Empowerment

Recently I was engaged in a conversation on empowerment with representation from people from various roles & responsibilities.

Here are the thoughts I shared with the group and a few points I wanted to write on...
Empowerment @ Wiki means increasing the strength of individuals & communities. I remember the leadership conference I attended @ Disney and some of the things Disney do to empower their employees. Disney does have processes & policies in place like any other organization does but what is more important is awareness of the process w.r.t the need, approach, expectations & decisions that the employ can take based on the situation.

Let me share an experience I learnt... on a sunny day afternoon a kid while walking in the Disney world accidentally dropped her ice-cream and there was a cast member (Disney employee) who quickly rushed to help clean her dress and buy a new ice-cream - WOW is the experience the kid would have received but analyzing what made it possible would be a process that mentioned x is the budget the employee can use to recover a situation with a clear definition of the boundaries. The first thought at this time would be pull our execs together to get some budget to empower people :)

Well that is definitely 1 way to look at it, now let me cite another experience I learnt… On day 1 the kid of the family bought a Mickey toy and then everyday when she returned home after the site-seeing she found Mickey doing some magic in the room like sometimes hiding below the pillow, reading her comic, etc and the kid was thrilled with the games Mickey played with her and she always came back to the hotel with the same energy levels she left every day morning for the rides… WOW is the experience the kid would have received but again analyzing what made is possible would just be the right attitude of the house-keeping cast member and effectively utilizing her creativity skills J

In both the examples employee realized power to do what is right for the customer as long as it is within the boundary of comforts of the guest, not impacting the interest of organization, employees & investors.

To summarize what I learnt was an employee can be empowered if he/she does the following:
· Awareness to information, choices & resources
· Situational decision making in the interest of the organization, employees & stake holders
· Encouraging positive thinking in the team & practicing strengths
And what one should not limit to self-imposed restriction viz.: Budget, roles, labor, etc.