Managing Knowledge Workers

They shuffle around the office looking unkempt in their scraggy T-shirts and jeans - that's if they make it to the office. They choose the hours they'll work, and where and when they'll work them. The office looks more like a playground than a place where serious work is done. There are even basketball hoops in some of the cubicles.

This is a profile of today's highly skilled knowledge workers who command high salaries and influence the nature of work in postindustrial society. To manage this new breed of worker, companies must understand what makes them tick.

Changing the culture of work

Some managers believe that knowledge workers are well treated because the economy is buoyant. They think that when there are fewer jobs than workers, order will be restored. Knowledge workers will no longer be able to call the shots. They'll have to knuckle down, don suits, and work regular hours.

However, managers must acknowledge that the business world has probably changed for good. The introduction of advanced technology has reduced the number of jobs that require little skill and increased the number of jobs that call for considerable skill. This is often referred to as a shift from "touch labor" to "knowledge workers," where employee responsibilities expand to include a richer array of activities, such as planning, decision making, and problem solving. In many cases, employees can be retrained to assume new roles and responsibilities. However, those employees who are displaced also require retraining. This has resulted in pages and pages of newspaper ads for applicants with technical or scientific training while several million job seekers without such training register for work with employment agencies.

Knowledge workers are often described as people who do mental as opposed to manual work, but they're more than that. Their brainpower and experience are more valuable to a company than physical assets or products. In the industrial age, workers were expendable. Today, their skills and experience form the intellectual capital of a company.

Having and effectively using knowledge workers gives a company a competitive advantage. However, if knowledge workers are unhappy or unmotivated, their intellectual assets are wasted. If a knowledge worker leaves a company, a valuable asset leaves. A major challenge for contemporary managers is finding ways to keep knowledge workers happy.

Understanding knowledge workers

Knowledge workers seem to be more interested in leading balanced lives than climbing corporate ladders. They're turning down promotions. They prefer to work in cubicles rather than big offices. They seem to care little for fancy job titles. Managers can be at their wits' end trying to find ways to satisfy this unpredictable breed of worker.

One way to understand the working style of knowledge workers is to think of them as foragers in a hunter-gatherer economy. The traits rewarded in a hunter-gatherer economy are the same as those rewarded in the knowledge economy. Like foragers, workers in the knowledge economy must be adaptable, alert to opportunities, and willing to change. Managers of foragers must base their strategies for managing, motivating, and retaining knowledge workers on these characteristics.

Allow decision making by consensus

Knowledge workers often don't like being told what to do. They prefer decisions to be reached by consensus, and they hate rule setting. Managers of knowledge workers need to recognize this and adjust their managerial style accordingly.

Reward teamwork and collaboration

Unlike blue-collar and white-collar workers, knowledge workers are usually specialists or experts. However, it is not enough for a knowledge worker to be an expert, he or she must also be able to collaborate with others. For example, he or she must understand and be understood by people who do not have the same knowledge base and thus who have different values and a different view of the world. The productivity of a knowledge team will depend on its ability to communicate.

In a knowledge-based economy, communication is very important. Managers need to recognize that building relationships with other knowledge workers is valuable. The time knowledge workers spend playing pool or chatting around the water cooler is often not wasted time. Relationships between team members can develop, and this can prove invaluable when workers need to collaborate on a project.

Encourage autonomy

If managers want to retain knowledge workers, they must give them the freedom to work as they choose. Foragers needed each other to survive, but they also needed space. The same is true of knowledge workers.

Managers need to allow knowledge workers to have downtime. Foragers often hunted for a week and then did nothing for several weeks. Likewise, knowledge workers sometimes work in spurts. In the industrial society, there was often a correlation between the hours spent working and production; this is not true in the knowledge-based society.

Be innovative

Money alone won't keep talented knowledge workers from job-hopping. Managers need to be innovative in finding ways to retain knowledge workers. Most knowledge workers have a formal education and have learned how to learn. They value learning and want to continue to learn throughout their lifetime. Managers should give them projects that offer opportunities to learn.

Many knowledge workers expect their jobs to fulfill personal values. Managers may need to help them feel part of something that they can believe in, something that gives meaning to their lives. Knowledge workers often value spiritual goals. Managers could try to discover what the values of individual knowledge workers are, and if possible, offer them projects that tie in with these values.

Stability and hierarchy belong to an old work culture. The new work culture is one where adaptability and egalitarianism rule the day. Knowledge workers are both products and progenitors of this culture. They are not seeking a job for life. They seek control over their destiny - conditions of work, salary, and career growth. Managers need to understand that they can give their workers this freedom and still maintain a productive organization.