Patrick Lencioni is one of my favorite authors, not just favorite business authors. I've talked about his work at our church, on my son's roller hockey team, and other non-business venues. He's written about how teams function ("The Five Dysfunctions of a Team"), politics in big business ("Silos, Politics, and Turf Wars") and leadership ("The Four Obsessions of an Extraordinary Executive"). He has even written a great book about business meetings, "Death by Meeting" (great title!) asking the question, "Which would you rather attend: a business meeting or a movie?" (If you answered movie, that's expected and you should read the book to see what's wrong with your company's meetings; if you said meeting, well, you may need more help than a book can provide).

His latest book is called "The Three Signs of a Miserable Job: A Fable for Managers (And Their Employees)". It is my favorite of all I've read of his. He starts out by describing his life and how he became aware of how many people dislike their jobs. You know, "The Sunday Blues." He goes on to describe his first job, a job that was coveted by his classmates, was high paying, and, by all rights, should have made him very happy. He wasn't working the tough job of a restaurant or potentially mind-numbing job of a bank teller. He describes his transition in thought that job dissatisfaction wasn't just finding the right job! (Emphasis is mine, because I've come to agree with this in my own experience painfully slowly.) People seemed fulfilled with less than desirable jobs, while others with these "lower-level" jobs as well as potentially great jobs like Lencioni's first one seemed dissatisfied and, well, miserable. To be sure, there are bad jobs - just watch the show, "Dirty Jobs", on the Discovery Channel. But a much higher percentage of people are miserable in their job, regardless of its inherent "badness".  Lencioni points out that this misery, besides being tragic for the employee, his boss, his family (and his dog, I suppose) is tremendously unhealthy for the organization as a whole, which is where the business owner needs to perk up his ears. Quoting him, "dissatisfaction of employees has a significant and direct impact on productivity, turnover, and morale, all of which eventually hit a company's bottom line hard." Ouch, yet another thing that detracts from my already shaky bottom line!

His solution is so simple, has no direct cost and, amazingly enough, is hardly being used. I believe he is right on track and, if you think about it over time, I think you will agree.

We'll talk about it more the next few days.