Have you ever thought about how many of your policies and procedures exist because a few people broke the rules? In a similar way we all have to endure travel headaches because of the actions of a few individuals. Some policies, procedures and regulations are helpful in establishing expectations. Sometimes we go too far and instead of confronting and correcting the behaviors of a few, we look towards group meetings and more restrictive policies.
Commit or Omit?
The vast majority of bosses don’t intentionally want to make employees miserable – usually it happens completely by accident! Whether it is an act of ‘commission’ or an act of ‘omission’, the results can be destructive.
A front line supervisor, manager or team leader can make things better or worse, both with what they DO and what they DON’T do.
Supervisor – Salt, Sugar or Spice?
Salt has two primary functions related to food: Preservative and Seasoning. Many people, me included, find that a little bit of salt brings out the flavor of food. In the same way a front line supervisor or manager is responsible for bringing out the best in employees. The supervisor is also responsible for preserving the values of the organization.
Transparent or need to know basis?
How much information should a leader really share with employees? Some bosses are like Col. Jessup played by Jack Nicholson in A Few Good Men in thinking their employees “can’t handle the truth.”
Communication continues to be cited as a problem in nearly all organizations. Solving communication problems is kind of like finding a cure for the common cold. Instead of fixing it, we put up with the symptoms.
One of our clients measured the time it took for a juicy rumor to spread from the front office to the shipping dock. 20 minutes! And yet at the same time it can take months or years to deliver key management messages.
An organization with an over active grapevine tends to be one where the official lines of communication are either overly controlled or not plentiful enough in their sharing.
Many managers, supervisors and executives are overly guarded in what they communicate. Either this is because the manager feels it unnecessary to share information or thinks that employees need not concerns themselves with information seemingly irrelevant to their specific job function. Certainly leaders do need to be cautious when musing about what might happen down the road. However, when it comes to discussing present-day facts and past performance we encourage over communication. Employees have such a desire to know what is going on they will make up information if management isn’t communicating enough.
Putting the Ideas into Action
- Do you have information that employees would like to know? Is there a down side to sharing it? Would employees be more likely to help you achieve success if they knew more about what was going on? Then begin sharing more. When holding back information, ask yourself if there is a good reason to do so.
- Use all means available to you – town hall meetings, one on ones, emails, newsletters.
- Be prepared to repeat yourself. Key messages can take a long time to sink in so repetition will help.
- Observe how morale and attitude improves with more frequent communication about what is going on.
Making amends
Should a leader apologize when he or she makes a mistake, or is it a sign of weakness?
In the front line leadership course we have two case studies on balancing friendship and leadership. This is a unique situation faced by supervisors and team leaders who have been promoted from within. One case study deals with an employee who asks for special treatment from his supervisor. The second describes a supervisor who was known to be an employee who broke the rules.
The question is, should the new supervisor with a questionable past try to ignore, cover up or make excuses for her previous behavior?
Employees have pretty good BS detectors and they are looking for transparency from their manager or supervisor. They can quickly tell when their boss is trying to pull a fast one on them.
Recently I have coached three senior leaders on how to say it like it is and even be prepared to apologize when they have made the wrong decision or breached someone’s trust.
For the newly appointed supervisor with the questionable past it is time to own up to those previous transgressions as a stepping stone to developing a respectful, transparent relationship with her workgroup.
Putting the Ideas into Action
- If you are in a leadership role and have made mistakes or breached trust then own up to it. You will gain credibility and respect from your employees.
- Instead of trying to project a stoic, unemotional leadership style why not let your guard down a bit and be more approachable. Being more ‘real’ with your employees can create a better sense of teamwork.
- Remember that employees have good BS detectors and that means you should say it like it is even when the message is painful.
Employees who feel entitled
What do you do with an employee who thinks she deserves a raise or a promotion but there is one thing holding her back – her attitude? Frequently the entitled employee is in a state of denial. Any attempt to confront and correct the attitude is met with contempt. In her own mind, she thinks she is untouchable.
