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There is something curious about a group of houses in Utah. They’re falling apart. Windows covered with wood. Roofs patched with blue tarp, blowing in the wind. Walls simply missing.
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And yet people live in them. These houses are not being built; they are half built. This has nothing to do with the real estate crash. It’s not a consequence of poverty, nor is it a design statement.
The houses’ inhabitants simply aren’t motivated to finish them. You see, they’re fundamentalist Mormons who have been excommunicated by the mainstream Mormon church for their practice of polygamy. And their last known leader, Warren Jeffs, had a penchant for predicting the end of the world on a rolling six-months basis.
If you think the world is about to end, what’s the point of fixing your house?
When I described these houses to Anne, a senior leader of a large retail bank, her face contorted with recognition.
“That’s exactly what I’m doing!” she said.
“Living in an unfinished house?” I asked.
“Yes!” She told me she hadn’t done her usual quarterly all-hands call with her team.
“Why not?” I asked.
“What’s there to say?” Anne responded. “Nothing’s clear. I have no idea what to tell them. Will they be in their roles in two months? Will their priorities change? Will we even exist? There’s too much uncertainty.”
She knew it was a mistake not to do the all-hands call. And yet, she admitted to me, she hadn’t done many of her normal management routines. She regularly canceled meetings with her direct reports and even skipped their performance reviews and career development conversations.
Why have a career development conversation with someone when there’s a good chance they may not have a career with you at all? You’re super-busy, understaffed, stressed, and feeling vulnerable yourself.
On top of all that, the people who report to you aren’t pushing for conversations, either. Sure, they want some answers. But they’re lying low. Keeping their heads down, trying not to make a splash. Because if you happen to be working on that layoff plan when they come by, you might take notice and add their name to the list. So they try to look busy. And they take the long way to the bathroom to avoid your office.
Here’s the problem: When our future is uncertain, we have a hard time functioning in the present.
So what should you do?
David McClelland, the Harvard psychology professor introduced a little earlier, wrote the book Human Motivation. It’s 688 pages long, but since the world might end in six months, I’ll give you the short version. Everyone is driven by three things:
1. Achievement (the desire to compete against increasingly challenging goals)
2. Affiliation (the desire to be liked/loved)
3. Power, expressed in one of two ways:
Personalized (the desire for influence and respect for yourself)
If people have the opportunity to achieve, affiliate, and influence, they’ll be motivated and engaged. Even without a clear vision of the future.
So instead of worrying about what life is going to be like tomorrow, focus on these three things today.
Answer these three questions:
Are you working on something meaningful and challenging—something for which you have about a 50 percent chance of succeeding?
Are you relating to other people at work or socially—people you like and to whom you feel close?
Do you feel recognized for the work you are doing—paid or unpaid? Can you influence decisions and outcomes?
If the answer is yes in each case, great. You’ll be motivated. Wherever it’s not, create those opportunities immediately.
Make sure you have clear goals and the autonomy to achieve them. Make sure you are working on something you find challenging and interesting.
And find opportunities to collaborate (and celebrate) with others. This is especially important because at times of uncertainty, people become more political. They start to suspect that their colleagues are trying to be noticed, take more credit, work on better projects. But as they work on projects collaboratively, their trust grows.
Also, look for opportunities to offer input on how things should be done. And if necessary, ask that your participation be recognized.
Anne realized that even though she was a “leader” in the bank, she too was paralyzed by the uncertainty of the future.
A few weeks after speaking with Anne, I met with her again and she told me she had held one-on-one meetings with each of her managers that week. In those meetings, she made sure each person had some kind of challenging, meaningful project to work on. She also made sure each had at least one project that involved collaboration with other people. She told me that the third motivator was harder because it felt fake to recognize people for something they had done when she didn’t feel they had been doing much. She did give them influence over how they were going to achieve their projects, and as they made headway, she was looking for opportunities to recognize them.
Doing this had a side benefit for Anne. She was considerably more energized when I last saw her. Following through on this plan tapped into her motivation. It was challenging (achievement), helped her connect to the people with whom she worked (affiliation) and enabled her to enable others (power).
But Anne took it a step further. She also went to her own manager and had the same conversation with him. She went over her projects, and together they set goals she felt—but was not certain—she could achieve. Goals she felt played to her strengths, allowed for her weaknesses, used her unique talents, and about which she felt passionate.
Then she asked that two other people—colleagues whom she enjoyed—be allowed to collaborate on the projects with her. And she set a date with her manager when he would review the work and, if appropriate, publicly recognize her for the work she and her colleagues had done.
Sound contrived? Maybe. But it still works. And sometimes it takes some contriving to get what you want.
Especially if the future is uncertain, your goals are not clear, and you feel paralyzed in terms of moving forward. Perhaps you don’t know exactly what this next year should be about. Perhaps you’re not crystal clear about your goals for the year or what you want to achieve.
That’s okay. As long as you create the right environment—one in which you feel challenged, loved, and respected—then you’ll be motivated enough to keep moving in the right direction. Even without a plan. Even without a destination.
So it’s time to choose. Do you want to live in a half-built house while you wait for the end of the world? As it turns out, some people have been living in those houses for years.
Or do you want to be like Anne and spend whatever time you have fixing your house, along with your colleagues?
The world may end in six months, but at least those six months can be filled with engaging work, connected community, and empowered action.
Don’t be paralyzed by an uncertain future. Just keep moving.
