Tag: management

team of business people meeting with female leader manager project colleague coworker

Why You Need to Let Your Team Go

Taylor Stauffer Leave a comment

Unless you’ve been living under a rock these last years, you’ll have heard about the phenomenon known as ‘helicopter parenting’. These are parents who won’t let their children experience failure of any kind.

In the business world, this is known as micro-managing. “Micromanagement is a management style whereby a manager closely observes and/or controls the work of his/her subordinates or employees.”

In fact, leading a team isn’t all that different from parenting. Not that team members are children nor should they be treated as such, but stick with my analogy for a moment and you’ll see where I’m going.

Avoiding being a bottleneck requires some planning

CEOs and top flight managers are often concerned with two issues:

  1. The amount of time they have to get tasks done that don’t relate to people management (which is often not enough!)—an issue every parent can relate to particularly when fights among siblings are a daily occurrence.
  2. Not becoming a bottleneck to work getting done.

The result is that in the aim of not becoming the bottleneck, they become too available to their team. Like the parent who is forever picking up after the older child who should know better, the analogic results for a leader or manager is that is that they a) don’t have enough time for point 1 and b) the team doesn’t learn to operate on their own.

Your team members must be set up to make decisions on their own, and fail if necessary. That is a far more valuable learning process than constantly stepping in to help them avoid all the pitfalls. Mentoring a team doesn’t necessarily mean making all the decisions for them and simply expecting them to execute; it means helping them find a way to making those decisions on their own.

Setting team members up to decide, not to fail

The previous point isn’t meant to say that you as a leader should set team members up to fail. Rather, you need to equip them with all the necessary tools and information so that they can make decisions without you. Non-helicopter parents do it all the time: they give their kids a certain level of freedom and the rules that surround that and let them go to it. As a leader, you need to think the same way with your team.

This means:

  • Clearly establishing the parameters and scope of their authority;
  • Encouraging creative solutions, even if they ultimately don’t work out, by not punishing failures;
  • Reviewing decisions on a regular basis as a team and seeing where improvements can be made, so that the review becomes a learning process for all.

Give team members some free range

The opposite to being a helicopter parent is being a free range parent. That is: “… raising children in the spirit of encouraging them to function independently and with limited parental supervision, in accordance of their age of development and with a reasonable acceptance of realistic personal risks”

Apply that to your team too: block off time to be available to your team but also block off time where you’re not. Whether that’s because you’re in conference or otherwise occupied, there are teams that will gravitate to always asking for your input because they don’t feel comfortable making decisions or have simply fallen into the habit.

Like the parent who wants their kids to be more independent over time, your team needs to be more independent and get into the habit of making a judgment call as to whether you really need to be brought into the decision in advance or whether it would be enough to fill you in later, at a pre-scheduled meeting.

A little trial and error where the errors don’t result in punishment will help your team to function on their own a little more, freeing up some of your time to focus on other priorities.

If you think about it, looking at the development of your team as a work in progress, as parents do with their children, you will be able to clearly see when they need a little boosting and encouragement and when they should be allowed to fly on their own. Giving your team independence is good for their development and feeling of accomplishment and it’s also good for your own satisfaction in your role. You can rest easy knowing that you’ve equipped them for the job you’re asking them to perform.

Sources: Wikipedia ;Wikipedia ; Wikipedia

How to Lead From a Distance

Taylor Stauffer Leave a comment

How do you provide a sense of purpose to your team when face to face interaction isn’t an option?

 

The importance of having regular meetings with team members can’t be overstated. Whether it’s to give feedback (positive and negative) or just to ‘check in’, much has been written about why this is important for overall team health, as well as individual job satisfaction and effectiveness.

Depending on the nature of the business, you could have staff that are working at a distance, or even a team scattered over a large geographic area, making connecting in person very difficult, if not impossible. So how can you authentically empower your team members from a distance and not have them roll their eyes at you?

 

1. Be clear on your purpose, as a team

If everyone is clear about what you are working towards and what the values are of the organization, it’s easier to motivate people, even from far away. When people are scattered, they need to feel that unifying purpose and they can’t do that if they don’t understand what the team is all about.

