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"You don't show people that they matter in spite of their low performance. You show people that they matter so that you can regenerate their energy and confidence to perform well." - Zach Mercurio
The WorkWell Podcast™ is back and I am so excited about the inspiring guests we have lined up. Wellbeing at work is the issue of our time. This podcast is your lens into what the experts are seeing, thinking, and doing.
Hi, I am Jen Fisher, host, bestselling author and influential speaker in the corporate wellbeing movement and the first-ever Chief Wellbeing Officer in the professional services industry. On this show, I sit down with inspiring individuals for wide-ranging conversations on all things wellbeing at work. Wellbeing is the future of work. This podcast will help you as an individual, but also support you in being part of the movement for change in your own organizations and communities. Wellbeing can be the outcome of work well designed. And we all have a role to play in this critical transformation!
This podcast provides general information and discussions about health and wellness. The content is not intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Always seek the advice of your physician or other qualified health provider with any questions you may have regarding a medical condition. Never disregard professional medical advice or delay in seeking it because of something you have heard on this podcast. The podcast owner, producer and any sponsors are not liable for any health-related claims or decisions made based on the information presented or discussed.
Jen Fisher: [00:00:00] We all know that feeling valued at work matters. It's not exactly breaking news that people wanna feel significant and appreciated, but here's what might surprise you. Despite this being obvious, research shows that a staggering number of employees still feel invisible, undervalued, or insignificant at their jobs.
So if we know that this is important, why are we still so bad at it? This is the Work Well podcast series. Hi, I'm Jen Fisher, and today I'm talking with Dr. Zach Mercurio. His new book, the Power of Mattering digs into this paradox why something so fundamental to human wellbeing is still so poorly executed in most workplaces and what leaders can actually do about it.
This episode of The Work Well Podcast is made possible because of our friends at Lyra [00:01:00] Health. Lyra Health is a premier global workforce mental health solution trusted by leading companies like Starbucks, Morgan Stanley, Lululemon, and Zoom. Lyra provides personalized care to over 17 million people with fast access to evidence-based providers and tools that deliver proven results, including faster recovery and reduced healthcare costs.
This season, Lyra and the Work Well Podcast are teaming up to bring you more insights on how to build a thriving work culture for today and the future. We'll be bringing you cutting edge data and research on workplace mental health and wellbeing, and we'll have some Lyra experts occasionally join us to share their perspectives on workforce mental health and creating psychologically safe and effective work environments.
Find out more@lyrahealth.com slash work. Well, thank you to Lira for helping us elevate this season of the Work Well podcast. Zach, welcome to the show.
Zach Mercurio: I'm glad to be here. I'm glad [00:02:00] we're finally able to connect.
Jen Fisher: Me too. And it's so awesome to be able to talk about your new book on the show. So I wanna start with.
The topic, the subject matter of your book, and most leaders that I talk to at least would say something like, of course, people need to feel like they matter in the workplace. So why do so many employees feel invisible right now?
Zach Mercurio: One of the recent surveys from Gallup is illuminating and instructive in this area.
Yeah. You know, in January, 2025, Gallup released its latest en engagement data, which showed that we are more disengaged than ever. It's the lowest it's been in a decade, but we have to look at what's been going on to address. Quote, unquote, engagement. We've invested collectively over $2 billion in programs, initiatives, DEI programs, wellbeing programs, all of these large scale initiatives from the top down level to address engagement and wellbeing.
And yet we're more disengaged than ever. We're lonelier than ever. We're more disconnected than ever. And why is that? There's a couple of data points in that. Study that [00:03:00] really get at why mattering is the underlying driver of these things. Just 39% of that sample of 15,000 employees, and this was kind of hidden in the report, um, just 39% strongly agreed that someone at work cared for them as a person.
Jen Fisher: Mm-hmm.
Zach Mercurio: Yeah. Um, just 30% of that sample indicated that somebody invested it and saw their unique potential. So what's happening is at the interactional level. People feel more unseen, unheard, undervalued by the people around them on an everyday basis, and you can't tackle this from a programmatic perspective.
You have to tackle this at an interaction by interaction perspective. The same is true with what we're seeing with loneliness, for example, a lot of people have called. This a loneliness epidemic. You know, eight out of 10 workers experience some level of [00:04:00] loneliness on a weekly basis. But what we've gotten wrong about loneliness is that the advice, a lot of the books out there, a lot of the articles have told us to connect more so when organizations hear the word, we need to connect more.
Usually that means more meetings and so we've Or go back to the office. Or go back to the office. Well, and our time, our time spent in meetings. And the US has tripled since 2020. There's 38 million people right now sending messages back and forth on Slack. We send an average of 30 to 40 text-based messages to each other a day, or we're more connected than ever, but we're lonelier than ever.
And why is that? The research is very clear that it's not the quantity of connection, it's the quality of connection that matters. It's the quality of interaction. It's not the lack of social contact. That results in loneliness. It's the result of a lack of perceived social value to others being in relationships, having interactions in which feel we feel seen, heard, valued, and [00:05:00] understood.
And, and the name for that right, is this experience of mattering. And so I think largely we're still lonely. We still feel invisible, we still feel unseen because we've tried to address this at the programmatic large scale level, but we haven't reskilled. Ourselves and our leaders to see, hear, and value the next person they interact with.
I think we have to bring it down to the interaction level. That's what's gonna move the needle.
Jen Fisher: Yeah. And so, and I don't know if this is the, the same Gallup report, 'cause I feel like Gallup has come out with a lot of great data, but they also came out with a report recently about managers and kind of manager training and the fact that I think something like 67% of managers haven't really been taught or given training on how to.
Lead and manage other humans. And so they're given technical skills and technical training, how to manage a p and l, things like that. But [00:06:00] they aren't actually given training on how do you engage and lead and, you know, be a, a, a good, a good manager, a good person, um, for, for your colleagues and those, those that you lead.
