Are You A Good Manager?
There are as many management styles as there are managers. Based on numerous studies and research into what makes an effective, result producing management style though, the bottom line is "How are you supporting and encouraging your employees?"
Here’s the hard facts. Based on extensive research, about 25% of the overall workforce are active participants at work… If these numbers are reflected in your small business, you have some issues that need to be dealt with ASAP.
What’s the main motivation for an actively participating team member?
The big assumption is that people are motivated by money and benefits. Or training and development. Actually research over many years now has shown that the manager (or Owner if you are managing also) is the most important aspect leading to a motivated and participating team.
Gallup has asked one question thousands and thousands of times and found that it is an accurate predictor of a company’s success and employment costs. It is:
"My manager cares about me as an individual."
Employees in companies that answer yes to that question, had results that were dramatically increased over the competition.
How people are motivated is directly impacted by how they are managed.
(And if you’re paying 20% below the market, you’re going to have disgruntled people and problems. You also don’t have to be the highest paid to keep great employees.)
The big lesson is that good people leave poor managers.
The core thing about being a good manager is managing emotions, yours and your teams. It’s also important to know the strengths of yourself and your team members. Everyone has built in things that they excel at, and the effective road to follow is where your team members tasks mostly involve exactly what their strengths are.
Further research shows that employees rate only one in ten managers as effective. Add it all up and the sum is that one of the most important decisions for your long term success is who becomes a manager.
The manager’s actions make a huge impact on the culture within an organization. Now, putting the wrong people in the wrong role generates frustration as well. So it’s not just having this pleasant, cushy environment.
Have you got the people in the right roles and are you looking at how to support them and run interference for them?
This is about supporting the person, demonstrating care, and allowing them to do their best. It’s not only about tracking numbers, etc. It’s about making sure that they feel supported and praised. It’s making sure that those things are done and that the person feels that that is how they are going to access the best performance.
It’s interesting because we tend to focus on measuring as a tool to manage.
"What gets measured, gets done!"
And as far as systems go, it is absolutely true. However, your people are not systems and they sure don’t want to be treated like a system.
When you set goals together on your outcomes and you support your staff and sales staff on their processes to meet their goals, it does make a big difference for the financial productivity of the company.
Another way of looking at this would be to treat your team members like customers. Customers need support concerning the goods or services that they purchase from you. They need to know that you will answer their questions, that you will provide help for their problems, that you will be responsive when they need help.
Your team also need this level of support.
Filed under Business Advice, Business Consulting, Employees, Sales Teams by Michael Walsh.
You make an excellent point. No matter how much people are paid, if they don’t feel valued, they won’t stay.