Page 92 - Anne Bruce - Building A HIgh Morale Workplace (2002)

72 Building a High Morale Workplace

When Fear Is Used to Motivate
There’s probably no better example of fear in the work-
place than in the 1952 episode of the I Love Lucy show,
called “Job Switching”—better known as “the Candy Factory.” In the
episode, Lucy and Ethel get jobs wrapping chocolates in a candy facto-
ry.Their supervisor is tough as nails and shows little or no compassion
for the new hires. Using fear motivation to get as much productivity as
possible out of Lucy and Ethel, the manipulative supervisor barks the
following orders:“All right, girls, if one candy gets past you on this
conveyor belt and into the packing room unwrapped—you’re fired!”
Motivated by fear that they will lose their jobs, Lucy and Ethel panic
when the conveyer belt starts moving faster than they can wrap.Then,
when they hear their supervisor approaching, they resort to drastic
measures.The rest is comedy history as Lucy and Ethel begin stuffing
the unwrapped chocolates down their uniforms and into their mouths.
Because it’s Lucy and Ethel, it’s funny. But it’s not funny at all that
there are still supervisors out there who believe that fear will moti-
vate their workers to perform better, when just the opposite is true.

Start by letting employees know that everyone is an equal
and important part of the team and, most of all, that everyone

is an individual and will be respected as such. Stress that this is
a team where everyone is welcome, not a place that rejects
people or makes them feel that they don’t belong.
Next, emphasize that there are no wrong answers or right

ways to achieve the end result. Stress that you are open to new
ways of doing things and that it’s OK when people don’t know
the answers, that they should just ask. Another way to keep
people from feeling vulnerable and weak is to encourage them
to be human and admit their mistakes. No one’s perfect—and

when someone messes up, everyone learns something. When
managers share their past mistakes with employees, they are
seen as human and helpful.
Finally, tell employees that individual performance is meas-

ured in many ways and that each person will know what is
expected of him or her before beginning work. Calm fears by
letting employees know that at no time will anyone be set up to
feel small or inferior. Remind everyone that you’re there to help