NCAA Tournament - Helping or Hindering Performance?

You’ve likely seen much in the media addressing how the NCAA tournament affects productivity – positively or negatively – like here, here, and here!

So, does it help or hinder productivity and performance?

Achieving higher levels of employee engagement and developing a high-performance culture are a focus of my work with clients. Does March Madness help or hinder employee engagement and performance? I can say – it depends. It’s a clear-cut answer for every organization. Company cultures are like snowflakes, no two are ever the same, and thus neither are the impacts of events such as these on productivity and performance. There are many factors involved.

So how do you measure the potential impacts of employees engaging in events like the NCAA tournament?

First – what are your data points? This varies for each organization. It could be sales numbers, lead generation; customer service outreach, goals and deadlines met, or maybe even the amount of output from your organization. But you need to set clear data points to determine a baseline – are you gaining or losing productivity? Is engagement going up, down, or the same?

Second – what are you comparing it to? You need a true apples-to-apples comparison. For example – the tournament is roughly 19 days. Find a time period that is comparable to this time of year or create a similar event – create your same data points – and sit back and watch it unfold.

Third – what is the network effect? For the NCAA tournament to hinder or help productivity and team performance, you need to pay attention to the network effect. Does this informal interaction reduce stress and increase engagement, helping teams work better together? Are you seeing more collaboration and innovation amongst your employees? Do such activities promote a better overall working environment and improved employee experience?

The fact of the matter is…you can read as many articles as you want to convince yourself whether these types of activities help or hinder your productivity and performance (or you can say screw it – I like college basketball – and do it anyway.) But the reality is you’re never going to know until you test it in your organization.

I was asked by a client if I’d help test this scenario with their organization – to provide them with data on how the tournament is affecting their productivity over the next few weeks. An informal and fun little experiment. The team is the project management office (PMO) at a consumer packaged goods (CPG) organization with lots of goals and deadlines to achieve in a short amount of time. So this should provide an intriguing example.

Now…let the “madness” commence!

About Scott Span, MSOD, CSM, ACC: is CEO at Tolero Solutions. As a people strategist, leadership coach, and change and transformation specialist, his work is focused on people. Through his consulting and training work he supports clients to survive and thrive through change and transition and create people-focused cultures and a great employee experience. Through his coaching work, he supports people willing to dig deeper to identify and overcome what’s holding them back, change behaviors, accelerate performance and achieve their goals.

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