If everyone is clear about their roles and responsibilities, to each other, to the project and to you / the organization, they can get on with their work with a sense of confidence that they’re on the right track. Then it’s up to you to make sure they retain that feeling.

 

2. Keep in touch

Out of sight, out of mind: you might be tempted to push off the effort to keep in touch with each individual team member simply because you don’t see them every day. It’s easy to say that you don’t have the time and that you’ll do it next week. However, leading by example is essential to distance teamwork being effective. Reaching out regularly to each person individually also needs to be a part of your routine, as it would be in an office environment. It shows respect, commitment, interest in your team members, and enhances their trust of you. Hopefully, they will appreciate and even replicate the behavior with others.

More often than not, this will require a formal communication strategy, at least at first. Processes by which team members check in with you and you check in with them. Everyone works differently and so work with your team members in a way that is authentic to them. If a daily meeting is too much, drop it to weekly. Not everyone ‘needs’ to check in daily to feel included and empowered to get the job done. Others may need that support at least at first.

 

3. Don’t skip the small talk

Conference calls and video conference meetings are the norms for teams that don’t work in the same space, but often, they’re fairly regimented in the aim of not wasting anyone’s time. Fair enough, but there is a lot of ‘team building’ and morale-boosting that goes on during water cooler chats. It’s in these more informal interactions that you, and others, can learn each other’s non-verbal cues and idiosyncrasies. Replicating that in a Skype call isn’t necessarily easy but the person leading the meeting sets the tone for it and should make time for a little small talk at the beginning or end of the meeting. After all, you know what they say about all work and no play!

Another aspect is celebrations! Yes, celebrating a birthday, milestone, or project success at a distance can be tough but technology is there to make it easier. Such as? Send a package to each team member in advance that contains a treat, with instructions not to open it until the video conference scheduled for the celebration day. Then you can all open them together and celebrate! It may seem silly but it’s in these little ways that you can build a solid community, even miles and miles apart!

 

4. Open door policy

Make sure that your team knows when they can reach you freely, in the same way as they would in an office environment. If you were in the same space, they’d be able to see whether your office door was open or closed or have a sense of whether you are in the middle of a crisis issue and can’t break.

At a distance, those cues are gone, so creating a calendar with blocks of time when you’re available makes sense. Like a professor who has posted office hours, you can let your team know that they can always reach you but that X, Y and Z time slots are the best!

 

5. Focus on the outcomes and the effort

Unlike an employee whose desk is right outside your office, you can’t really observe or track how much effort a remote employee is making. Frankly, you shouldn’t be micromanaging an employee right in front of you that way either, but that’s another blog post!

Instead, focus on the outcomes. Are they delivering their projects/work on time? Is the work well done or does it seem rushed and incomplete? If they’re doing good work and they’re doing it on time, that’s what matters! If not, that needs to be dealt with too, so that other team members aren’t left feeling like that person isn’t pulling their weight.

 

Key to all of these efforts is authenticity. You have to believe in what you’re doing, and your team, in order to reach them. Going through the motions isn’t enough. Trust in the people you work with, show them what you expect and walk with them along the path. Even at a distance, thanks to technology, you can do all of these things and do them well.

 

 

Tips for Making Sure Your Performance Reviews Are Productive

Tips for Making Sure Your Performance Reviews Are Productive

Shannon Cassidy Leave a comment

Performance reviews are a staple of many company’s management strategies, but they aren’t always helpful. If not properly done, they can become homogenous and their insights insignificant. If you’re in human resources or management, here are five tips that will help make sure your performance reviews are useful for both your company and its employees.

Make Time for Performance Reviews

Performance reviews are often neglected because there’s not time to complete them. They’re another task that managers must complete, but time is rarely devoted specifically to them. Managers are forced to fit performance reviews into already hectic schedules. What should be meaningful conversations become five-minute meetings that take place between (or even during) other tasks.

A year, or even six months, of work can’t adequately be assessed in five minutes. If performance reviews are to provide individualized insights into employees’ performance, there must be time specifically set aside for them. Consider giving managers a half hour to an hour that’s solely to meet with an employee and discuss how they’re doing. If managers will still be tempted to shortchange the time, give them funds to go out for lunch with each employee. Conducting a review during a meal will ensure that there’s adequate time.