And so, I mean, you're talking about kind of this. Idea of helping others feel like they matter. And yes, there's a huge impact on wellbeing. And I think what we're seeing in the wellbeing space too is, is that same thing, right? That the things that are impacting people's wellbeing on a day in, day out basis is not the fact that they're.
Company doesn't have the right programs. Um, it's largely relational or interactional. It's largely, you know, some of it is, is due to workload and work overwhelm, but a lot of it is kind of the relationship that I have with my colleagues and my leader. So this is a skillset that can be taught to people, right?
Zach Mercurio: Yeah, I wanna highlight what you just mentioned, [00:07:00] which is this skills gap. Yeah. And one of the drivers of that skills gap is the fact that for the past 25 years we've been able to communicate with each other via short digital transactions. Since the advent of texting, we've been able to actually get out of the situations that allowed us in the past to socially learn the skills to care.
So for example, if you were frustrated in this conversation, I can now just send you like a message. There's a chat option right here and I can say, oh, it seems like you're frustrated. Sorry to hear that. Uh, and then I've done my moral duty. If you gimme some bad news, I can just send you a thumbs down emoji on Slack and say, oh, let's catch up next week.
Every time I'm able to do that and get out of the situation of being uncomfortable with you. Of seeking understanding of what you're going through, of showing compassion. I actually lose and become less proficient at the skill to do those things. And so we've been able to rely on [00:08:00] this technology for 25 years.
It's good for efficiency. It's been very bad for our skills. Connecting to one another. This is why when people say, oh, we need to put down our phones. Putting down our phones is not gonna heal our disconnection. What we do when we put down our phones will, so if we don't have the skills to see, hear, value, and show compassion to the person across from us, 'cause we haven't had to use them, then our interactions suffer.
And imagine this, there are, there's been some theorists and philosophers that propose that, um. That there are some people entering into the workforce that have never had to show compassion to another human being in real time in their lives.
Jen Fisher: That's really scary.
Zach Mercurio: Right. And so that's very scary. But, so this is a, this is a, this is a skills gap, but the, the good news is that we can learn these skills in these interactions.
And one of the things that you mentioned also is its impact on wellbeing.
Jen Fisher: Yeah.
Zach Mercurio: No, no symbolic program. No [00:09:00] perk. No wage increase. In fact, wages have increased 42% in the last eight years. Despite inflation. Uh, we've invested more in perks than ever. Um, there are more access to personal development, uh, personal wellbeing, resources than ever.
Um, and yet people feel disconnected, disengaged, uh, and unwell more than ever. And that's because no symbol, no perk, no program can make up. For the daily experience of feeling invisible, it's very hard for anything to matter, even your own energy. Uh, to someone who doesn't first believe that they matter to the people around them.
And so I think that bringing this wellbeing conversation down to the interpersonal interaction level is important. And we found that, you know, there are, there are a set of skills that we can learn, you know, to, to help people feel significant. Uh, noticing people, seeing and hearing them. Affirming people, showing people the difference that they make, reminding people how they're needed.
These are things that we can learn. It may be common [00:10:00] sense. But it is not common practice and we have to learn the skills to make it common practice.
Jen Fisher: And perhaps it even isn't common sense anymore, right? If we are, if we've become so accustomed to. Not doing it, it does it fall out of the realm, realm of common sense if we actually have to, uh, you know, learn or relearn those skills.
Fascinating. I often speak about kind of these wellbeing programs and perks that I do believe have a role to play. They're foundational. They're necessary. They're a signal. That you care, but they were never meant to solve the problems that we now expect them to solve. A meditation app is never going to solve the problem of, I have way too much work to do.
Like, you know, that's not, that's not the purpose of it. And so, you know, you do, you do see a lot of. People, myself included, you know, kind of talking about the, you know, the, the [00:11:00] programs and perks and it's, it's not an effort to kind of say that the programs and perks themselves are bad. It's actually, I think, more, you know, our expectation as leaders or organizations that are investing in these things, kind of like this disconnect between what the perk is actually meant to do versus what perhaps our thinking that the perk is going to do.
So. I, I wanna get into something that's in the subtitle of your book. It's The Power of Mattering, and then the subtitle is How Leaders Can Create a Culture of Significance. So tell me the difference between mattering and significance. They're not the same thing. And tell me, kind of give me the important distinction there.
Zach Mercurio: Hmm. Yeah. Can I go back one quick to highlight a point? Of course you made because it's great. I think you said like, these things are signals, right? Yeah. Their signals are symbols of value. I, I was, but they can't actually value somebody like a program can't value [00:12:00] somebody. Right. A per can't value somebody.
Only people can value people. And I think sometimes organizations think they're valuing their people by giving them signals or symbols of value, but the magic happens. The signal or the symbol aligns with the daily experience. I was, uh, I, this two days ago, I was in a conversation with a company that offers benefits to um, organizations, and one of their benefits they offer is pet care.
And they were telling me all about their pet care benefits and how it helps, you know, genzer feel seen because. Uh, they're, they have more pets than kids now and all of this. And I, and I was like, yeah, but, but you can give somebody like a pet care benefit, but what really creates mattering is if their manager knows their pet's name.
Jen Fisher: Yeah.
Zach Mercurio: Right? And that's the skill of noticing somebody. If you feel unseen by the person you work with most, it doesn't really matter what signals and symbols say that that interaction, that [00:13:00] next interaction that someone has is actually your culture. Yeah. Um, and so it brings me to, to your question, you know, the power of mattering and how, how leaders can create a culture of significance.
Mattering is the feeling of being significant to the people around you. Uh, that comes from two major factors. Feeling valued by them, feeling seen, heard well, and then knowing how we add value, knowing how our unique strengths make a unique difference. That feeling of significance. That feeling of importance to other people is the key driver of that overall feeling of, of mattering, of feeling significant.
