📉 Microsoft Report: Managers Don’t Trust Employees (Interesting Data)

Welcome to The Level Ups. Modern business news for the future business leader (explained in plain-Jane English).

Today:

• The New Microsoft report highlights the massive disconnect between managers and employees.

• Their recommendations for building a better workplace.

• The future of productivity (starting with digital ads).

Let’s get into it.

Estimated reading time: 5 minutes & 30 seconds. Longer than usual, but worth it.

Productivity Paranoia?

Managers with less control over a hybrid workforce are starting to get “productivity paranoia.”

It’s a label for bosses who feel like employees are not doing their job.

You KNOW this person.

Microsoft recently published a report on hybrid work (”hybrid” refers to a combination of working from an office and remotely).

Here’s just one key stat:

• 87% of employees say they’re productive at work.

• 12% of leaders say they’re confident employees are productive at work.

Supervisors with hybrid employees are less trusting than in-person managers. It was 36% and 49% respectively. If you work remotely and say 10 things to your boss, they will only trust 3-4 of them. Good luck working there.

There’s more. But first, let’s look at how Microsoft even got this data.

The Sources:

Microsoft interviewed 20,000 people in 11 different countries and analyzed trillions of data points pulled from Microsoft’s internal suite of productivity software (email, instant messaging, meeting software, docs and spreadsheets, etc.). This suite of products is called Microsoft 365, and it wasn’t the only source.

Labour trends were reviewed based on data from LinkedIn (which Microsoft owns) and findings from Glint People Science.

Microsoft also references reports from the U.S Department of Commerce about the greater economy (which is going down).

A lot of data, but was it worth studying?

What’s The Impact?

Productivity paranoia feels like a direct reaction to “quiet quitting.”

First, it was about employees no longer going above and beyond at work (like they used to).

Now, it’s about managers being paranoid that employees are slacking off. It looks like they also read about quiet quitting and overcompensating.

This lack of trust had companies install tracking software to control remote workers. Shocker, now they have trust issues.

No, it didn’t work. Instead, “mouse movers” are a thing.

Surely there’s a better way.

There were three major recommendations in Microsoft’s report.

1. End Productivity Paranoia

Some key stats:

• Meetings are up 153%.

• Double bookings are up 46%.

• 42% of employees work on something else while in a meeting.

• 85% of leaders blame hybrid work (pretty much).

How can they still disagree about who’s productive or not when meetings are up 153%? Do they not talk about this in all those meetings?

Ironically, more meetings mean less time to do the actual work. Productivity paranoia is a very annoying cycle.

The big issue here is the obviously missing clarity between leaders and employees.

So what’s Microsoft recommending?

• Set clear targets and goals. These are often called OKRs or “Objectives & Key Results.”

• Establish No-KRs, which is a fancy way of saying, “tell people what they cannot do.”

• Collect feedback to find out who’s off track and why, ASAP.

For better or worse, modern HR practices won’t let a manager say, “you’re not working hard enough,” At least not anymore, especially if they want to fire someone over it. The exception is during probation, when they can fire you for pretty much any reason.

Outside the probation period, there needs to be proof and documentation (note: different rules for different countries).

Microsoft suggests formal metrics because a history of these numbers becomes an employee’s performance.

If the numbers are bad, then it’s clear who’s productive or not (exceptions may apply). This can address the clarity issue.

When both sides can see the numbers, there’s less room for managers to abuse their power and for employees to take advantage of remote work.

Has your boss given you key metrics yet? They’re coming.

People Come In For Each Other. Embrace It.

The office is about community now. It’s for fun, not grinding in cubicles.

73% of employees said they need a better reason to go to the office than just company expectations.

Especially for younger employees, 63% of which aspire to be entrepreneurs. Gen Z is an important group to consider because they’ll be 30% of the workforce by 2030.

Naturally, they want companies that give them the flexibility to pursue side hustles.

Would your company be ok with employees working on side hustles? Most are probably not, even if they say they are (especially if working from home).

They will worry about employees neglecting their jobs to work on side hustles. It’s a real concern.

So what’s Microsoft recommending?

• Use the in-person time for employees to connect, not grind in cubicles.

• Create a digital community. Use Slack (sorry Microsoft), host online games, and make it overall easier/better to connect online.

It just depends on whether a bigger workforce will appreciate a workplace community.

I actually agree. A little bit of fun (even if just once in a while), can make a big difference.

More on side hustles in the next section.

Re-recruit Employees.

Re-recruit (basically) means creating better HR practices and re-selling them to existing employees.

Things like

• pay for performance (people who do better get paid more),

• flexibility around side hustles,

• new perks, etc.

So, what does Microsoft recommend?

• Add “learning and growth” as a perk. Many companies offer a “professional development” budget for taking courses.

• View a career as more of a “playground” and realize the peak of a career is not always at the top. Describing a career path as a “playground” is strange but ok.

• Create an internal talent marketplace to build skills for employees to make internal moves rather than leave the company. If your business is not so big, you can create talent networks with other partners you trust.

Young people watch Mr. Beast make millions on Youtube (among other ventures).

IG influencers, Twitch streamers, OnlyFans, Patreon, and newsletters are all viable. Some make millions. If the company tells young people not to try these things, they'll leave.

Expect side hustles to come up at your workplace (if they haven’t already).

My Thoughts On All This:

I will give most companies credit. Many remote employees take advantage of the setup.

But hiring practices are the root of the issue.

Maybe instead of hiring a full-time person for 40 hours a week, hire someone for 20 hours and use better software? Just an example.

When times are tough, productivity is critical. It doesn’t always have to be more bodies. Automation is another straightforward way to boost efficiency.

What’s better (the overall productivity is the same):

• One or two highly productive employees that carry major responsibilities? Or

• A dozen semi-productive employees?

AI is moving us toward having one or two employees become hyper-productive. Hope that was your answer.

I talk about AI often, but not with HR. Mostly because people think that AI will take jobs. It’s a touchy subject, but an important one. And yes, AI will cut some jobs out of the workforce. But it’ll also position top talent to go even higher.

I'm going to test this out.

Starting With Ad Design

I’ll be testing out a new AI program to create digital ads. No designer, no other person, no office politics. Just three simple steps to go from nothing to a viable ad.

To do this, I’ll be talking to the team at Alvy:

• They’re MIT grads who’ve worked at Apple and Youtube before starting their own ventures (in Web3 and Fintech).

• The software is built on Stable Diffusion (the AI image generator).

• The team promises that anyone can become a designer with their product.

The experiment is simple. I’ll use the product and calculate the cost and time savings. We’ll see if AI is better/faster, or if it’s still too early.

You can try it out as well. You can sign up here. It’s free for now, and you should get in after a few days.

I’ve spoken with the team, and they’re very responsive. It’s free, might as well. What if the ads are actually amazing, and making them takes just 5min?

Let me know if you do! Would love to see what you create.

Thanks for reading!

Darwin