Work as a product: a new paradigm to increase employee satisfaction and motivation

Interviewer: Today, I'm interviewing Mr. Dart Lindsley on his article jointly authored with Eric Anicich, Reimagining Work as a Product, published in the November-December 2024 issue of Harvard Business Review. The focus of this interview is summed up in the strap line to the article's title. If companies listen to employees the way they do customers, they can increase retention and engagement. Listeners are expected to have read the article before listening. Mr. Lindsley is the Founder of 11fold and a former Head of Global Process Excellence for People Operations at Google. His bio and details of other senior positions he has held accompany this interview. Mr. Lindsley, thank you for sparing the time. I want to go immediately to the implications of what you've written and assume a wish to try it out. You write of managers doing and not doing, but managers are also employees. Let's go to the people involved in the business who are not employees. The non-executive directors and shareholders, the owners. What should they do and perhaps more importantly, not do, to test applying this approach in a business without betting the farm? Mr. Lindsley. Mr. Lindsley: The premise of the article, which I'll just state briefly, is that work is a product and employees are customers who buy it.