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Activate Virtuousness
Consider two different business organizations. One is characterized by a single-minded focus on creating profitability and shareholder value as key indicators of success. Competition, productivity, carrot-and-stick incentives, and high pressure for performance characterize the culture. This organization frequently leads employees to demonstrate selfishness, manipulation, secrecy, and distrust of their colleagues.
Another business organization is characterized by a focus on creating abundance and human well-being as key indicators of success. The work culture emphasizes appreciation, collaboration, positive energy, and meaningfulness. This organization produces social relationships typified by compassion, loyalty, trustworthiness, respect, and forgiveness.
The first business is common and one with which we are all familiar. The second is less common, but describes more closely what we mean by a virtuous organization. These organizations help members achieve their very best and reach extraordinarily positive outcomes. They implement universally valued ennobling attributes, such as forgiveness, gratitude, honesty, compassion, and love. When organizations engender these characteristics, they are labeled as virtuous.
The Value of Virtuousness
Organizations do not need to trade a desire for financial success for virtuous practices. An extensive amount of evidence shows that demonstrations of virtuousness in work organizations are associated with desirable outcomes, including profitability.
Virtuousness is not merely saccharine, smiley-faced behavior. Rather, it has a tangible impact on both individuals at work and their organizations. Gratitude, forgiveness, transcendence, compassion, honesty, hope, and love are among the virtues found to predict desired outcomes in people.1 Increased commitment, satisfaction, motivation, positive emotions, effort, physical health, and psychological health are among the outcomes produced. Evidence even suggests that heart rhythms, brain functioning, physiological alignments, nervous system health, memory, and brain cortex thickness are positively affected by virtuousness.2 When people behave virtuously, positive results occur physiologically, emotionally, intellectually, and socially.
The irony associated with virtuousness is that, by definition, virtues are of inherent worth. Virtuousness is its own reward and the preeminent condition to which people aspire. Achieving a payoff or some other benefit is unnecessary for making virtuousness relevant and valuable.
On the other hand, if observable bottom-line results are not detected in organizations, attention to virtuousness usually becomes subservient to the very real pressures of enhancing financial return and organizational benefit.3 Few leaders invest in practices or processes that do not produce profitability, productivity, and customer satisfaction. Without a visible payoff, those with stewardship for organizational resources tend to ignore virtuousness and consider it of little relevance to important stakeholders. Finding an association between virtuousness and desired organizational outcomes is important because it causes leaders to pay attention.
Evidence of Virtuousness and Performance in Organizations
Empirical evidence shows when virtuousness scores improve, important organizational outcomes also increase. In particular, significant improvements have been found in profitability, productivity, quality, innovation, customer loyalty, and employee engagement.4 Examples of the virtues assessed in these studies include gratitude, forgiveness, compassion, trustworthiness, integrity, and transcendence. Even in organizations that recently downsized and faced the prospect of common occurrences,5 such as low morale, scapegoating of leaders, diminished trust, and politicized environments, performance increased markedly over time when virtuous practices were implemented as a part of the downsizing activities.6 These results were observed subsequent to improvements in virtuousness scores, so causal directionality can be inferred in these studies.7 In the U.S. airline and financial services industries, virtuous practices were also found to be highly predictive of financial performance over subsequent years, even though these publicly traded firms were under constant pressure to return value to shareholders.8 A conclusion drawn from these studies is that financial performance follows virtuousness in organizations. People and organizations do better when virtuousness is demonstrated.
Enabling Virtuousness
How, then, is virtuousness fostered in organizations? What are examples of practices that can be implemented? This section describes three such practices.
Expressing Gratitude
One of the easiest virtues to implement is the expression of gratitude. Frequent and sincere expressions of appreciation have been found to produce dramatic effects on individuals and organizations. In one study, college students were assigned to keep a daily or weekly journal. Some were to record events for which they were grateful, some focused on neutral events, and others on problem occurrences. Students who kept gratitude journals experienced better physical health, better social relationships, and better cognitive performance than the other students.9
In a study of thirty health-care organizations, frequent expressions of gratitude and periodic gratitude visits to other employees were the second-highest predictor of improvement in outcomes such as quality of care, patient satisfaction, employee engagement, and turnover.10
Some practical hints for fostering gratitude in organizations include the following:
• Journal. Encourage employees (or family members) to keep a gratitude journal. Have them keep track each day of at least three things that occurred for which they are grateful.