I, I will say that there's a couple of other words that get misconstrued around this topic as well, and that are things like belonging or inclusion, which we've heard a lot about in the last 15 years. Um, I think about it like a three-legged stool. When I think of a culture of significance, you have belonging.
Which is feeling welcomed and accepted and [00:14:00] connected in a group you have inclusion, which is being able to take an equal active role in that group, but there's something missing when you don't have mattering, which is mattering is the feeling of being significant to individuals in that group. I can feel like I belong and that I'm included in a room, in a team, but not feel that you've noticed that I'm a caretaker for a parent who's in the hospital or, yeah, you may not be able to name.
My unique gifts relative to other people. And so I think that that's, that mattering piece is what's been missing that fits into belonging and inclusion to create this culture of significance where I know that I'm seen, heard, valued. So that I have the confidence needed to add value and see how I'm making a difference.
Jen Fisher: Yeah, I love that. And I think it puts a fine point on what is missing, right? And helps us understand that, oh, this is that kind of next [00:15:00] action that I need to take, or next thing that I need to do that perhaps wasn't as clear before. So. You know, we, we've kind of touched on this a little bit, but I'd love for you to talk about what you've learned from your research on this topic and just generally from a wellbeing perspective, what actually happens to people mentally and physically when they don't feel like they matter specifically at work?
I mean, there's other groups that we're involved in, other communities that. Many of us are involved in, but work is where we spend most of our waking hours. Um, and so the workplace is such a critical place for people to feel these things, to believe these things, to learn these skills. And so what happens to them when they don't feel this way at work?
Zach Mercurio: I, I, I bring this back. All the way to our initial instinct to matter as [00:16:00] as children, right? The moment we're born, we reach out and grasp for significance to somebody. Um, we have to be important enough to somebody else to keep us alive, and I think that that is, is really important to know that the root of this psychological need to matter to others is rooted in our very survival.
And survival instincts never go away. They're hardwired into us. And you know, I want imagine a, a child who reaches out to matter to somebody and finds no one, you know, the same, that same visceral stress of insignificance is what people feel when they feel unseen and unheard and unvalued. To get a sense of what this is like in your personal life, imagine being in a room full of people that may be friends, but feeling utterly unseen.
Unheard and invisible. A lot of people have that feeling of being in a room full of people and feeling like no one really knows you. That is the experience of not mattering of, of feeling invisible, of [00:17:00] feeling overlooked. And there's a couple of things that happen in the workplace when this happens. One is we either withdraw or we act out in desperation.
So acts of withdrawal are things like, you know, we've, we've talked about this, you've talked about this quiet, quitting. Quiet, quitting was this trend. I mean, now we have like quiet cracking and all these other trends really. And
Jen Fisher: I think corporate, corporate hugging or job hugging is the new one that I saw the other day.
Course. Yeah.
Zach Mercurio: Whatever it is, it's all, it's all mattering or anti-matter in disguise. Really. Yeah. 'cause when we, when we feel insignificant in a relationship, and work is a relationship, it's a relationship with people. Organizations are individuals who organize for some reason. It's the fabric of an organization is relationship.
So when we feel insignificant in any relationship, we tend to withdraw. We don't put forth much effort, we withhold our information. 'cause we don't have that trust, we stay silent. So in an organization, when people start saying silent. When you notice people's [00:18:00] energy for a task is not what it used to be, turnover is a great signal of insignificance.
Like quiet. Quitting was the inevitable withdrawal response to a generation of people who felt insignificant and unseen in their organizations. It's also why at the same time, the lying flat movement went viral. In China, the lying flat movement was a renunciation of commitment to a society that doesn't commit to them.
It's the withdrawal response to feeling insignificant. Or if people feel insignificant in their daily relationships, it can be louder. They act out in desperation, complaining, blaming, gossiping. Um, the number one predictor of negative workplace gossip, for example, is not people being a narcissistic, toxic person.
It's actually, it's called psychological contract violation. If I, if my expectation of fair treatment from you is violated, and I can't speak up to you. I will speak out to somebody else. People are desperate to matter, so they will form relationships in which they feel that they [00:19:00] matter, even if it's built on negative grounds, even if it's built on destructive grounds because we're so desperate.
So this is why many of the most toxic or difficult employees my clients ask me to work with are actually when I dig down deep enough, the ones who feel the most unseen, unheard and undervalued. Yeah.
Jen Fisher: I, I mean, I, wow. Like that's a mic drop moment, right. Knowing that as a leader mm-hmm. Um, you know, it, it changes your entire approach of how, or it should change your entire approach of how you deal with people that you know, might be acting out or speaking out in the workplace.
Zach Mercurio: And I'm, I'll let you in on a little pet peeve of mine right now, but I see a lot of articles right now that say like, how to deal with difficult people, right? Yeah. How, how do you deal with the difficult people and we don't deal with people. We're, we're not built to deal with people, we're built to support people, [00:20:00] to understand people.
Um, one of the things that's happened in organizations is we are labels obsessed. We have difficult employees, toxic employees, high performers, low performers, and the problem with labels is the moment your brain labels something. Categorizes something, it actually stops seeking to understand them. Yeah.
There's this great spiritual teacher, I forget his name in India, who in, in ancient text said, the moment a child learns the name of a bird is the moment it stops seeing the bird. And what I, what I what he means by that is that. You know, a child or a human is like, oh wow, look, this fluffy thing that can fly in the air magically and is inherently interested in it.
But once it knows it's a sparrow, it's the child is just like, oh, I've seen sparrows before. Right, right. So we stop being interested when we label people. And so when we label someone as difficult, what typically happens is we treat them as if they're difficult.
Jen Fisher: Yeah. As
Zach Mercurio: if they're just an issue to be dealt with.