Speak About Specific Situations

Just as you want to hear about specific instances from interviewees, managers should speak of specific situations when conducting performance reviews. Every item on a review should be supported by a specific example. What employees do well should be precisely detailed, along with the exact things they can do to improve.

Keep Ongoing Notes to Reference

Performance reviews are meant to cover a specified amount of time, often either six months or a year. Many times, however, only the weeks immediately preceding a review are assessed. It’s too difficult to remember everything an employee did over several months or a year, especially when managing multiple employees.

In order to accurately assess an employee over the entire duration of a review, managers should keep ongoing notes on all of the employees they oversee. While employees in your company may already be written up for serious errors, managers should also keep notes on the good things that employees do. These notes will help form the foundation of a comprehensive review, and they can provide specific examples for the review.

Suggest Ways to Improve

Performance reviews shouldn’t just be about what the employee has done in the past. They should also give the employee ways to improve in the future. When critiquing, don’t just be critical. Be constructive. Help employees identify ways they can improve, and offer to help them as they strive for those goals.  Although there may be some negative items on a review, offering constructive ways to improve will give employees hope that they can get a better review in the future.

Have Two-Way Conversations

Performance reviews are much more productive when employees are actively engaged. To encourage employees to take part, turn reviews into two-way conversations rather than one-way monologues. Even if you don’t want to debate an employee’s review with them, they should at least have an opportunity to ask questions and explain their personal goals.

Don’t let your company’s performance reviews become a mere formality that managers squeeze in. Instead, make sure they’re a valuable part of your company’s management strategy by making time for them, speaking about specifics, referencing notes, being constructive and having a conversation. These five actions are simple, but they’ll have a profound effect on how beneficial your company’s performance reviews are.

 

open door policy

The Importance of an Open Door Policy

Shannon Cassidy 2 Comments

In facilities with an open door policy in place, managers keep their office doors open to welcome feedback, encourage in-house resolution of problems, better observe and manage their departments, and remain accessible to their staff. While an open door policy has the potential to do all of these things, employees who work in facilities with such a policy don’t, in actuality, communicate more openly with their managers. As a matter of fact, 44% of these employees indicate that they don’t feel free to speak openly and honestly with their managers and 20% said they fear repercussions.

There is more to an effective open door policy than meets the eye; keeping the doors to manager offices open should be only one component of a multi-faceted policy. When the policy is written appropriately and followed, open door policies are vital for preventing disengagement and even potential litigation as a result of unresolved issues at work.

The following components can transform an open door policy from ineffective to necessary for survival:

Open Doors

The first and most literal element is an open door. Of course, doors will be closed during private meetings, disciplines, and crunch time before a deadline, but for the most part, office doors should be open to indicate interest in others and openness to their feedback. An open door is welcoming and has the potential to open the lines of communication, increase respect for management, and provide transparency that may improve trust.

No Repercussion

A primary reason employees working in open door facilities don’t communicate more with their supervisors is fear of repercussion or retaliation. An effective open door policy can address this fear by clearly communicating protection for a reporter. A few ways to say this include:

“Questions, comments, and concerns brought forth as a result of the open door policy will not be used as a means of discipline for the reporter. Managers within the organization have made a commitment to take such questions, concerns, and comments seriously and protect employees from the repercussions that may accompany reporting them. “

“There will be no retaliation by management against employees who report violations or concerns, and coworkers who retaliate against a reporter will be disciplined or terminated. Retaliation will not be supported or tolerated.”

“To extent legally permissible, reporters will remain anonymous.”

The best way to illustrate commitment to repercussion-free reporting of incidents, violations, and problems at work is to follow through with organizational open door policy consistently. When an employee reports a concern and receives adequate feedback with no change in treatment from management or coworkers, they’re more likely to report their concerns next time.