An attitude of entitlement can form when employees become conditioned to think that they will receive positive reinforcements without having to earn it through their performance. If their current manager or a series of previous managers have been reluctant to confront the problem, the employee may feel entitled or justified in their behavior.
From the Employee’s Perspective
The entitled employee in his own mind often sees the world from a different perspective. He may think everyone around him (including his manager) as less competent than he is. He thinks that if it wasn’t for him, the whole place would fall apart. And he feels that it is his duty to point out the flaws of others.
An attitude of superiority may have been with them since the individual entered the workforce or it may have been cultivated from working for a manager who reinforced that behavior. The employee may have felt overlooked when they didn’t get a promotion or job opening that was posted.
A victim mentality only serves to perpetuate the employee’s perception that the world is against her. A low sense of self-esteem is an underlying cause and makes the employee fragile when confronted. It isn’t unusual for this employee to break down emotionally when confronted by their manager which causes many managers to avoid the subject.
The good news is that there is hope. This mindset can be turned around. It requires action from the manager.
Attitude is a Performance Problem
Managers are sometimes reluctant to confront an attitude problem with the same vigor as other performance issues. One employee’s negativity can poison the productivity of the workgroup.
Because the manager doesn’t necessarily have to be around the negative employee it can be easy to avoid the person. Unfortunately co-workers do not have the same opportunity to retreat. Therefore unabated, the culture of the workgroup becomes poisoned.
Putting the Ideas into Action
- Prevent an attitude of entitlement to establish itself by reinforcing desired results AND behavior.
- Provide coaching as soon as possible when an attitude issue becomes apparent.
- If coaching fails to improve the situation consider using progressive discipline to apply negative consequences.
- If attitude improves, provide positive feedback and encouragement.
- If attitude tends to relapse after a few weeks or months, then deal with that pattern in a coaching or correcting conversation.
Caught in the Chaos?
A manager or supervisor’s job should be easier. After all, as long as you have the right people, the right materials, the right information and the right equipment, everything goes smoothly. For most of us this fairy tale scenario only happens on occasion. The rest of the time we are scrambling because one or two of the success elements is missing.
In fact it would be easy to simply react to whatever happens and never look past the immediate requirements.
Unfortunately this also means that the supervisor or manager never feels a sense that they are winning or moving the organization forward. And the employees never see a picture of where their leader is trying to take them.
Sports psychologists who work with elite athletes use a powerful technique that might help you in your leadership role.
The athlete will be asked to envision success – sinking the winning putt at the Masters or winning the Grand Slam of Tennis or hoisting the MVP trophy at the World Series. Then the sports psychologist will ask the high-potential athlete to imagine that they are looking back from that triumphant moment to today. They are asked to see what the steps would have been in order to achieve that ultimate success. Inevitably they will have needed good coaches, personal discipline, opportunities to compete and a track record of success.
In a similar way the supervisor or manager can imagine their department, division or company as he or she would like it to be. Crystallizing that vivid picture can help the manager look beyond todays hassles and frustration and towards a more exciting and powerful future.
Getting out of reaction mode and setting a powerful vision for yourself and your team will pay big dividends in terms of results, personal satisfaction and employee engagement.
Putting it into action
- List all of the hassles and frustrations you encounter on a regular basis.
- Describe your department in the future where those hassles have melted away and your vision has been achieved.
- Think about the steps that would need to be taken to get there.
- Keep that picture in your mind as you move forward.
- Even when you find yourself going in circles because of today’s circumstances, realize that your vision is becoming closer to being a reality.
- Watch how your team responds to your vision and helps you achieve it.
- Feel the sense of satisfaction that comes from a job well done.
Teamwork requires conflict
If the title of this article makes you scratch your head, consider for a few minutes the concept that a strong team with a high degree of trust requires its members to challenge one another.
Ian Thomas, a professional speaker from South Africa was using the illustration of a pride of lions and the lessons we could learn in terms of our workplace teams.