When we treat them as an [00:21:00] issue to be dealt with, they, they tend to see themselves that way. I'm difficult, I'll, I'll never amount to anything. I'll always be an issue. I'm just, uh, inconvenience to this person who I'm spending a third of my life with, and then they start acting that way. And then the, the cycle continues.
So, you know what I've, what I've been, um, coaching leaders to do is instead of saying, this is a difficult person or this is a difficult employee, I say, you know, think about this person as a human being who's living a life as vivid and complex and as important as your own, who has people that deeply love them, who is acting in ways that you perceive as difficult.
And then that opens the door to start seeking understanding. And when we seek understanding, that's what helps people feel noticed and feel that they matter. And it helps you as a leader because you can't care for someone you don't understand.
Jen Fisher: Yeah. I I, I love that. 'cause I, I think one of the things that perhaps has always been a, a pet peeve of mine that.
Very similar is that idea of a low performer, you know, and first of [00:22:00] all, the labeling someone a low performer, what that does to them psychologically. But also have we actually stepped back and looked deep enough as to. What are, what are the, what are the actual reasons behind, you know, this person potentially being a low performer or not performing at the levels in which we expect or need them to?
And usually there's something about. You know, the environment they're in or the relationship or, or probably that they don't feel like they matter. Mm-hmm. Um, that is, that is driving kind of that quote unquote low performance behavior. And so I think this provides such incredible, just incredible knowledge and context and a way to look at these things differently in, in so many aspects, whether it's.
Quote unquote difficult person or a low performer, or pick your other favorite label in the workplace because you're right, we have way, we just have way too many labels in life.
Zach Mercurio: [00:23:00] And you know what we, what we don't understand, we tend to try to control.
Jen Fisher: Yeah.
Zach Mercurio: So when we, when we, and labeling,
Jen Fisher: I guess, is a way to control labeling is controlling.
Zach Mercurio: So is, so is slapping a performance improvement plan on somebody? Without deeply understanding and coming to care for them, so is giving them critique without laying the relational groundwork of care. Um, there's been studies shown that, um, almost 38% of feedback that's meant to improve performance actually decreases performance.
And researchers find that it's not because of the nature of the feedback, it's actually because the person feels unseen, unheard and misunderstood by the person giving the feedback. So it's really hard for anything, even your most well-intentioned performance, improving feedback to matter to someone who doesn't first feel that they matter to you.
And so the, what leaders tend to not understand is that the, the, the quality of a performance improvement conversation actually is developed in the days, weeks, months, and years. [00:24:00] Before that conversation. Yeah. The relational groundwork that makes those difficult conversations easier. But I will also say that this is also not about not having high expectations, right.
For high performance. You know, a lot of people say to me, how do I help people feel that they matter if I need them to improve their performance? This is the most common question that I get asked. I always say, you, you help people feel that they matter so that they can improve their performance.
Jen Fisher: Great.
Zach Mercurio: Right. When we help people feel
Jen Fisher: mattering, they're not, they're not mutually exclusive. Right? Right. But
Zach Mercurio: when we, when we help people feel seen and heard and valued, they develop two beliefs that, uh, researchers Joyce Bono and Timothy Judge find, um, are the most predictive of workplace performance. And those two beliefs are self-esteem, the belief that I'm worthy.
And self-efficacy, the belief that I'm capable. And so when we are doing this work to to see hear value people, even when we're trying to improve their performance, we're actually giving them beliefs that help build their confidence needed to add value. To perform [00:25:00] well, and so I think that that's an important nuance for leaders listening is that you don't show people that they matter in spite of their low performance.
You show people that they matter, so that you can re regenerate their energy and confidence to perform well.
Jen Fisher: Have you found that there are certain types of people, I know we just, uh, we just, we just talked about not labeling, but are there certain types of people or roles that perhaps are more vulnerable to feeling insignificant?
Like are there patterns, like what should, I guess, what should leaders look for to better understand where someone on their team or their entire team, you know, that kind of thing.
Zach Mercurio: Yeah, so what we've done is we've asked, you know, thousands of people and surveyed thousands of people. Some version of this question, you know, when you feel that you mattered.
To a leader, what are they doing? Hmm. And the three practice areas that came about were when people feel noticed. So when they feel seen and heard, [00:26:00] when people feel affirmed, when they know how their unique gifts make a unique difference, and when they feel needed, when they feel relied on, indispensable to some bigger purpose or some bigger goal.
One of the things that I would encourage all leaders to do. After listening to this is to ask your people that question and make sure people in your organization are asking this question. When you feel that you matter to me, what am I doing? Uh, when you feel that you matter here, what are we doing? Uh, because that will help you give you the actual lived experience of what someone is experiencing when they do feel significant to you, which is really helpful data.
But I would also say that one of the things that I encourage organizations to do is what I call a mattering audit, which is to think about, you know, noticing people, affirming them, showing them how they're needed. And list your employees on your team or list in groups in your organization and write down what you're strategically doing to make sure they feel seen and heard.
[00:27:00] Write down what you're strategically doing for that group to feel affirmed. See how their gifts make a unique difference. Write down what you're strategically doing to make sure that they feel that they're needed. And if you're not doing anything intentionally and strategically and skillfully, just leave it blank.
With no self-judgment and very quickly you'll start to see this sort of heat map of mattering in your organization or on your team. And a couple of the types of roles and people that are often especially susceptible to feelings of anti-matter are frontline workers. So frontline employees? The, yeah, the people who are the, the who are the backbone of organizations and society often are the least invested in when it comes to things like leadership development and personal development in an organization.
It's like an inverted pyramid when it comes to investment in development and role status on a hierarchy. So understanding that, that people in the front line, while they may feel closest to. The customer, the end user, [00:28:00] oftentimes they feel more distant from the leaders. Another group is the high performers, the people that just show up, they don't make much noise.
