Workmanship is the personal touch and pride individuals bring to work beyond completing tasks or meeting quotas. It’s about the personal touch and pride individuals bring to their work. Whether assembling products, writing code, or managing projects, true workmanship involves adding something unique that elevates the ordinary to the exceptional.

While standardization ensures consistency, it doesn’t have to eliminate the individuality and pride that come with personal contribution. As a leader, your challenge is to balance process adherence with allowing employees to bring their unique strengths and creativity to their work.

Barriers to Pride of Workmanship

Many organizations unintentionally create barriers that rob employees of pride in their work. These barriers include:

• Overemphasis on Metrics: Focusing solely on hitting quotas or other quantitative targets can detract from the quality of work. Employees may feel valued only for their output volume, leading to a sense of detachment from their work.
• Rigid Performance Appraisals: Traditional performance reviews often focus on narrow criteria, overlooking the intangible aspects of an employee’s contribution. This can lead to frustration, as employees feel their efforts to add unique value are neither recognized nor rewarded.
• Lack of Feedback Loops: Innovation and improvement are stifled without a system for listening to and acting on employee feedback. Employees who feel unheard are less likely to invest fully in their work, knowing their ideas and concerns may go unaddressed.

Deming’s 12th point, “Remove barriers that rob people of pride in workmanship,” addresses these issues directly. When employees are seen as mere tools for achieving business goals—valued only for their output and not for their insights, creativity, or personal investment—the quality of work and workforce morale suffer. This is not just a theoretical concern; it has practical implications for your organization’s success.

Your Role in Creating Workmanship

As a leader, you can remove these barriers and create an environment where workmanship can thrive. Here’s how:

1. Encourage Experimentation:

• Support your team in trying new ideas and approaches, even if it means occasionally stepping outside the standard procedures. This doesn’t mean abandoning processes altogether; it means allowing flexibility that can lead to innovation and improvement.
• Jay Patel, CEO of Amtech, emphasizes this approach: “Real leaders understand that you need to experiment to change. If not, they will be exposed some time in their career that they are not true leaders.”

2. Develop Open Communication and Feedback:

• Establish a feedback loop where employees feel heard and valued. Make it clear that their insights are welcomed and essential to the organization’s growth and success.
• Ensure that feedback isn’t just collected but acted upon, reinforcing that each person’s contribution is important and that their input can lead to meaningful organizational changes.

3. Shift the Focus from Output to Quality:

• While meeting targets is important, it shouldn’t come at the expense of quality or employee satisfaction. Recognize and reward the quality of work and the innovative processes that contribute to better outcomes rather than just the quantity of output.
• Consider revising your performance metrics to include qualitative aspects of work, such as creativity, problem-solving, and contributions to improving processes.

4. Nurture Personal Ownership:

• Empower employees to take ownership of their work by giving them the autonomy to make decisions and bring their ideas to life. This enhances their pride and leads to better results as employees are more invested in their work.
• Establish clear goals aligning with organizational objectives and individual aspirations, allowing employees to see how their work contributes to the bigger picture.

Building a Resilient, Engaged Workforce

By removing the barriers that prevent employees from taking pride in their work, you’re improving output quality and building a more resilient, engaged, and motivated workforce. Employees who feel valued and take pride in their work are likelier to go the extra mile, contribute innovative ideas, and stay committed to the organization for the long term.

This approach requires a shift in mindset—from viewing employees as just tools for achieving business goals to seeing them as integral partners in the organization’s success. It demands a leadership style that is open, adaptable, and committed to continuous improvement.

Authentic leadership involves the courage to experiment, adapt, and continuously strive to create a workplace where pride in workmanship is the standard. Creating an environment that values quality, innovation, and personal investment will set your organization up for sustainable success.