6 Quick Tips to Improve Your Professional Presence

Posted by & filed under Accountability, Active Listening, Career Development, Communicating To Manage Performance, Communication, Conflict, Corporate Culture, Employee Development, increasing personal effectiveness, Leadership, Professional Presence in a Casual World.

speech photoIn today’s busy lifestyle, whether at the office, at your favorite social function, or even at the grocery store, it is very important for you to exude professional presence in public. A professional presence will help you to achieve many of your goals, e.g., getting that budget approved, being calm and poised during meetings, and becoming a charismatic goodwill ambassador for your office and your community.  Professionals that have a ‘presence’ are described as having ‘that something’ or having an ‘aura.’ Let’s begin in the spirit of our “Professional Presence in a Casual World” Program by building your own Professional Presence Toolkit:

  1. Be flexible. Often, someone’s failure to plan becomes your emergency. While you do not want to become a doormat, you need to be flexible. Learn about other people’s personality styles (and there are many); this way you can better relate to each individual’s needs. For example, does your manager prefer to communicate in quick bursts via email, or would she rather have a meeting in person? The same goes with your immediate team and the general public. Learn what makes each of them tick, and be flexible with the most appropriate response.
  2. Pursue excellence. Avoid accepting mediocrity as excellence! Be the person that delivers excellence in everything you do. On the phone, at your desk, in presentations — everything you do, do it with zest. Being known as a person of excellence will take you far within your circle of influence and beyond to make the world a better place and further your career.
  3. Listen more; talk less. In an era where people don’t think twice about talking over each other, it is critical to be an exemplary good listener. Practice this with your team and everyone you interact with. After first listening, ask insightful questions to the individual(s) concerned. 
  4. Practice diplomacy and tact. You are tested daily. As a professional, you must remain calm and focused when conflict arises. You may be privy to numerous confidential matters and you may also at times find yourself being the town psychologist. A professional that is poised under pressure is someone who will be given the autonomy to make critical decisions.
  5. Be a person of character and respect. Be known as positive and pleasant. You interact with many personalities, and need to work with individuals who may not always be at their best. Goodwill is something that has to be earned and it stays with you for a long, long time. Show respect even to people who don’t deserve it: not as a reflection of their character, but as a reflection of yours. Staying composed when dealing with members of the community will go a long way to solidifying your public profile.
  6. Practice “netiquette.” Email, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram, and blogging are just a few of the social media tools used to interact with the public. Whether you are emailing your boss, colleagues, or constituents: be formal. Compose thoughtful emails and proofread them carefully before hitting send. There are many examples where seemingly private posts from public officials become broadcasted for all to see.

This is only the beginning, and a good reminder that you own your presence.  You are the author of your identity, and you write the script for managing your credibility and career. Commit to putting into practice the tips described above in order to show your superb charisma, credibility, and influence.  It’s your biggest asset in defining your career, accomplishing more within your scope of inflence, and becoming a prominent voice in your organization.

Leaders with the most impact are those who can build and successfully manage great teams. Every day, we help our clients and colleagues achieve their highest levels of professional presence and personal effectiveness. That includes everyone on the ladder, from company presidents to project managers, to staff members. Contact us at 800-282-3374 to find out how we can help you impact your own productivity and the productivity of your entire organization.

Employee Development Systems delivers results-oriented training programs that increase productivity, effectiveness, & performance.


Photo by marioanima via Flickr

The First Step to Exemplary Leadership: Challenging Neuroscience

Posted by & filed under Corporate Culture, Employee Development, Leadership, Performance Management.

The Problem with Neuroscience

meeting photoOur research suggests that neuroscience in business certainly adds a new viewpoint to the organizational content but cannot stand on its own. We have to conclude that neuro-scientific research takes away too much real-life organizational context in order for it to become a dominant tool for organizations. Ethical considerations (like viewing employees as resources that can be “fixed” or manipulated by science) are problematic for the workplace, and can eventually cause resentment or violations of privacy.

Principles of Exemplary Leadership: A Better Option?