They don't give much feedback. Many leaders use their attention to fix what's wrong.
Jen Fisher: Yeah.
Zach Mercurio: And so we're always trying to. Improve a disengagement or fix an underperforming employee or, but we forget that, uh, to focus our attention on what's going right. Uh, and a lot of high performers feel undervalued. In fact, we did an article and we found a study that found that almost 50% of high performers that left an organization didn't have a meaningful conversation with their manager about how they were doing in the three months prior to leaving.
Wow. Um, other places that people feel that they don't matter are roles that are 3, 4, 5 steps removed from the end impact of their role.
Jen Fisher: Yeah.
Zach Mercurio: So being able to bring the human [00:29:00] impact that you can probably see as a leader and, and reveal to people that downstream impact of them on other people and affirm them, uh, is especially important in roles like it.
Finance, um, a lot of the roles that do some of the backend stuff that make everything else possible, oftentimes those people are taken for granted. Um, and there's some risk there, but there's risk for everybody because mattering is created through interactions, but it also can be destroyed in singular interactions.
Jen Fisher: Yeah.
Zach Mercurio: So, you know, those little gestures and those little moments of anti-matter can also create feelings of. I'm insignificant
Jen Fisher: and they're probably more, uh, powerful is not the the right word, but, um, they have more of a, of a, of a detrimental impact, um, at, at a, at a larger scale I would imagine.
Zach Mercurio: Yeah, I have seen like, you know, I have seen small moments where some like [00:30:00] singular moments where somebody's voice was shut down, that stayed with employees for
Jen Fisher: Yeah,
Zach Mercurio: five years.
You know, I had a, um, one of the stories that I tell is I, that opened my eyes to this is I was asked to go work with a group of maintenance workers. One of the responsibilities was washing the. Bottom floor windows of this industrial complex here in Colorado. And they had to do this every summer. Every summer and every morning in the summer, this team had to go wash these windows.
And there was a woman who just got hired. She got hired as a team lead, and she was responsible for the team that had to go wash the windows. And the supervisor hired me 'cause. He was like, I need you to figure out what's going on with this team. They're unmotivated. So I got them all into a room and I just asked them, Hey, if you were running this place, you know, what would you do differently?
And there was just tons of energy. But she followed me out and she said, you know, five years ago I got here, I was responsible for this team and this summer, and we'd go and do this window washing task every morning. And I, I quickly noticed that the sprinklers. It came on at 3:00 PM in the afternoon at that site, and they were aimed wrong.
So they [00:31:00] splashed the windows and they left. They left all of these avoidable like dried water splotches. And I realized that's the only reason why we have to go there every morning in the summer. And so I went to the supervisor and I said, Hey, like. I have an idea, let's just adjust, readjust the sprinkler's aim.
And she told me he, he looked at her and he said, that's the sprinkler people's problem. I need you to just do your job. And she said, that was five years ago. And I, I shut down. She said, I went and guess I went and told my team that, you know. I'm not gonna go talk to him again and we're just gonna do our job.
And over time that team had developed, learned helplessness. They, they learned that what they said, didn't say, what they did, didn't do, didn't really matter 'cause nothing was gonna change. So this was not an unmotivated group of people. This, this was a group of people who experienced these small issues.
We've come to call these sprinkler issues, and if you're listening and you're thinking, oh gosh, that supervisor was terrible, you may be right. But also [00:32:00] all of our teams and organizations have sprinkler issues, very small things. The eye roll that we don't have time for this, we don't have the budget for this.
The not following up on a conversation that you notice someone was frustrated in. We have these very small moments.
Jen Fisher: That's not, that's not how we do things here.
Zach Mercurio: That's not how we do things here. Um, so, so acknowledging and seeing those quote unquote sprinkler issues on your team and those threats to mattering is also an important practice.
Jen Fisher: Yeah, I mean there's a ton of correlation there with the research and the book that I have coming out on hope and kind of what builds hope and what kills hope and within an organization. And it's many of kind of those similar or same types of, of human interaction Wow. That, that either build hope or kill hope.
The number one thing that all of us do as human beings is, you know, the language that we use and the impact that it has on. How other people. Feel right, and so does it create hope or create hopelessness. And so I [00:33:00] think there's a lot of correlation and connection to what you're saying, um, to hopelessness or hope in an organization.
Zach Mercurio: I think. I think there's something there around, yeah, there's learned helplessness, but I'm sure there's learned hopelessness.
Jen Fisher: Yeah, absolutely.
Zach Mercurio: Or we get these subtle messages of just like, oh, we just have to push through. This is how it is. Oh yeah. This is how the industry mm-hmm. Is it's a difficult time.
Yeah. Yeah. I just was, uh, working with a hospital and they were talking about how their, their senior nurses will, you know, that there's pretty difficult conditions as a frontline, like nursing assistant Absolutely. Is when they're hired entry level, and one of the things that they saw as a problem was that a lot of the senior nurses would say, well, that's what you signed up for.
Jen Fisher: Yeah,
Zach Mercurio: this is, suck it up is just how this is just how it is. Yeah. So we do these, these little signals, signals of hopelessness that I think feed into those feelings of not mattering.
Jen Fisher: My husband was, was in in it for many, many years, and he used to say, you never really hear from anyone until [00:34:00] their computer's not working correctly.
Right, right. Yeah, absolutely. When your laptop does turn on, that means that you know somebody's doing something right and you should let them know.
Zach Mercurio: This is a really, really important point because one of the practices that we hear helps people feel significant. Is this. This practice of being affirmed, being shown, the difference that we make and how we make it.
You know, a lot of, a lot of leaders tell their people that they matter. But it takes skill to show them how they matter. Uh, there was a national Park Service maintenance, uh, supervisor that I worked with because he had a very high morale, low turnover team, which was very rare in the National Park Service, especially in maintenance because they're often in very difficult locations.
