for the most part it boils down to
to make things difficult for people»
Peter Drucker
A rather rigid definition, however, not unreasonable. If the bosses and subordinates fail to find a common language, any, even the most ingenious, business idea is doomed to failure. It is time to admit that we create most of the problems for ourselves, paying all attention to production processes and completely forgetting about people.
On the different sides of the barricades
All personnel management rests on three pillars: delegation, control, development. Dozens of smart books, hundreds of useful trainings and conferences, thousands of bright articles are dedicated to them. Many talented coaches help leaders understand the principles of creative management of subordinates. But let’s remember how often we replace delegation with directive management, control with total pressure, and instead of full-fledged development, we formally suggest visiting a training center once a year. Subordinates, as a rule, respond quite adequately. They condescendingly accept offers to learn, get annoyed when they are patronized over trifles and relax when they forget to entrust them with something on time. This dysfunction leads to the fact that managers live their lives, and their employees live theirs, and the level of mutual misunderstanding begins to affect the results of the overall work.
I’ll give you a simple example. In one large logistics company, we conducted a small study on how employees understand the task of «do it urgently.» The result surprised even the most experienced — people offered 29 options for their own vision of urgency. Some believed that they needed to “be in time by the evening”, others — “postpone other things and start doing it now”, others — “do it within an hour”, fourths — “work faster”, fifths — “stay late today”, etc. e. Is it necessary to say that the actions of employees when such a task is received are practically unpredictable for the manager?
A good manager, in fact, needs only one thing — that his subordinates began to work more efficiently. It is also clear that you want to achieve the result with minimal time losses. This is how hard management paradigms are born, for which domestic managers have a special love, especially those who are interested in the rapid development of a career. Barracks style is effective, but for a short period. Then the staff can be divided into two camps: those who supervise, and those who are in the «hedgehogs». Further, according to the law of the genre, one should expect office riots. That’s when the moment comes to work on the mistakes, when adults come to trainings with simple questions: “How to manage my deputies?”, “How to increase sales?”. And finally, the most important, not always, however, clothed in the exact wording: «How to succeed?»
Lose a day, but fly in five minutes
I must say that success is always individual, and mistakes are standard. It is this position that makes training in personnel management so popular. As a rule, the problem of one participant is clear to another, this creates an atmosphere of mutual understanding in the classroom, makes you work with redoubled energy. Everyone understands that success cannot be achieved without eliminating from your practice the attitudes that prevent you from becoming more efficient, more professional, and more competent.
Management literacy depends on a person’s ability to correctly assess the state of a business process, manage its development and, if necessary, initiate the necessary changes. A typical situation: the manager suddenly realizes that discipline in the department has fallen so much that there is a direct threat to performance. Employees disrupt meetings, publicly challenge management decisions, and spend excessive time on personal matters. The question arises — «what to do?». Analyzing the situation, the coach finds out what was wrong. Once a brave employee, perhaps even the best one, was half an hour late for work and explained that he was stuck in a traffic jam. Then he left two hours early because his wife was ill. At the meeting, he allowed me to speak sharply about the plans of the leadership. Others followed his example. The symptoms persisted for a long time, but the manager noticed only the most powerful signal when an important contract fell through or the authorities showed their displeasure.
But why deal with the consequences? Obviously, this strategy is ineffective. It is much easier to correct the employee’s behavior by proactive action, and much depends on the time of exposure — the sooner we intervene, the easier it is to change the situation.
A competent manager understands that there is a deep abyss between preventive actions and unjustified cruelty. uet slash without sufficient grounds for that — it is absurd and meaningless. Control is, first of all, the existence of certain rules, which are understandable and observed by everyone. Moreover, on their basis, it is necessary to develop certain standards, broadcast them to subordinates and be sure to follow them yourself. The regulation of life is a routine procedure, but there is no need to spare effort on it. It is better to spend a day or even a week on creating such instructions from the very beginning than to deal with personnel chaos for six months afterwards.