• Cards. Distribute three gratitude cards each day. Write a short expression of thanks to at least three people in your organization each day.
• Meetings. Begin each meeting by asking participants to share one thing that occurred during the week for which they are grateful. Or, end each meeting with the same activity so that people leave with positive energy.
• Positively embarrass. Positively embarrass someone each day, by verbally complimenting or expressing gratitude to a person in the presence of another person who cares.
• Comparisons. Take stock each day of your privileges and gifts. Compare your circumstances to those of others around you who may be struggling. Count your blessings.11
Enabling Forgiveness
Harm, trauma, and injustice are common occurrences in organizations. They frequently lead to retribution, condemnation, victimization, and revenge. As a result, individual and organizational performance almost always deteriorates. The challenge facing leaders is to help organizations heal, replenish, restore positive energy, and enhance resiliency. Enabling forgiveness is one of the most effective mechanisms for achieving these outcomes. Empirical research indicates that institutionalizing forgiveness in organizations is among the most powerful predictors of improvement in productivity, employee satisfaction, decreased turnover, innovation, quality, and profitability.12 Organizations with a forgiving culture experience more trusting alliances, social capital, workplace humaneness, customer care, and a sense of calling among employees.13
Forgiveness does not appear in isolation. It always occurs in collaboration with other virtues such as compassion, caring, and love. Forgiveness does not require abandoning anger or resentment. One can be angry yet forgive, and one can forgive without pardoning, minimizing, or dismissing the offense. Forgiveness is active, not passive, in transforming negative emotions and attitudes into positive ones. It fosters healing, restitution, and restoration in both giver and receiver.
In studies of successful organizations that experienced traumas, ranging from downsizing and job loss to law-breaking and unethical or abusive occurrences, leaders played an important role in fostering forgiveness. The following are some cues for enabling and encouraging forgiveness:
• Redefinition. Acknowledge the harm or injustice, as well as the anger and resentment, but define the event as an opportunity to move forward. Identify a new, positive target rather than dwelling on the past wrong.
• Meaningfulness. Associate the objectives being pursued with a higher purpose that provides personal meaning for organization members. This higher purpose replaces a focus on self with a focus on an elevated objective.
• Focus on excellence. Forgiveness is not synonymous with tolerance of error, excusing mistakes, or lowering expectations. It does not lower the existing standard, so continue to focus on improvement, lessons learned, and excellence.
• Support. Provide opportunities for interpersonal interaction and conversation. Forgiveness usually requires opportunities for verbal expressions, empathetic listening, and human support. Humanize the individuals involved. Separate acts from persons. People can forgive others while abhorring their actions.
• Justice. Honor fairness and equity. Work toward justice for offenders and restoration for those harmed. Many people have difficulty forgiving when justice, apology, or restitution is absent.
Facilitating Transcendence
Transcendence refers to positive deviance, a sense of profound purpose, and the realization of an ideal. It is one of the universally prescribed virtues from Aristotle, Confucius, and Thomas Aquinas14 relating to inspiration and elevation—and what leads people to experience awe and wonder.15 Experiencing a sense of calling in work or in life is an example of transcendence.16 As with other virtues, experiencing transcendence has been found to produce positive effects in individuals and organizations. Individuals are more cooperative, creative, motivated, have more immunological strength, feel more gratitude, experience greater life satisfaction, and have greater feelings of well-being when they experience transcendence.17 Commitment, prosocial behavior, teamwork, courtesy, compliance, citizenship, and reciprocity all are significantly associated with transcendence and elevation in organizations.18
One tool for fostering transcendence is to develop an “Everest goal,” based on the idea that climbing Mt. Everest represents the peak, culmination, or supreme achievement that people can imagine. Everest goals are not just fantasies or dreams. They possess special attributes, making them transcendent in their characteristics.19
Everest goals share the attributes of highly effective goal setting, summarized by the commonly used acronym, SMART:
S = Specific versus general. A specific goal provides a clear standard or level of performance.
M = Measurable versus vague. A measurable goal can be clearly assessed.
A = Aligned versus unrelated. Aligned goals are consistent with the purposes of the organization.
R = Realistic versus impossible to attain. A realistic goal is difficult but not impossible.
T = Time bound versus limitless. A time-bound goal is not open-ended.
What sets an Everest goal apart, however, are five unique attributes leading to an experience of transcendence and elevation:
• Positive deviance. It aims at extraordinary, spectacular, remarkable performance, inspiring a sense of wonder and awe. It is virtuous, focusing on achieving the best of the human condition, not just mere success.
