How are you doing?
How many times have you asked that question almost without waiting for a response? I’m good; I’m fine; or I’m busy usually sum up most people’s responses. The question is so open ended, but it rarely gets below the surface. Most people have an innate, internal feeling about how they are doing, but without the time and space for deliberate reflection, it can be hard to articulate what they are feeling and why.
To have a positive impact on the organization, an individual must show up as their best. Thus, leaders must understand how people are doing at a deeper level, which requires encouraging team members to explore why they feel the way they do and then helping them address the barriers holding them back.
Viewing how someone is doing simply as a function of how they are performing is a very limited view. Yet, many organizations continue to do performance reviews as if work performance exists in isolation. Humans can’t compartmentalize who they are. A person’s work is a complex combination of their talents, skills, and context, which is then mixed with their relationships, connections, mindsets, and overall wellness. These aspects affect each other in deep, integrated ways, and they all affect “how we are doing” both professionally and personally.
How might you explore how you—and, if you’re leading a team, how your people—are doing holistically? As part of our Thriving Organization Collection, our iTHRiVE Reflection tool offers a simple framework to help leaders go beyond narrow performance discussions to facilitate broader conversations with team members about how they’re doing holistically what their relationship with the organization is like.
Understanding the Thrive Model
Thriving at work isn’t just a function of performance; it requires intentional assessment and balancing of six core factors:
- Capability: The tools, training, feedback, and other support an individual needs to do their best work.
- Potential: The force that pulls an individual toward something greater.
- Purpose: The sense that an individual is doing meaningful work.
- Resources: The knowledge, skills, and expertise required to perform the work.
- Security: The sense of safety (physical, financial, cyber, and psychological) experienced within an organization.
- Connection: Alignment and connectivity among people, values, behaviors, and organizational systems.
These six factors work in concert with each other to help people thrive in organizations. Examining one factor without the others can conceal challenges and issues that affect an individual and their performance. Examining the six factors together helps individuals connect dots and understand how each area is in tension with and impacts another.
How to Use the Tool
Using the iTHRiVE framework, individuals reflect on how they’re experiencing work and integrating into the organization through several “I” statements related to each factor. It’s important to recognize that there are no right answers; this framework captures perspectives, which can then be mined for valuable insights.
By encouraging team members to regularly reflect on how they’re doing holistically, leaders send three clear messages:
- Your value is more than the transactional work you do.
- I care about you holistically—not just your contributions to the organization.
- I recognize that you perform in a complex environment with several integrated factors that require regular assessment and balancing.
When leaders simply give team members ratings of “exceeds expectations” or “below expectations” on performance reviews, the rating becomes the focus. Holistic reflection, however, encourages deeper exploration of the factors affecting a person’s performance, which fuels more open two-way dialogue than a traditional performance discussion.
Holistic reflection not only enables leaders to uncover how a team member is doing in all dimensions of their work life, but it also helps them learn perceived barriers to that team member’s growth and success. Insights from self-reflection can also help the individual feel empowered to take action to change the factors impacting their work. Together, the leader and individual can use these insights to co-create a path toward fuller engagement and broader impact. As leaders, that’s ultimately what we want: to fully engage each team member and help them do their best work.
For more people-centered tools to lead with purpose and help your teams flourish, check out Thriving Organizations Collection.
For more ways on how to use your leadership position to make a meaningful impact on all stakeholders, read Greg’s book, Impact with Love.