Leading positive culture change with WISE goals

As employees adjust to the workplace post-COVID-19-lockdowns, many are struggling to reconnect with their colleagues. With lonely employees in fragmented teams, leaders face the challenge and opportunity to shape their workplace culture in positive new ways. To rise to the occasion, leaders can harness the power of ‘WISE goals’.

What are WISE goals?

Most leaders know about ‘SMART goals’: specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time-bound. However, now leaders should also encourage WISE goals. That is, for a happier and more connected workforce goals should be guided by:

• Win-win thinking
• Intrinsic motivation
• Service orientation
• Enlightened self-interest

Win-win thinking

In The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, Stephen Covey famously called win-win thinking “the habit of effective interpersonal leadership.” Goals guided by win-win thinking yield outcomes that benefit more than just the person setting the goal, but others as well.

Intrinsic motivation

Key to humans flourishing, intrinsic motivation involves goals that satisfy our basic psychological needs for autonomy, relatedness, and competence. Pursuing intrinsically motivated goals is inherently engaging. No promise of money, status or power is required; achieving intrinsically motivated goals is its own reward.

Service orientation

One of the best ways to satisfy our intrinsic need to connect with others is to be of service to them. While win-win thinking ensures that achieving goals benefits others, service orientation means that goals are set with the express intention of doing so. Service-oriented goals not only help us build healthy relationships with others, but they also make us more contented with ourselves.

Enlightened self-interest

In ethics philosophy, enlightened self-interest means that by serving the interests of others we also serve our own interests. In practical terms, setting goals guided by enlightened self-interest does not deny that others’ interests can – and often do – conflict with our own; instead, it reminds us of an empirical fact that we all intuitively know to be true: when we strive to take care of others, they are more likely to take care of us.

The practical importance of WISE rewards

At this point, you might be thinking that WISE goals sound interesting but also perhaps a bit impractical. After all, the realities of the workplace are such that we can’t always be pursuing intrinsically motivated goals for the benefit of others, right?

Fair enough. And to this point two responses are in order. First, not all goals need to be – or even should be – WISE goals. Rather, WISE goals themselves should be used wisely and only when appropriate. Second, WISE goals can be operationalised in a very practical way through what I call ‘WISE rewards’.

In contrast to traditional rewards, WISE rewards are given not to those who achieve a goal but rather to a different beneficiary of their choice. Beneficiaries of WISE rewards can include any other person the employee designates (e.g. co-worker), or alternatively any group the employee is a member of (e.g. work team) or which is otherwise important or meaningful to them (e.g. charity). If WISE rewards are linked to intrinsic goals and primarily for their own benefit, they can be given by employees themselves. However, if they are linked to extrinsic goals and primarily for the benefit of their employer, WISE rewards can be given by leaders on their behalf.

WISE rewards satisfy basic psychological needs

The reason WISE rewards help improve psychological wellbeing is that they can transform any task that is not intrinsically motivating in-and-of-itself into a goal-directed activity that cultivates employees’ three basic psychological needs for autonomy, relatedness, and competence.

First, WISE rewards foster autonomy by allowing employees to choose which tasks to connect their rewards to, as well as who the beneficiaries will be. In so doing, WISE rewards encourage employees to take initiative and align their actions with their values.

Second, WISE rewards promote relatedness by building positive connections between employees and meaningful others. Those who receive WISE rewards implicitly understand that they are valued and important to the employee. In turn, they are more likely to express their appreciation and return the favor.

Third, WISE rewards nurture employees’ sense of competence not only by encouraging goal achievement, but also by increasing awareness and positive regard from their coworkers for doing so. Over time, they are more likely to develop new skills and see themselves as capable and worthy of the respect they receive from their coworkers for their accomplishments.

WISE habits for lasting change

In interpreting the philosophy of Aristotle, Will Durant famously said: “We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.” In the same spirit, WISE goals and rewards are more likely to bring about lasting change for employees and the work cultures they inhabit when they become habitual.

For this reason, I recommend that leaders try WISE goals for themselves and their teams, but that they do so at regular intervals – perhaps once per week (or whatever period of time works best for them). Like my own students, employees may find them a bit strange at first, but over time they are likely to feel more connected with each other, but more importantly with themselves.

Now that’s WISE leadership.

Dr Adam Kay is management and leadership expert at UQ Business School