• Goods of first intent. A good of first intent possesses inherent value and is desirable because of its intrinsic worth. It is inherently virtuous. A good of second intent is desirable for the sake of obtaining something else, such as profit, prestige, or power. People never tire of goods of first intent, but goods of second intent lead to satiation.20
• Possessing an affirmative orientation. It does not merely focus on solving problems, reducing obstacles, overcoming challenges, or removing difficulties. Rather, an Everest goal also focuses on opportunities and possibilities. It is likely to emphasize strengths and potential more than weaknesses and obstacles.
• Representing a contribution. It focuses on making a contribution rather than merely seeking a personal benefit or reward, and on creating value in place of attaining self-centered acquisitions. Contribution trumps achievement.
• Creating and fostering sustainable positive energy. It is inherently energizing and does not require an external motivator or incentive. People are not exhausted by pursuing an Everest goal but instead are uplifted, elevated, and energized. The goal itself provides the necessary positive energy.
Several examples of organizational Everest goals are Ford, at the turn of the twentieth century, aiming to democratize the auto industry; then, fifty years later, Sony wanting to change the image of Japanese quality; Apple’s goal of “one-person, one-computer” in the 1980s; Prudential, at the turn of the twenty-first century, seeking to ensure secure retirement for ten million people; and Interface driving to become a net contributor to a positive carbon footprint. Dramatic success followed in each case.
Putting It All Together
Virtuousness is commonplace in most people’s lives and organizations. Most of us frequently experience gratitude, forgiveness, transcendence, kindness, love, and trustworthiness. However, virtuous practices are often shelved when the pressure is on, resources get tight, achieving results is paramount, the competition is gaining, major blunders occur, uncertainty predominates, and disagreements arise. Virtuousness is deemed too soft, too saccharine, and too naive to achieve the needed outcomes. Our research shows just the opposite. Performance increases at all levels when leaders foster virtuousness, organizations implement virtuousness, and individuals demonstrate virtuousness. Activating virtuousness pays.
IMPLEMENTING VIRTUOUS PRACTICES AT GRIFFIN HOSPITAL
At Griffin Hospital, in Derby, Connecticut, the popular vice president of operations, Patrick Charmel, was forced to resign by the board of directors. The employees rebelled and pressured the board of directors to replace the current chief executive officer (CEO) and president with Charmel. Within six months of his return, however, the hospital’s decimated financial circumstances necessitated downsizing, and some of the very people who supported Charmel’s return lost their jobs. The most likely consequences of downsizing are deteriorating loyalty and morale, perceptions of injustice and duplicity, blaming, accusations, cynicism, and anger. Layoffs and retrenchment almost always lead to deteriorating performance.
Instead, the opposite occurred at Griffin. Upon his return, Charmel made a concerted effort to implement virtuous practices. He institutionalized forgiveness, optimism, loving relationships, and integrity. Throughout the organization, stories of compassion and acts of kindness and virtuousness were almost daily fare. One respondent said, “We are in a very competitive health-care market, so we have differentiated ourselves through our compassionate and caring culture…. I know it sounds trite, but we really do love our patients…. People love working here, and our employees’ family members love us too…. Even when we downsized, Pat maintained the highest levels of integrity. He told the truth, and he shared everything. He got the support of everyone by his genuineness and personal concern…. It wasn’t hard to forgive.”
Specific actions included installing queen-size beds in the maternity ward so fathers could sleep with mothers rather than sit in a chair through the night, creating numerous communal rooms for family gatherings, allowing patients’ pets or providing pets for patients, hanging original paintings with virtuous themes on walls, and placing Jacuzzis in the maternity ward.
As a result, Griffin is the only hospital to be listed in Fortune’s Top 100 Best Places to Work for ten consecutive years. It is only one of three U.S. hospitals given the Distinction for Leadership and Innovation in Patient-Centered Care Award. Griffin also was designated in the top 5 percent of Distinguished Hospitals for Clinical Excellence and received the Platinum Innovation Prize. And yes, revenues have soared.
TWEETS
Virtuous practices pay off by producing higher levels of organizational performance as well as more employee flourishing.
When people behave virtuously in organizations, positive results occur physiologically, emotionally, intellectually, and socially.
Especially effective strategies for leaders include expressing gratitude, enabling forgiveness, and facilitating transcendence.