many cases highlights the either blatant disrespect that an employee has for their employer or at the very best, a lack of drive, motivation, and initiative to do the job they were hired to do.
I certainly don’t want people like this as a part of my team, do you?
When my parents came to America in the late 1970’s they had no money, no possessions, and didn’t speak English. They left the former U.S.S.R where they didn’t have the freedom and to say and do what they wanted and where they were persecuted for being Jews to build a better life for themselves from scratch (which they did).
My dad spent 8 hours a day watching the Merv Griffin and Jonny Carson shows with an English to Russian translation dictionary so that he could understand the words. He would spend hours in front a mirror mouthing the words and practicing how to speak English. He worked hard his entire life and never complained. That to me is a modern day hero and I wish we had more stories like that today.
I was raised with the same mentality of working hard, building, leading, and doing whatever was needed to succeed and thrive. A recent WSJ highlighted this struggle in an article titled, Bosses Want Hard Workers—So They’re Hiring Older People.
Where are the trends of people showing that they did more than what they were asked to do, where they tried something new at work, where they overcame a difficult challenge, where they got their first promotion, where they are excited to show up to work, where through ambition and motivation they were able to achieve or build something, and the like?
In the rest of this article I want to unpack what some of the causes of this are and how we can get back working hard which is so needed today.
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