They have difficult time hiring workers. Um, but one of the practices that he had that you just made me think of was. Every week, he would go around in the park and he would take pictures of projects that his maintenance team worked on. So if there were visitors walking across a bridge or a new trail that was open and people were using it, [00:35:00] or if they repaired a bathroom that was non-functional.
Now there was a shorter line. He would take pictures and he had this practice on every Friday morning, he would send them this email and the subject line just said, look what you did. And then he would attach the pictures, um, because a lot of those maintenance workers just did the project and they went onto something else and they were often very susceptible to feeling that they didn't matter.
But he actually showed them, you know, he showed them the downstream impact of their work. And we find that leaders who have teams that feel that they matter, they don't let their people forget. About how what they do has an inevitable impact on someone else, even if it's them or a team member. And so that practice of bringing that downstream impact back to the person in a very authentic sort of inarguable way, giving someone the indisputable evidence of their significance is very important.
Practice.
Jen Fisher: I, I love that. And also the idea that it's not a one and [00:36:00] done, right? Like I didn't sit you down in the room and tell you that you all matter and then never tell you again.
Zach Mercurio: Yeah. It's consistent. I mean, intention, intentionality, consistency, authenticity are critical.
Jen Fisher: What about when the leader themselves doesn't feel like they matter?
Like, is there something that I can do as a leader? If I don't feel like I matter, but I don't want my team to feel like they
Zach Mercurio: don't matter, well, it does not help me feel like I matter. That's great. Great. This is a great question. Yes. A lot of, a lot of leaders, uh, don't feel that they matter Yeah. In their organizations or matter to their leaders.
One of the things that some people say to me, Zach, well, what do I do if my leader doesn't do this for me? And I often ask them, you know, do you do it for them? Hmm. Uh, mattering is non-directional, and there's this principle in psychology. It's called the complementarity principle. It means that if you and I are having a series of conversations over the course [00:37:00] of a few weeks, and you never asked me about my personal life, you never checked in on me, you never affirmed me.
If I start doing that for you, if I start asking you about your life, if I start. Noticing your gifts and saying thank you to you and affirming you and reminding you how I rely on you. Research shows that inevitably in, in almost all relationships, the other person will start doing that for us. So one of the things that happens is, is that when we're in the middle, and I see this with middle managers a lot, yeah.
Is sometimes we can forget that while we may not have positional power, we always have interactional power. Like we can always choose how we're showing up in everyday interactions. Oftentimes what inevitably happens is our brains actually, if we don't feel like something's happening to us, we withdraw.
But if you can, if you can have that emotional intelligence to say to yourself. I am noticing that I feel that I [00:38:00] don't matter. I'm noticing that this is resulting in me withdrawing, which unintentionally can help the next person I feel I interact with, feel that they don't matter. And if I am interacting in that way, I start feeling that I don't matter 'cause I don't see.
How I'm making an impact, um, and choose to, to show up in interactions, even with that leader who's not doing it for you in ways that help them feel significant, is a key way for you to remember how you're significant, ironically. So I think that that's a really important point is to not let anybody take away your interaction power.
But the other way, the other thing. Bringing this up to the leader, uh, or those who are not making you feel that you matter in a way that doesn't blame them or shame them is very important. Yeah. So, you know, one of the things that I recommend doing is, um, saying things, something like, Hey, I've noticed that I.
Add value the best here when I'm able to see the unique difference that I'm making, and it's [00:39:00] been harder for me to see that lately. You know, can we talk about how we can make it easier for me and my team to see that instead of, I don't feel that I matter here. You know, you need to change.
Jen Fisher: Yeah.
Zach Mercurio: You know, so I think that that as you're, as you're giving leaders feedback, you have to do it in a way that helps the leader that you're giving feedback to know that they matter.
In this, that you're with them in this, that this is not something you're, you're blaming them for, it's something you're willing to work with them on. So I think that that's really important that mattering tends to beget mattering.
Jen Fisher: Yeah.
Zach Mercurio: You know, research finds one of the best ways to feel that you matter is to go show someone how they matter.
For example, if you're just right now, today, if you're having a bad day and you're going to the grocery store, commit to, even if you don't want to commit to learning the name of the clerk, say to them, Hey, I know life's really hard. I'm really glad that you're here. Uh, what, what led you into this job? And learn something about them.
And chances are research fines, you will leave. Feeling more [00:40:00] fulfilled, more energized, and feeling that you matter because you saw what happens when you show someone else how they matter, which reaffirms that you can make a difference.
Jen Fisher: Yeah, that's true with, you know, happiness. You know, happiness comes from helping others, not from just focusing on your own happiness.
Yes. So let's talk about the skeptics. Um, you know, you touched on this a little bit when we were kind of talking about low performance in the workplace. But I mean, have you gotten any leaders that are like, well, if I make people feel like they matter too much, you know? Yeah, yeah. Am I gonna create entitled employees?
You know, um, you know, I know that that. That tends to come up a little bit in my world of wellbeing, right? Like if mm-hmm. You know, if people are too happy or they feel too well, then maybe they're not going to do their work.
Zach Mercurio: Yeah, I, I've gotten that a lot.
Jen Fisher: I figured. So I want you to address the skeptics.
Zach Mercurio: Yeah. So we have this, we have this, there's this [00:41:00] old notion in business especially, that people should be valued once they add value. So like we recognize people, we promote people, we give them more money once they add value, once they've earned it, but once they've earned it. But I feel like that this is also the reason why we're in this cycle of perpetual disengagement, this five year cycle of labor shortages and great resignations, is that people psychologically add value when they feel valued.
Right. It, it's the opposite. It is hard for anybody to care sustainably if they don't feel cared for. It's just how we're wired as human beings. Um, and so one of the things that happens in organizations is that we expect people to care without doing the rigorous work to make sure they feel cared for.