A few observations:
- Studies show that as little as 5% of employees actually understand the goals they are supposed to pursue. There is a pretty good chance then that your team is not pulling in the same direction.
- Strong teams require strong individuals. Thomas suggests that every member of a lion pride has a job to do – some protect territory, some chase prey towards other members who go in for the kill. If any one of the team members is weak it automatically causes other team members to mistrust them because they are not helping advance towards the objective.
- The team must challenge one another in order to make absolutely sure that they trust one another to pursue the goal together.
The conflict comes when the team debates the goal, makes sure they understand it completely and are totally committed to achieving the goal. They also have to challenge one another to bring 100% of themselves to the pursuit of the goal.
By not challenging one another in a work team, it might at first appear that everything is ‘okay’ with the team. In reality a team that loses confidence in itself and what the goal is will also breed mistrust and ultimately performance will suffer.
Putting it into action
- Instead of assuming the team understands the goal – clarify it, debate it and ensure complete understanding.
- Challenge each member of the team to be the absolute best at what they do and make sure you hire people who can perform to your expectations.
- Encourage conflict be having the team challenge one another to be the best they can be.
Misdirected by metrics?
You’ve likely heard the expression, “What get’s measured, gets managed.”
And yet, if you pay attention to the wrong metrics or measurements, it can distract both management and employees from desired behaviors.
Metrics provide management with the key information needed to make decisions and assess performance in the business. Paying attention to the wrong metrics or confusing people with too many metrics can cause undesirable actions that actually work against the very goals you are trying to reach in the business.
Consider lean manufacturing as an example. Achieving lean can be in contradiction with the typical ways you measure efficiency. Lean is about reducing waste and making product in lock-step with customer demand. Old metrics might encourage a production manager to run excess product in order to drive down unit cost when that product will end up in the warehouse tying up working capital. Instead you want the production manager to figure out how to run smaller and smaller batch sizes to avoid work-in-process inventory.
It can be confusing enough for employees to understand what is expected of them without adding to the confusion with measures that incentify them to do the opposite of what senior management really wants.
If you are measuring so many things that no one can figure out the really important metrics, it might be time to stop measuring certain elements.
If there is no time to manage all the things you measure, why measure them?
Putting it Into Action
- Based on where you are trying to take your organization, decide which metrics will provide the feedback you need to make better decisions.
- Consider the value of some measurements – what does it cost to track that information and what decisions get made from it?
- Consider the unintended consequences that might be created by paying attention to certain metrics.
Hiding behind your keyboard?
For all the productivity improvements technology has brought us, there is a dark side and it is impacting employee engagement and management effectiveness.
I’m talking about the tendency to send emails instead of going and talking to people.
In extreme cases it might even be to the person in the office or cubical next door.
With technology, it has become easy to avoid talking to people. Even cell phone providers are noticing that subscribers aren’t using many voice minutes, preferring instead to send texts and emails. For a manager, the use of technology can create an illusion of productivity and leave behind a wake of destruction in terms of engagement and less than stellar results.
Email isn’t a problem when dealing with facts and figures. It is a problem when dealing with conflict, persuasion and criticism. You may have been on the receiving end of a caustic email, or perhaps caught in the cross fire between two colleagues trying to out do one another with criticism. Hopefully you haven’t been the sender of this type of communication.
One of the exercises in our front line leadership course is reflecting on a communication situation in which you feel uncomfortable. Some of the most frequent responses:
- Delivering bad news
- Dealing with authority figures
- Communicating with negative people
The discomfort leads to avoidance and makes it easier to type out an email instead of doing the right thing – going to talk to the person. Yes it takes longer and it could get a little messy and yet it is the only way to achieve the results you are looking for.
Putting it Into Action
- When you are avoiding a conversation, stop yourself from sending the email and go talk to the person.
- Before you send criticism by email and copy everyone in the organization – stop and go talk to the person.
- Before you hit ‘reply to all’ and send back a zinger to someone who maligned you, stop and go talk to the person.
Need help to be able to have those uncomfortable conversations with people – come take our courses…
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