Follow Up

An open door policy loses its power when managers fail to follow up to concerns in a timely manner. A well-defined schedule for follow up after a complaint has been filed includes three primary elements:

  • Notification to the employee in writing that a complaint or request has been received and is being investigated or discussed within 24 hours of receipt of complaint. In this letter, employees should be given an estimated date of resolution.
  • A face to face meeting with the employee within seven days of receipt of complaint to gain understanding, clarify points, and learn about their expectations in terms of outcome.
  • A final written response to the employee, detailing what was found (if permissible and appropriate to share), indicating resolution of the issue, thanking the employee for their efforts to improve the workplace, and encouraging them to share future concerns.

An open door policy can work when all elements are in place and managers are committed to the policy.

How is technology changing management?

How is technology changing management?

Shannon Cassidy Leave a comment

The basics of management haven’t changed with time, notes Harvard Business Review; it remains more art than science. Styles and subject matter may evolve, but basic management practice endures. Managing is action-oriented, fast-paced and rife with pressure. Managers are interrupted often and typically don’t have the luxury of long periods of concentration.

Indeed, managers have always led hectic lives. It seems someone needs something from them at every moment of the day. With the advent of the Internet, managers’ time has become even more scarce as technology blurs the lines between the professional and the private, as HowStuffWorks notes.

But technology also has simplified life for managers in many ways. Information is much easier to access from the cloud than from file drawers back at the office, and email allows instant communication to every corner of the globe. Is technology changing management for the better? To answer that question, it’s necessary to examine the pros and cons.

Con: Less time for human contact

Staring at a screen and typing means less time for face-to-face interaction with other people, as Harvard Business Review notes. Managers — who historically have done their jobs primarily by walking around and talking to people — only have so many hours in each day. Text-based methods of communication like email provide ample room for misinterpretation and misunderstanding, which certainly can impede managers from doing their jobs effectively.

A perpetually clogged email inbox is bound to serve as a stumbling block to real human interaction — especially when the expectation is that managers respond to emails and texts instantaneously.

Pro: Ease of keeping in touch with external networks

A manager’s life can be a lonely one, especially when it seems no one in the company truly understands the challenges. Managers often tend to get pressure from both sides: from their employees below them and from their bosses or board members above them. Often, limited resources and marching orders from above leave them feeling that their hands are tied.

Modern technologies including email, along with social networking sites like Facebook and LinkedIn, allow managers to stay in touch with extended networks, including people in similar management roles in other locations. The ability to blow off steam or get quick advice from peers can help managers keep their situations in perspective and relieve stress.

Con: More focus on the short term, less on the long term

The frantic pace of life on the Internet tends to make everyone focus on the short term. A manager’s day has always involved someone needing something at every moment, but email and text messages have increased the number of “someones” making demands at all hours. With limited time available and increasing pressure to focus on short-term needs, many managers are left without time or motivation to focus on long-term strategies and plans of action — often to the detriment of employees and organizations.

Pro and Con: Easier monitoring of employees

In today’s world, most employees understand that they do not have a reasonable expectation of privacy at work. Their Internet usage may be tracked in a number of ways, including the sites they visit, the projects they work on and even the keystrokes they make. Company-issued cell phones can monitor employees’ whereabouts at every moment of the day, even during their time off.

All that monitoring can certainly shed light on employees’ productivity, but that can be both a blessing and a curse for managers whose time is already at a premium. Constant monitoring also can damage relationships and mutual trust that can take many years to build.

How can managers use technology effectively?

Whether it’s a net pro or con, technology is here to stay. But skilled managers are using technology in ways that contribute to team cohesion and productivity, and they make sure that its use doesn’t erect unnecessary barriers to honest communication. To ensure that technology remains a useful tool rather than an impediment, managers should:

  • Use email sparingly, and meet in person with team members as often as possible.
  • Set up a news and information section on the company intranet that allows for communication of general news to the entire team in a timely manner.
  • Save time by using an internal instant messaging program for quick questions and answers.

Technology: Changing management for the better?

Technology is simply a tool that managers can use in positive or negative ways. For maximum communication, productivity and team harmony, managers should keep a foot in two worlds: Use technology for quick communication and sharing general information, but continue to nurture the critical element of face-to-face interaction.