It's just not gonna work. It doesn't work in any other human relationship. Um, it, it's not gonna work in work, every outcome you say you want. So the
Jen Fisher: transaction of time for money doesn't change that [00:42:00] essentially. Yeah, again, money.
Zach Mercurio: Money. Again, money will create a not dissatisfied employee. Yeah, right. Uh, money perks, having a good schedule, all of that stuff that we kind of obsess about.
You know, Frederick Herzberg, the psychologist called those hygiene factors. They, they're like as basic as brushing your teeth, but brushing your teeth doesn't make you healthy. Right. Um, right. So, uh, you're creating a not dissatisfied employee if you're just focusing on those things, not a motivated employee, which comes from things like purpose, relationships, autonomy, mastery, all of those things which are all outcomes of mattering to other people.
So I would say every outcome you say you want an organization is mediated through human energy. And so if you're not. Regenerating the human energy needed to get the outcomes that you want, then you're playing a short game. And that's where people tend typically tend to control and use fear. Um, another thing about entitlement, A lot of people say like, I'm not gonna thank people for just doing their [00:43:00] job.
Well, you should.
Jen Fisher: Yeah.
Zach Mercurio: Right. You're not thanking someone for doing their job. Y you we're in a, you're in a position right now where people have more choices than ever of where, when, and how to earn a living. So with gig work, online work, uh, people have more choices. Simply more choices. Literacy rates are going up, educational attainments going up across the globe despite what we see about how bad everything is.
The state of living and the, the quality of living worldwide on average is actually better than it's ever been. What happens from a work standpoint is that when those variables go up, people have more choice. It's called high volition, and when people have more choice, they tend to discern. And when people have more opportunity to discern, they discern not based on what they get at work, but based on how they feel at work.
So we are in a situation where perpetually people have, will, will have more choices of where, when, and how to earn a living and um. [00:44:00] That's never, that's not gonna go away. And so how people feel while they're doing it is more important than ever. It's why, uh, remote work mandates, return to office mandates, you know, don't work.
Because if you don't fix the culture, what people experience while they're working, it doesn't matter where they work,
Jen Fisher: right? Yeah. They'll
Zach Mercurio: be un unproductive. So. People add value once they feel valued. People have more choices of where, when, and how to earn a living. They're going to prioritize feeling valued and knowing how they add value sort of in perpetuity as we move into the next generation.
And so I really believe that this is non, non-optional, uh, to do this. And it's not about being nice though. Yeah. Like this is not about being nice or that everything is easy. This is about meeting basic human needs. The basic human need to feel significant.
Jen Fisher: Yeah. There's so [00:45:00] much here, there's so much wisdom here, so much we could take away.
Um, how do you personally ensure that people in your life and work know that they matter? You're the expert, so what are your fas
Zach Mercurio: Yeah, well, um. I don't do it well all the time. You know, I need to, I, I teach what I need to hear the most. Right. Most of us do. And so, uh, but one of the things, because my first study that launched me into this work was with a group of university cleaners and we embedded ourselves with cleaners for.
A year and a half trying to understand what made work meaningful. And I've developed just a ton of empathy for that lived experience of being in a job where you're sitting in a break room and a building user walks by and throws a piece of trash and it hits the edge of the trash can. It falls on the floor, and that person just walks by as if you don't exist.
And about 60% of our workforce in the United States is in frontline service based work, who experience that level of social ignorance every single day. [00:46:00] And, um, we asked these, these custodians how they see. The meaning in their lives and in their work. And they all mentioned, all of them who experienced high levels of motivation, meaningfulness, and wellbeing, all mentioned that they had someone in their daily life, whether it was a building user or a supervisor or a peer who truly looked them in the eye, remembered their name, remembered things about their lives, and, and saw them and acknowledged them instead of brushing by them.
So one of the things I try to do is if I'm in the airport, um, and I travel a lot, but if I'm in the airport and there's a custodian in the airport. I will stop and I'll say, Hey, I just wanna thank you. This looks really clean, really makes a difference for me. And they will, they, they just, they're just shocked to be seen.
Yeah. And it's really sad. Um, if, if I am waiting at a construction, uh, site and there's the annoying one lane roads, you have to wait. Or when they, yeah, the construction flag returns the [00:47:00] stop sign. I'll just go outside my window and I'll say, Hey, thanks for being here. Appreciate it. And all of a sudden someone, Hey start.
Hey, you
Jen Fisher: mean you don't honk your horn loudly and obnoxiously some someone's like
Zach Mercurio: startled to be seen. Um, I was working with a conference organizer and she told me that all of the other speakers were. Demanding all of these things and things in their green room and all of this. And I, I had said to her, I said, Hey, I just wanna thank you, like, for making this happen.
You know, I'll, I'll take just coffee and water if you have it, but I want to thank you for all this work. This is hard. This must be a really hard time for you. 'cause the event's two weeks away. So let me know if I can do anything to make it easier. And you just see them just relax.
Jen Fisher: Yeah. So
Zach Mercurio: those are the things that I try to do is just commit to like seeing people where they're at, affirming them in what they're doing, affirming the fact that their work is an active community, that I am benefiting from all work, and that's made a difference for me and it's made my days richer.[00:48:00]
Jen Fisher: Yeah, I bet. And imagine the world we live in, if all of us committed to doing that just once a day. Just once. Yeah. Yeah. You don't have to do it multiple times a day. Just do it once. Well, Zach, uh, thank you for this conversation. Um, I, I gained so much from this conversation. I loved your book. Um, I think it's, it a book of our time, um, that every.
Person, leader, or not should, should have on their desk. Mine is, uh, is well loved and dogeared. So I'm grateful for the work that you do, and thank you for being on the show.
