The key to what makes organizations achieve great things are people. Companies understand machines and go to great lengths to make sure machines are happy and productive. When it comes to people, most companies guess.

Humantech CEO and Founder, Franz Schneider has spent his career implementing initiatives to improve the effectiveness of people at Fortune 500 companies around the globe. What leverages business to succeed versus what drives them to fail was the subject of his presentation at TEDx event located at Saginaw Valley State University on August 1.

Schneider in his opening remarks said, “We made tools to reach places we could never go; we took a peek at Pluto; we’ve seen the depths of the ocean; we fathomed a human heart that works; and we’ve come up with chocolate ice cream.” But, the most beneficial piece of technology, he explained, “is the one that can take a mundane pile of bricks and turn it into a thriving enterprise.” That piece of technology is the human being.

“People are what give business life; they are the single and sole source of productivity. Most organizations don’t understand how critical people are. No other element is as crucial, nor is there any other element as misunderstood and unattended to as people,” he explained.

The old-fashioned way of conning people to achieve more doesn’t work. “You can’t beat people into high-quality performance because productivity is not negotiable,” he said.

See: Do You Know the Next Big Driver for Corporate Productivity?

If people feel like they are being “messed with” they will stop producing or do the least amount of work to get by.  The reality today is that productivity is negotiable. An employee can negotiate today on the productivity and performance, they can deliver.

Every organisation is perfectly designed to get the results it achieves. Right now, business demand and educational system delivery are perfectly designed to create an environment where people are ignorant about other people’s capacity. We are fascinated by our own and not about anybody else.

Schneider adds:  “Anything that goes wrong in your organisation is because of the people – if people fail to do the right things in business – error of omission, error of doing the right thing at the wrong place, right thing but in a wrong sequence is a chronological error – all of these human errors exist because of people.”

“Human error doesn’t come from human error. It is a design mismatch between human capacity and demand. There are certain things that people can do and certain things that people cannot do.”

In order to close the productivity gap, your organization has to treat people with at least the same respect as you treat buildings and machines, using data to drive decisions. Even the most mundane tasks can be made enjoyable in a correct ecology.

To learn how to optimize performance and close the gap between what people can do is if they are inspired and what they do not to get fired, view the full video.

Also read: Do’s and Don’ts on Tracking Employee Productivity

Image credit: flickr.com