Knowledge workers refer to mental workers who have strong knowledge learning ability and knowledge innovation ability, and can make full use of modern scientific and technological knowledge to improve work efficiency, that is, people who have intellectual capital property rights and add value with knowledge as the carrier, and the value created by brain is higher than that created by physical strength. In the new economic era, information is an important resource for production, operation and enterprise development, which can only be obtained through people. In this sense, people have become more important special resources than capital and non-renewable resources. As the carrier of enterprise knowledge, the importance of knowledge workers is self-evident. Therefore, developing the ability and potential of knowledge workers has become an important task and purpose of management activities. After China's entry into WTO, the economic development and globalization require enterprises to grow and develop continuously, and the focus of competition between enterprises' economic management lies in the knowledge workers in the knowledge and information technology complex. The most important thing for enterprises to enhance their core competitiveness is the management of knowledge workers.
First, the common problems in the process of knowledge-based employee management
Facing the increasingly fierce market competition, especially after China's entry into WTO, it is facing the dual challenges of domestic counterparts and powerful international competitors. Whether we can train and build a knowledge-based workforce with sufficient quantity and guaranteed quality as soon as possible to meet the needs of competition is related to the survival and development of enterprises. However, there are still many problems in the management of knowledge workers in most enterprises.
1. Did not really understand the characteristics and uniqueness of knowledge workers. In management, our enterprises often treat knowledge workers and ordinary employees equally, and their personality and characteristics are not respected, which leads to their potential not being stimulated and even brain drain.
2. Did not really pay attention to the important role of knowledge workers. In the new economic era, knowledge workers with knowledge are the most important resources of enterprises. Without them, enterprises have no core competitiveness. Only by giving full play to their abilities can enterprises be in an invincible position in the fierce competition.
3. The management mode of knowledge workers is still very simple, with traditional "control and command" and material incentives as the mainstay, lacking an efficient and scientific performance evaluation system, a comprehensive incentive system and an appropriate distribution system.
4. Insufficient investment and waste of resources coexist in human resource management. Although many enterprises deeply realize the importance of human resources, especially knowledge-based employees, in practice, many enterprises have not invested enough money, manpower, material resources and time in human resources management with the purpose of "doing more with less money". At the same time, precious resources are not used for important incentives for knowledge workers, but wasted on daily egalitarian personnel management.
Second, the personality and characteristics of knowledge workers in the new era
In the final analysis, the reason why our enterprises have great deficiencies in the management of knowledge-based employees is because they don't know enough about the characteristics of knowledge-based employees. Therefore, we must fully understand and master the characteristics of knowledge workers.
1. Knowledge workers have high professional skills and continuous learning ability.
Knowledge-based employees often receive a good and systematic professional education, have higher academic qualifications, and master certain professional knowledge and skills. At the same time, most of them have high personal quality, rich knowledge and broad vision. At the same time, the knowledge of knowledge workers is not static, they have a strong desire to update knowledge and excellent continuous learning ability. In the ever-changing environment, the ability of continuous learning is the most fundamental advantage of knowledge workers.
2. Knowledge workers have low loyalty to the enterprise and strong desire for mobility.
Knowledge workers have a strong sense of self, and they are committed to their own careers rather than the enterprises they serve. Even if knowledge workers leave a specific enterprise, they can get employment or start their own businesses by virtue of their excellent professional knowledge and skills, and realize their own value again. Therefore, they have a strong desire for mobility, which poses a severe challenge to enterprises. Therefore, enterprises should strengthen the risk management of employee turnover and enhance the loyalty of knowledge workers.
3. Knowledge workers have strong innovation ability and strategic thinking ability.
Innovation ability is the most important feature of knowledge workers. What can create value for enterprises is their innovative ability, which is incomparable to ordinary people. Knowledge workers are not engaged in simple mechanical work, but give full play to their personal qualifications and inspiration in a changeable and uncertain environmental system, respond to various possible situations, promote technological progress and scientific and technological development, constantly update products and services, and create great value for enterprises. Because of the key role of knowledge workers in enterprise development, they should have certain strategic thinking ability, so as to discover the truth in the complex market environment and make their innovation accepted by practice.
4. It is difficult to directly monitor the working process of knowledge workers, and it is also difficult to measure the working results.
The performance and value evaluation of knowledge workers is complex and uncertain, and their work process often has no fixed flow and steps, but presents great randomness and subjective dominance. Therefore, their labor performance measurement, the determination of individual labor results and team labor results, the correlation between salary and performance, the internal combination and diversion of knowledge workers, performance analysis and so on. All of them have challenged the traditional enterprise evaluation.