Zach Mercurio: Thank you, Jen. You too.
Jen Fisher: We just heard from Zach Mercurio about the power of mattering and how leaders can create cultures of significance.
Now, I'm excited to bring in Sarah Haggerty from Lyra Health to dive deeper into the science behind these insights. Sarah is a clinical psychologist and a neuroscientist who specializes in workforce mental health programs at Lira Health. [00:49:00] So Sarah, in this episode with Zach, he and I discussed the Gallup study that says that 67% of managers haven't actually been trained on the skills that they need to lead humans.
And then we heard that only 39% of employees feel like someone cares for them. As a person. So from your perspective, what are the key components that we need to be teaching managers to notice when someone's struggling and how to check in appropriately?
Sarah Haggerty: First of all, just in case anybody else is having an emotional reaction to those statistics like I did, I have to admit that my first reaction was disappointment and sadness.
That just feels as somebody who cares deeply about humans, as I know you do too, that just feels really tough to sit with.
Jen Fisher: It does, yeah.
Sarah Haggerty: But my second take was actually more optimistic. So two thirds of managers haven't been trained to lead humans, and I would argue that part of being trained to lead humans means being trained to notice when somebody is [00:50:00] struggling.
To check in with them in a way that's effective and work appropriate. And it really starts with knowing the signs that somebody might be struggling or in need of support. So the key here is to know that person's baseline, how they typically show up at work. Once you've noticed those signs, the next step really is to check in with the person.
Now, I will caveat that different organizations have different policies and procedures about when it's appropriate to have these conversations. And so when we train folks in this, one thing we always say is to check your organization's policies and procedures, but start out by just letting the person know.
What the conversation's gonna be about. You wanna let them know that you care about them and that you wanna check in on how they're doing. The third piece is giving them an opportunity to share what might be going on for them. And the key thing here is that you're giving them an opportunity. You are not.
Forcing them to share, you're not compelling them to share. [00:51:00] And if they set a boundary and they say, I don't wanna talk about it, that is okay. You wanna respect that. The idea is not to turn managers into therapists or mental health professionals, but in my experience, more often than not, people really will share something.
Jen Fisher: What would you say to the manager that says, well, I wanna check in, but what if they tell me something and I don't know what to do about it? If I can't fix it, or if I can't do something about it, then isn't it better just to not say something? So what do you say in that case?
Sarah Haggerty: I'm so glad you asked that question because I really do feel that that is a huge source of hesitancy for managers.
Yeah. Is that, Hey, I'm actually gonna make things worse by checking in and by asking the person. I'd love to just dispel that worry. If possible checking in does not mean that you need to have all the answers and that you need to fix their problems. In fact, that's absolutely not the case. But what you can play a really powerful [00:52:00] role in is connecting them to the resources and support that can be that appropriate longer term solution for them.
Jen Fisher: Zach also talked about how mattering requires being seen, right? So it inherently requires vulnerability, but some workplace norms reinforce that showing weakness isn't. Okay. You and I have kind of talked about this concept of 10% more depth. So how can organizations create. This depth, this psychological safety that allows for authentic connection without crossing those professional barriers or this feeling of like, oh no, I can't do this because it means I'm showing weakness.
Sarah Haggerty: I love this question and I find this vulnerability piece to be such an interesting and important angle to this mattering discussion. You really can't have mattering without vulnerability, [00:53:00] and I think it's worth noting that there's been some really compelling and relevant research done in this area. So the top line finding from that body of research is that we want to have richer.
Deeper, more meaningful interactions with others, including in the workplace. But we leave a lot of opportunity for connection on the table because we're not good at predicting how it's gonna feel to go deeper and to bring more of ourselves to the table. So it really invites this question of what we do about it.
And I would argue that creating a greater sense of mattering through greater depth of connection really does start with individual employees being willing to lead by example to kind of throw down this metaphorical vulnerability anchor, and then ask yourself and kind of challenge yourself, what would it look like to go 10% further?
To bring 10% more of yourself to your workplace, to your coworkers?
Jen Fisher: [00:54:00] I love that. Okay, final question for you. So you talk about gratitude as a leadership superpower with a huge impact effort ratio. So how does expressing specific gratitude, and I say specific, actually change brain patterns for both the giver and receiver?
And how can this become systematic rather than just occasional?
Sarah Haggerty: So this really boils down to neuroplasticity, which is a fancy word for this idea that our brains are capable of making new connections and strengthening certain existing connections. So I'll use a metaphor here, um, which is that I see the brain as kind of a system of trails.
The trails that get used the most. Get more defined, they get easier to navigate. You're more likely to take them. The trails that don't get used as much, they gradually, you know, get covered with leaves [00:55:00] and branches and eventually they may even become impassable. So when we make an intentional effort to practice and express gratitude, we're actually training our brain to strengthen those connections that are geared towards the positive and with enough practice and repetition and with some help from neuroplasticity.
This can actually start to bias our thinking and attention towards the positive and create this kind of flywheel of positive mood and wellbeing that not only benefits us, but also the people that we're expressing gratitude towards. And I like how you said, how can we make this systematic so that this is not just a one-time thing?
Because the benefits really are going to come from habit and making this second nature. I like to encourage people to start their day with sending a note of gratitude as the very first thing on the [00:56:00] to-do list. Another idea is to end your day with noting three things you're grateful for. And these can be big or small, but I love these two practices because they book end our day with.
Expressions of gratitude.
Jen Fisher: Yeah, that's one of my favorite practices too. So, Sarah, thank you for helping us understand the science behind what makes people feel like they matter at work. Thanks for having me.
I am so grateful Zach could be with us today to explore how leaders can create workplaces where everyone feels truly significant and valued. Thank you to our producer and our listeners. You can find the Work Well podcast by visiting various podcasters using the key word work Well. All one word to hear more.
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