Fun and work are not mutually exclusive

 I have a pet peeve having to do with stock photos on the pages of many enterprise software company websites (including our own - see our solutions page).  Why?  Because I don't know these people...or anyone that looks like them for that matter.  They are a little too perfect...a little too smiley without actually laughing...I don't work with those people and frankly, they don't look like a lot of fun either.

This picture from Flickr is more like the people I work with - and like the people with whom I want to work.  A bit less than perfect, a bit quirky...but very creative and talented.  Which gets me to my point.  Who was the person who decided that work shouldn't be fun and that we should all be widgets doing a very narrowly specified job?  Was it IBM/Big Blue and their blue suit/white shirt diktat?   And why did we collectively accept that?  People are much more creative and talented than any job description and if we don't let people explore, reach out, and participate in new ways everyone loses.  We lose people's passion and commitment but we also lose a great deal of their productivity.  And yes, that includes having a lot of fun.  People learn best by playing games - it allows us to abstract out a problem and solve it in a different context. By doing so, we often learn how to solve a problem in its original context.  In my last job, an engineer (who is also a great friend) attached a dancing hampster to our payment gateway. He put it right on top of our multual cube wall and people could pay 25 cents to turn it on...annoying as hell because I was the poor sucker who had to either listen to three verses of hamster singing or pay another 25 cents to turn it off.  But so funny...so inventive...and such a good example of how flexible our product was and everyone in the company knew about it (it probably helped that it was a really amusing way to annoy me!).

How does this relate to my general theme of enterprise social media?  Because enterprise social media should allow individuals to express themselves - with all their quirky, interesting, creative...and sometimes weird...ideas. It lets us connect to each other, it lets us display all our talents...and hopefully it allows us to make work fun. Why not?  And if you want to see who I really work with go to www.mzinga.com - Barry, Aaron, and Mike are incredibly talented AND a lot of fun.

Comments

[Gavin Heaton]

I arrived at IBM just after the the "must wear a jacket when you leave your desk" rule was relaxed!

Isn't it funny how corporate culture so easily becomes ingrained in our behaviours? One of the benefits of enterprise social media is that it allows us all to more easily demonstrate our wider skill sets and interests. Perhaps, in this way, corporations will, indeed, become more human -- and begin conversing. We can always hope ;)

[David Mullen]

Amen!

That old school way of thinking worked in the days when people would sacrifice fun for the sake of working at a big brand. People put up with it to work at places like IBM and others. And, plenty of companies still enforce dress policies and the like, but I suspect that will have to change soon if they want to stay ahead of the competition.

Gen X types are becoming more restless with that way of work life and Gen Y types are bucking that way of work life. If companies want to continue attracting and keeping top talent - which is necessary to continue growing their brands in the marketplace - they will need to compromise. They don't have to, of course. And many won't. But I believe it will be bad for their businesses.

I saw some interesting results from a recent survey. I don't remember the exact numbers, but the gist was telling.

-30-something percent of companies say they are blocking social networking sites from work computers.
-60-something percent of Gen Y-ers say they wouldn't work for a company that blocks social networking sites.

If those Gen Y-ers follow through with what they say, those 30-something percent of companies will need to change their ways of thinking to stay competitive.

On another note, I have a friend who took a new job a year ago. He's one of the funniest people I know and always made work a blast. When his new employer offered him the job, they told him they also want him to be their Director of Fun and shape the workplace environment into a place employees want to come to everyday. Now that's cool gig.