The asset called employee

There are too many countries in the world that would envy the infrastructure Oman has and is about to have.  But what about the people the soft power of a country so to speak? The hardware which is pretty much there worth only as much as the software that runs on it.  Obviously it can always be running on imported apps and home made programs but better to have a well established own operating system, an open code that is ready to continuously improve and learn from outside inputs.

I have worked in organizations which had as only assets the people at their desks. They did not own the desks though, nor the buildings  or computers, no cars either. Everything was leased. So they had to make sure talent is retained and accounted for as well utilized asset. One can imagine that in these environment there is a lot of effort put in continuous development, retention, personal and carrier development programs, performance management etc. Much like the maintenance work in a factory or in a computer park. I also worked in organizations that lack all of this. Totally. The only thing they had is some sort of rationality regarding the employer-employee relationship, stemmed mainly from a master and servant customary setup. This came though with some degree of fairness but totally random and limited in capacity. Much like a family business with lots of personal involvement, emotion and all. Needless to say both have advantages and disadvantages and both have their own role in an economy.  Problem is when one or the other is missing.

I don't think there is anything new in saying that is key to the sustainability of the Omani economy to  have the institutional practices of being able to continuously maintain, refresh, and at times to rewrite the software. And I am not referring to a checklist to include in quarterly reports to the board, but more to a culture, a belief that my employee is my value, the better he does the better I do. So I better be spending time and effort in making sure he/she is at its best.

Not being an HR professional I can just write from my own experience of working under both styles and leading a team under the former. So I have decided to share some of the low hanging fruits that I think are easy to implement, cheep and have almost an immediate impact with regards to employee satisfaction, commitment and performance. And I hope you'll find them applicable to Oman. So maybe you'll find something of use if you are leading and/or managing (there are two very different things) people in Oman. Stay tuned.