Turning Into Organizational Performance - the role of passion in business management and leadership

Training & Development, May, 2001 by Richard Chang

BISD turned things around by defining a new organizational core passion to teach and empower all children in its care and by identifying a purpose that every student can learn. From 1991 to 1998, the proportion of economically disadvantaged students who passed the Texas Assessment of Academic Skills in reading rose from 60 percent to 91 percent, in math from 54 to 93 percent, and in writing from 57 to 90 percent. The results for minority groups are equally impressive. The numbers aren't just data; they're a reflection of the shared passion that resulted from a change of heart of the district's leaders and associates-a passion that ultimately produced improved organizational performance.

Passion alignment through HRD efforts

When employees are passionate about their work, their organizations thrive. Once passion is present and reinforced throughout an organization, it becomes contagious. All organizational stakeholders-employees, partners, and customers-sense it and respond to it. Passion wins support, inspires loyalty, and gains invaluable energy as associates from each stakeholder group share in the excitement passion creates.

Given the current challenges that organizations face in the economy worldwide, it's vital that they harness the power of their people's vitality, creativity, and energy-in a nutshell, their passions. According to the human resources champion of development at Clarke American, "The key to our success, now and in the future, is our-people. Our competitors can duplicate our technology, they can duplicate our products, and they can duplicate our processes. But they cant clone our people."

To truly benefit from passion, organizations must help employees grow in their passion. That includes helping them more fully understand and experience the organization's core passions and find ways to incorporate their personal passions into their work. The bottom line is that if organizations want associates to be passionate about their work, they must be passionate about helping them. Each of the organizations profiled in The Passion Plan at Work have either established internal universities or specific training programs to promote and strengthen passion in their employees.

At the Disney Institute, the training organization of Walt Disney World, leaders go to extreme lengths to make sure employees (who are called Cast Members) gain experience from the perspective of a Guest (as Disney World visitors are called). For example, new reservationists are invited to stay at the resort as a Guest so they understand what they're selling to customers. One institute leader explains the motivation behind that practice: "It would be a false expectation to think that people could stay passionate about something but then not let them try it themselves.... We just think it's really important that our Cast Members stay connected to who we are and what we do so they can communicate that passion to our Guests."

Training can help employees develop skills and discover the emotional forces they need to perform at their peak and derive fulfillment from their work. At Southwest's University for People, employees can take classes in leadership, customer service, career development, team performance, and personal development. The leadership classes focus on the company's history, its values, and its passions, but they also help employees identify their own strengths and potential areas for growth.