ABC for an employee
A good employee must have the necessary competencies and sufficient motivation. Suppose that the level of his professionalism can be identified at the stage of hiring. Even if approximately, the missing skills are developed in the course of corporate training. But motivation is a process that must be constantly maintained, and the main burden falls on the shoulders of the immediate supervisor. Alas, in most companies, theoretical discussions on this topic do not go further. Not always passes in cases of lack of motivation and the usual practice of encouraging us.
When a person begins to receive a salary exceeding 45–50 thousand USD, the extra money no longer affects the quality of his work as before. Statistics say that only three out of ten people are ready to take on more responsibility for a higher salary. For example, consider the situation in a company that manufactures industrial equipment. The newly recruited employees of the sales department worked hard at first: they met each client as if they were the last, stayed up late, showed initiative, willingly went to meetings in remote areas of the city. But the moment came when the database was formed, and each seller had several wholesale buyers. Stagnation began: women were intensely engaged in their appearance, and men switched to discussing sports news and automotive innovations.
No additional bonuses offered by management changed the overall picture. Of course, no one refused money, but they did not want to work, as before. Salaries allowed them to fully realize all simple human desires: go on vacation to Turkey, go to inexpensive restaurants, go shopping in shopping centers and boutiques. Random customers with small orders became uninteresting, sellers sat all day waiting for the next visit of the «regular».
Any manager needs to remember that motivation is a perishable product. Dreams come true, there are much fewer reasons for employees to strain. Proper motivation is not so much the creation of material well-being and comfort for employees as it is goal-oriented: when one is achieved, it is necessary to formulate others. And involve others in this continuous process. Otherwise, people themselves will determine the ceiling for themselves and, if the situation is successful, they themselves will press the brake pedal, blocking further movement.
A good husband needs to be made by yourself
However, it does not matter, husband or wife. This folk wisdom contains a simple and at the same time deep thought: there are no ideal people. It is necessary to understand that if we want to see certain qualities in a person, we need to take a proactive position towards him. Talk about your views and expectations, help and praise, share responsibility. Finally, something to forgive, and somewhere to go on principle. All this is just as true for industrial relations as it is for family relations.
Of course, at work, all relationships are much more formalized than at home, and the development of employees is quite pragmatic. However, certain actions of an educational nature are also possible here. To reflect the specific qualities of this process, we often use the technical term «formatting». Yes, employees need and can be formatted to achieve maximum usefulness and compliance with the duties assigned to them.
Properly built relationships between a leader and a subordinate imply that the latter is able to perform not only the simplest tasks (that is, act at the executive level), but also, in certain cases, replace the leader himself. Many in such cases rely on intuition or trust only those whom they have known for several years. In our opinion, both approaches do not guarantee a successful result.
Formatting avoids two extremes. On the one hand — total guardianship and picking up «tails» for subordinates, and on the other — the administrative style and constant turnover. When delegating and instructing, we must be sure that a person is able to complete the task at a decent level, without the subsequent intervention of the manager.
How to gain this confidence? You need to educate employees on trifles. Any skill can be divided into several simpler ones, simple ones, in turn, into the simplest ones. And when you know that a person has mastered a certain amount of micro-skills, be sure that a difficult task will be up to him.
What is success?
In conclusion, let’s try to answer the question of what managerial success is. Someone believes that this is a dynamic movement up the career ladder. Others believe that the performance of the unit can serve as a criterion for success, and others get deep satisfaction from the opportunity to lead other people. Without pretending to the completeness of the truth, expressed in any one, «extremely correct» point of view, we only want to note the fact that achieving maximum results for a company is impossible without intensive development of employees. An effective leader needs employees who can create a normal business plan, conduct a planning meeting or complex negotiations. And if the boss, after a long business trip, finds out that nothing went wrong in the unit entrusted to him, that the mechanism of industrial relations works like an expensive Swiss watch, then everything was done correctly.