5. Knowledge workers enjoy a high degree of autonomy and independence because of their knowledge capital.
Knowledge workers have a strong sense of engaging in an activity independently. Because they have knowledge of the means of production and some special skills, relying on this guarantee, they tend to prefer an independent working environment, not only unwilling to be controlled by things, but even unable to stand the remote command of superiors, emphasizing self-guidance in their work, unwilling to obey orders and be controlled by others. They need the trust and support of enterprises, full authorization and a certain scope of activities. Dead rules and regulations can only suppress their creativity and work inspiration.
6. In the team of knowledge workers, the boundary between the leader and the led is blurred, and everyone tends to be equal.
The two sides are both interactive and role replacement. In enterprises, the effectiveness of leadership lies in understanding this interaction and consciously managing this dynamic. Communication, concern, trust, commitment, support, innovation, learning, cooperation, etc. Are the guidelines for managing knowledge workers. In the knowledge-based staff team, everyone is equal, which is beneficial to their effective interaction and mutual learning, and is also beneficial to the interests of the organization.
7. Knowledge-based employees make great contributions to enterprise value and have high expectations for their own value returns.
Their internal demand model is mixed demand. Although material treatment is a low-level demand, it is now a sign of a person's social prestige and has become satisfaction at the level of achievement. From this point of view, the current demand level is completely mixed demand. It is the individual needs of knowledge workers that require enterprise human resources management to continuously provide personalized human resources services for customers.
8. Knowledge workers pay more attention to spirit and achievement motivation.
Their material requirements are not particularly urgent. In the incentive structure of knowledge workers, the proportion of achievement incentive and spiritual incentive is far greater than that of material incentives such as money. So they are more eager to see their growth, the right to work freely and the fruits of their work. They expect their work to be more meaningful and contribute to the enterprise. Therefore, achievement itself is a better incentive for them, while traditional incentives such as money and promotion take second place. Moreover, due to the high concern for self-worth, knowledge workers also pay special attention to the evaluation of others, organizations and society, and strongly hope to be recognized and respected by society.
Third, the management strategy that enterprises should implement.
It is precisely because knowledge workers have the above characteristics that enterprises should emphasize the following strategies when implementing management:
1. Enterprises should follow the management concept of "people-oriented, respecting human nature", give knowledge workers room to fully realize their personal values, take "people-oriented, respecting human nature" as the modern management concept, and emphasize that the ultimate goal of management-improving the economic benefits of enterprises is behind people. Management behavior is no longer a cold imperative behavior, but runs through the whole process of encouragement, trust, care and consideration. Managers can't regard knowledge workers as simple "economic men" and only meet their survival needs and material interests. On the contrary, they should pay attention to their high-level spiritual needs, such as respect and self-realization, in order to provide creative work, encourage the development of personality and arouse their enthusiasm. In equal guidance and communication, establish the business philosophy of the enterprise; Turn external control into self-control, trust employees and fully empower them, so that knowledge-based employees can spontaneously form a sense of loyalty and responsibility to the enterprise, and then realize their personal value and the unity with the survival and development of the enterprise.
2. Fully respect the personality of knowledge workers and establish learning individuals and organizations.
Excellent employees with creative potential often have strong personalities, or the creativity of excellent employees is often contained in their unique and distinctive personalities. Knowledge workers full of personality charm are the most precious capital of enterprises and the source of innovation and development of enterprises.
To attract personalized knowledge workers, besides respecting their individuality, it is more important to enhance the charm of the enterprise itself. It is an effective way for enterprises and knowledge workers to build learning organizations and individuals together. Cultivating learning organizations and individuals is not only conducive to enhancing the core competitiveness of enterprises, but also determines the effect of knowledge creation, dissemination and application, and has a positive effect on improving the personal quality and ability of knowledge-based employees, so the attraction of enterprises to knowledge-based employees is greatly increased.
3. Establish a scientific assessment mechanism and strengthen the effective management of knowledge workers.
Knowledge workers have strong creativity and contribution to enterprises, and their working environment is complex and difficult to monitor, so it is necessary to evaluate the performance of knowledge workers effectively with scientific methods. Only when knowledge workers know their own work results can they realize their achievement motivation. Enterprises should break away from egalitarianism and gradually form an institutionalized, scientific, practical and adaptive evaluation mechanism with employee performance evaluation as the main body.
(1) It is necessary to grasp the comprehensive and practical evaluation scale and enhance the evaluation value. In the evaluation of enterprise human resources, the assessed should be evaluated from four angles, namely, direct leadership, self-evaluation, parallel departments of the assessed departments and company superiors. According to the different weights of four aspects, an all-round assessment system is formed, which reflects rationality and comprehensiveness. At the same time, in the design of assessment indicators, the assessment of knowledge workers generally includes three aspects: work attitude, work ability and work performance. (2) Combining qualitative and quantitative evaluation methods to enhance the operability and accuracy of evaluation.
