People are intelligent, resourceful and want to a good job. Many have these things throttled out of them as the years go by.

Some questions for you:

Do you listen to the people you are responsible for?

How do you see them?

Are they to be trusted? Would they waste all their time on Facebook if they weren’t watched like hawks?

If that is how you do see them, have you ever considered that a) you might be wrong, or b) if you are right, that they might act differently if their work had more meaning and you had different expectations of them?

Are you prepared to change you mind?

For a number of years in my working life, I held a series of low-paid, unchallenging jobs. Then I grabbed the chance to do a PhD when, unlikely as it seems, the opportunity came along. I was immediately catapulted into senior positions, and have for the past decade worked closely with senior executives.

Here’s the thing. I was clever and talented while I was working in all those unchallenging jobs. So were all the people I worked with. One of the most enjoyable jobs I did temporarily was working at a checkout desk in a supermarket. Those were the funniest, sassiest, most intelligent women it has ever been my privilege to work with. To be fair, our employer and managers treated us as such.

Few management gurus earn that status in my eyes. One that does is Dr W. Edwards Deming. In this video clip, he describes how we all have self-esteem, dignity, desire to co-operate and a yearning for learning at the start of our working lives – and how often this is crushed.

One thing Dr Deming does not mention is the deep desire to be heard. That, more than anything, was my biggest frustration in those early jobs. I had no status. What did I know? Plenty as it happens, and so did my colleagues.

Start the conversation and listen. How to do that is for another blog post.