9 Ways Leadership in Business Parallels Life!

Leadership in business often uses the same principles we apply in everyday life.   Consider the following life situations:

Puppy training:    Our family has just acquired a puppy, and our training program has interesting parallels to my past days of supervising in the office.

• Maintain Consistent Rules – Remain firm and apply the same rules to all members, all the time.  This ensures expectations remain clear
• Accomplish Big Goals in Smaller Steps – just as teaching a puppy tricks is done in tiny steps, developing your employee’s skills or completing a large project can also be broken down into smaller steps
• Spend Time Monitoring Progress – potty or crate training for a puppy is just like the office and new employees; it takes time, patience and constant monitoring of progress to ensure good long-term results

Teenagers:    Parenting comes with its own unique set of challenges; I believe that parents are often the best equipped to take on new supervision duties in an office environment

• Apply the Same Rules to Everyone – Fairness to competing siblings is just the same as fairness to employees working in the same environment
• Use Meaningful Rewards and Natural Consequences – celebrate successes, and explain impact of mistakes or failures.  Where possible, learning happens best when children (or employees) can experience the consequences of their actions.
• Stick to Facts, Eliminate Emotions – particularly in sensitive or disciplinary situations, children or employees can take criticism or negative situations personally.  Shifting the focus to a “behavior”, not a personal judgement can reduce the hurt and speed closure of a problem

Neighbours:   Living peacefully in a neighbourhood takes the same skills as working in groups and teams.

• Consider the Impact of Your Actions on Others – Every behavior has a perceived impression on others.  Using your yard for a junk repository or holding loud, noisy parties can annoy your residential neighbours just as a messy desk area or playing music during office hours/holding loud personal conversations in a business area can annoy your workmates.
• Use MRI (Most Respectful Interpretation) – When disputes or differences arise, communication can become difficult.  Take the high road and use the most respectful interpretation of whatever is being said, this can save battles, whether with family members or work colleagues.
• Plan Ahead and Manage Expectations – if you are planning a party or renovating your home, let your neighbours know what will be happening ahead of time as a courtesy.  This same principle applies dealing with business groups or departments; set up expectations of what will be happening and when.  This will alleviate anxiety and reduce gossip or resistance to your plans from other group members.

In summary, use courtesy and common sense in all situations – these are appreciated by family, friends, neighbours and coworkers.  They are the underpinnings of basic leadership, at work and in life.

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Employee Discipline – 7 tips for Winning Results

Managing people is usually the difficult part of a job – human interaction leaves much open to interpretation.  When an employee is not performing, there are many variables that contribute to the problem:

a) personal issues

(these can cloud an empoyee’s judgement or capability)

b) unclear expectations

(ever try to do a job when you aren’t sure WHAT the job is?)

c) lack of job training

(impacts capability)

The key question to ask:  “Is this employee trainable / salvagable to eventually perform the required job?”

When your answer is “yes”, the solution is usually added training or clarified expectations.  When your answer is “no”, it’s time for employee performance discipline.

Okay, so it’s time for discipline.  Some hints:

1) Determine the specific expectations required on the job.

Make sure there is a clear, written job description (this is the minimum performance delivery required for the employee to keep his/her job).  Review expectations with the employee – use examples to clarify how the job duties are to be performed or delivered.

2)  Work with the employee to establish agreed upon standards for performance.

These standards may include timeliness (ie. meeting deadlines), accuracy or quality levels, and completeness of job duties.  Often, employees, when asked what is a reasonable job standard, will commit to a higher level than the supervisor expects.  Make sure there are clear measures of these agreed standards so that the employee can self-monitor results and report back on a regular basis.

3)  Follow up daily, weekly, monthly on measurement of standards.

Frequency of meeting will depend on the degree of supervision appropriate to the situation.

Where results are below standard, identify solutions that both employer and employee can participate in (i.e. job-specific training by employer, self-study or extra care by employee).

4)  When continued efforts to improve performance are not successful, written discipline is the next step.

Before meeting, write down a specific list of performance deficiencies including specific examples of each deficiency.  When you are ready for the discipline meeting, keep this list handy and quietly (subtly) “tick off” each item on the list as you discuss with the employee.  This list will help keep you on track, ensure you don’t forget anything and will also become your HR documentation if needed later.

5)  Buy a box of tissues

Keep them handy in case the employer/employee meeting becomes emotional.  If the employee cries, hand out the tissue(s) and wait……   resume the meeting and complete discussion of the deficiencies when the employee is composed. If you cancel the rest of the meeting once crying commences, you will have to redo the discipline discussion all over again at a later time — it’s better to complete all of the issues in one meeting and get the pain over with.

6) Conclude the meeting with a solution and action plan, with dates for followup.

This is usually a list of performance standards to remain employed (stated to the employee in a letter).

7) Have a Plan B in the back of your mind, in case an employee is beligerent or insubordinate.

There will be situations where an employee will never admit performance problems or who, by the end of the meeting, you will realize they are “unsalvageable” in terms of ever getting to required performance levels.  In these more severe cases, having a more serious discussion about termination or resignation can be appropriate.  You may also keep a termination letter handy (with researched severance options etc), to be presented only in a worst case scenario – this can save you the difficulty of rescheduling a separate termination meeting later.

Where possible, work on training, clear expectations and ways to salvage employees – this is the mark of true leadership!