(3) From performance appraisal to performance management, grasp the new trend of knowledge-based employee management. Performance management is an idea and method to improve the probability of success by managing people. This is a continuous communication process. Different from performance appraisal, performance management is people-centered, paying attention not only to the result goal, but also to the behavior goal.
4. Enterprises must determine a comprehensive salary distribution system to fully motivate knowledge workers.
For knowledge workers, satisfactory salary does not simply mean high income, but also includes many things other than money. As analyzed by Fortune magazine, once people reach a certain level of material satisfaction, they will pay more attention to self-realization and a satisfactory working environment. Therefore, enterprises must realize a comprehensive salary strategy, that is, the salary paid by enterprises to knowledge workers is divided into external and internal parts. External compensation mainly provides quantifiable monetary value for knowledge workers. For example, short-term incentive salary such as basic salary and bonus, monetary benefits such as pension and medical insurance, and other monetary expenses paid by the company, such as housing subsidies. Intrinsic reward refers to various non-monetary incentives. For example, job satisfaction, providing various convenient tools to complete the work, training opportunities, cooperative working environment, and the company's recognition and gratitude to individuals. External salary and internal salary must be closely combined and coordinated to form a complete salary system. Only in this way can we better meet the comprehensive needs of knowledge workers and truly retain talents.
5. Strengthen the management of new employee relations and establish a new strategic partnership.
Today, the relationship between knowledge workers and organizations has undergone tremendous changes. The relationship between employees and enterprises is no longer the traditional unequal employer-employee relationship, but a more equal partnership. Knowledge workers are both employees and owners of enterprises. Knowledge workers can provide "capital"-intellectual capital through technology, patents and other knowledge, just like fund providers. This change has transformed the relationship between knowledge workers and employers into a strategic partnership. As strategic partners, knowledge workers should have a substantive say in improving the working environment and adjusting the work content, whether they are solving immediate problems or planning the future work nature. As the direct creators of wealth, knowledge workers should also share their success with investors and participate in the distribution of surplus value. Knowledge workers should also share decision-making power with enterprise decision makers. Transparent and democratic decision-making makes knowledge workers feel valued and respected, which helps to improve morale. Therefore, this is a brand-new employee relationship management.
6. Create a good "soft environment" and enhance the cohesion of knowledge workers.
Good soft environment, attach importance to human feelings and emotional input, and give employees family-style emotional comfort. Providing "soft welfare" for knowledge workers-the convenience of further coordinating the relationship between work and life. This kind of welfare makes the enterprise become the human family in their minds, pays attention to strengthening the connection between people, and allows managers to listen to the voices of employees and all kinds of opinions and suggestions on the enterprise. In a word, knowledge workers have a strong demand for respect. Managers should often go deep into their subordinates, have equal dialogues, often participate in various collective activities, strengthen interpersonal communication, and build the enterprise into a big family full of affection, so that knowledge workers have a strong sense of belonging, rather than being marginalized by the organization.
7. Comprehensively strengthen the stress management of knowledge workers to ensure their physical and mental health.
"Water stirs up rocks, but people stir up ambitions". A certain pressure is the source of power. Without pressure, there is no power. To form moderate pressure on knowledge workers, we can first give them challenging jobs. Compared with ordinary employees, knowledge workers pay more attention to the realization of their own values. They are not satisfied with passively completing general tasks, but pursuing perfect results. They regard overcoming difficulties as a pleasure and a way to realize their own value. Of course, this is also a potential stress. Second, giving knowledge-based employees more responsibility and trust, trusting and respecting knowledge-based employees, and letting them take on greater responsibilities will inevitably form a kind of pressure.
At the same time, we should also actively alleviate the work pressure of knowledge workers. They are engaged in creative work, often high-intensity mental work, and excessive pressure will have very negative consequences. Therefore, in order to relieve and release the pressure of knowledge workers, it is necessary to establish a good communication mechanism, including communication in the team and communication between superiors and subordinates, and gradually realize seamless communication. Good team communication can share knowledge, supplement information exchange and enhance team cohesion. At the same time, we should create a corporate culture and atmosphere of cooperation and progress, and work in mutual cooperation and influence. Without the support of colleagues, knowledge workers will feel lonely and bear great pressure alone, so it is necessary to form a corporate culture, form a team with complementary skills and enhance the sense of teamwork.
In short, in contrast to the personality and characteristics of knowledge workers, we must organically combine humanized management with scientific control, and put forward more scientific management methods and measures to maximize the personal value of employees and achieve organizational goals.
Reporter of this website: Yong Cheng