One Gene Modification

I recently read an article by Carolyn Y. Johnson in The Washington Post about the latest research that may possibly explain why humans survived thrived thousands and thousands of years ago when other hominins like Neanderthals did not. It is based on a study that was published recently in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. If you are fascinated with human development like I am, it is a very interesting read. The link to the article is at the end of this post.

Here's the snapshot of the article. Geneticists at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany have been looking for clues that would explain why humans survived and thrived when other hominins did not. One part of the research has recently focused on one gene – ADSL. One part of the gene ADSL that is present in humans today was not present in the other hominins that did not survive. It is also not present in chimpanzees today. Scientists wondered if slight mutations (changes) in the ADSL gene gave us a cognitive evolutionary advantage over other hominins.

There is still tons of research left to do, but the article started me thinking about small changes at work that have the potential to create dynamic changes in people, products, and performance. I think about Continuous Improvement and how it transformed manufacturing and then business in general in the 1970’s, 1980’s, and 1990’s. At the core of Continuous Improvement is a simple cycle – PDCA - Plan, Do, Check, Act. I think about how one simple idea created the team model that has dominated the workplace for over 50 years. That one simple idea – The people that do the work every day know the problems, and they also know how to fix them.

The article also made me think about the decline in employee engagement today and how to reverse the trend. The summary of The Gallup 2025 US Employee Engagement Update by Dr. Jim Harter identified what many of us already know intuitively – employee engagement is declining. Only 31% of people who responded to the survey said they were engaged. Of the 12 engagement elements that people scored in the survey, the three that were most troubling were these:

• Clarity of expectations. Just 46% of employees clearly know what is expected of them at work, down 10 points from a high of 56% in March 2020.
• Feeling someone at work cares about them as a person. Currently, 39% of employees feel strongly that someone cares about them, a drop from 47% in March 2020. 

• Someone encouraging their development. Only 30% strongly agree that someone at work encourages their development, down from 36% in March 2020.

 These results mean that over 50% of the survey responders were not clear about what is expected of them. Over 60% of survey responders did not feel strongly that someone cared about them as a person at work, and 70% of survey responders did not feel strongly that someone was encouraging their development.

These are troubling trends. 

But there is one mutation (change) that may be able to address lack of clarity, no one cares about me, and no one is focused on my development. Get rid of performance reviews and replace them with growth mapping.  

https://www.washingtonpost.com/science/2025/08/04/neanderthal-human-brain-chemistry-difference/

https://www.gallup.com/workplace/654911/employee-engagement-sinks-year-low.aspx