“Ah!  Looks like the dance of the living dead!” – Rodney Dangerfield, from the movie, “Caddyshack”.

Do you recall this line?  Do you feel that way when you walk through the halls at work?

While you may feel completely fulfilled in your work and life, most people in large organizations are weary and dazed, often feeling that they are selling their souls for a paycheck.

Travel back in time to 2008-09, when the financial markets unraveled and those who were sleep-walking behind shady leaders woke up to find they were unemployed and moving back in with their parents. Perhaps it was around that same time that only 30 percent of workers said they were satisfied with their jobs.

So, the real question for anyone is, “Have you become a zombie?”

Well, how do you define a zombie?

Zombies are people, sleep-walking through life, stuck between two worlds, the world of their true self and the world they experience at work. They stare into space, afraid of consequence, limited by rules they consider to be crazy. They go through the motions without emotion, feeling unseen and unheard. Yet, not too long ago, these same people were very much alive and happily contributing to the world around them.

Zombie checklist: Seven claims to help you determine if you have become a zombie:

1. Getting out of bed groaning about the day ahead.
2. Feeling chest tightness while getting dressed for work.
3. Don’t recall driving the kids to school.
4. Determining that you have no voice at work, so you may as well give up trying to share your ideas because it won’t matter anyway.
5. Running that familiar refrain around in your head, “take this job and shove it.”
6. Slapping your forehead with the palm of your hand – gesture is called a ‘face palm’ – multiple times a day when you realize it could have been you with that promotion if only you had played the game differently.
7. Wondering if you will ever be anything more than the position you hold now.
8. Can’t stomach the people you work with – especially or mainly – the boss.

If you answered “yes” to two or more of the above, you might be a zombie.

We have all been in organizations, walking through hallways where people fail to make eye contact, too busy and preoccupied with their importance – or maybe with the important stuff of life they can never manage. The biggest sign for me that I have entered a zombie company is this: no one is curious any more.

We have killed curiosity as surely as we have killed the truth.

I sat as an observer in a leadership team meeting last year where the entire six hours was spent on having really important leaders report out their activity.  People shook hands, smiled, said “good meeting,” and ran from the room to catch planes.  Sitting quietly on the sidelines, the new president of the company simply asked me, “what did you think?”

My response was, “no one asked a question. Not one.”

The reason we have killed engagement and encounter zombies is pretty simple. People have operated from fear so long that they have become protective, feeling they need to have answers and because we are all paid “to know stuff.” If we do stop long enough to ask a question, we are afraid of the answer.

Companies fall into patterns of behavior and interaction, just like families do.   When companies lack curiosity and focus only on efficiency, it’s easy for employees to operate on autopilot.  As the company spoon-feeds employees with the messages they have carefully crafted into company-speak, employees stare back with blank lifeless expressions.

In considering new definitions, we are also redefining what it means to have a company that is a creative bastion – a place where people challenge each other, make requests of each other instead of complaining, a place where people feel a true ownership of outcomes and shake things up to change the game of work.

Last month, I sat on the floor of the home of Sam Horn in Reston, VA, with a host of way cool people.  Sam is my writing coach and holds retreats for people who are up to a big game – Olympians, XGamers and professionals from all walks of life.  We present our ideas to each other and sort.  In my presentation, I introduced, “Revolution, Changing the Game of Work,” and several of the Generation Xers yawned, and Sam said, “put the manuscript down.”  Someone took it from my hand, and she said, “in a phrase say what you are doing now.” And I simply responded, “I work with an amazing team of coaches to bring people to life at work.” One of the younger people commented, “like zombies?”  And, from there the book was given a new life itself.

I welcome your comments, ideas and thoughts as we blog some of the components of that book here. We will open the dialogue about how to bring people back to life as zealots who are excited, fully conscious caretakers, ready to create a new game of work.

Join us, if you feel that “it’s time to wake up at work”.