Before you play with the shiny new fad of ‘neuroscience’ in your teambuilding, we would recommend the tested and proven Five Practices of Exemplary Leadership common to personal-best leadership experiences. We have extensively researched the use of these practices in the free market, which has a proven history of growth and success compared to other market systems around the world. The same tested and proven principles guide leaders mobilize others to get extraordinary things done in virtually every arena of organized activity.

You will find the same principles of exemplary leadership in profit-based firms and nonprofits, manufacturing and services, government and business, health care, education, and community service. You will find examples of exemplary leadership everywhere you look. our Although each example is unique in expression, every case follows remarkably similar patterns of action. Programs like Communicating to Manage Performance and Increasing Personal Effectiveness leverage these patterns to help your workplace attain an optimal blend of productivity, enthusiasm, and effective leadership.

Commitments of Leadership

Embedded in the Five Practices Of Exemplary Leadership are behaviors that serve as the basis for how leaders get extraordinary things done in organizations. Leaders with the most impact are those who can build and successfully manage great teams. Every day, we help our clients and colleagues achieve their highest levels of professional presence and personal effectiveness. That includes everyone on the ladder, from company presidents to project managers, to staff members. Contact us at 800-282-3374 to find out how we can help you impact your own productivity and the productivity of your entire organization.

Employee Development Systems delivers results-oriented training programs that increase productivity, effectiveness, & performance.

 

Photo by woodleywonderworks via Flickr

Good to Great: The Measure of Exceptional Leadership

Posted by & filed under Accountability, Actively Engaged Workers, Communicating To Manage Performance, increasing personal effectiveness, Leadership.

Startup Stock PhotosMost people are actually somewhere between being a good leader and a bad leader, with the majority uncertain of the connection between their leadership and performance. A deeper knowledge of what good (or great) leadership is will then enable you to breakthrough and effect change in the performance of your team, organization or company like never before.

To produce the absolute best products and services in the marketplace, all employees must treat their work and their customers with great respect and care. Everyone knows this. It follows then that good leadership requires treating employees with great respect and care — the better the respect and caring, the better the outcome. Click to learn the core tenets of Increased Personal Effectiveness and Communicating to Manage Performance programs.

This is a Natural Law (inexorable, inescapable): treat employees as important and valuable and you will lift them to feel and become this way. They will in turn treat their work, customers, peers and management this way. They will follow your lead.

 

What then characterizes good (or great) leadership?

  • Listening to your employees including subordinate managers/bosses — addressing their complaints, suggestions, concerns, and personal issues at work.
  • Coaching people when necessary to raise them to a higher standard.
  • Allowing everyone to put in their two cents.
  • Trusting your employees to do the work.
  • Not giving orders or setting visions, goals and objectives, but instead soliciting this from your employees so everyone is fully involved in how the company will be successful.
  • Providing direction, when needed, to ensure that everyone is on the same page (the one they devised). A good leader communicates the vision that was set by all. If it is a vision of little interest, then another one must be found.

Every person wants to be heard and respected. Everyone has something to contribute. Listening and responding respectfully makes it worthwhile for employees to apply 100% of their brainpower to their work, unleashing their full potential of creativity, innovation and productivity and, making them highly motivated, committed and productive. All of this gives them very high morale, enables them to take great pride in their work. Employees will literally love to come to work. Good leadership multiplies whatever creativity, innovation and productivity top management has by however many employees they have.

What every manager, boss, executive —leader— honestly needs to do for the greatest and most immediate results is to listen respectfully and to follow-up with a satisfactory response (actions) to those involved. We can consciously choose to adjust our actions to always lead in the good direction to raise our performance and success in managing people.

Leaders with the most impact are those who can build and successfully manage great teams. Every day, we help our clients and colleagues achieve their highest levels of professional presence and personal effectiveness. That includes everyone on the ladder, from company presidents to project managers, to staff members. Contact us at 800-282-3374 to find out how we can help you impact your own productivity and the productivity of your entire organization.

Employee Development Systems delivers results-oriented training programs that increase productivity, effectiveness, & performance.

 

5 Practical Takeaways for an Effective Leadership Team

Posted by & filed under Communicating To Manage Performance, DISC Personality Styles, Employee Development, Leadership.

EDS_Leadership5_21_16Do you have a cohesive leadership team? Even the phrase “leadership team” is overused today when we see little evidence of trust, collaboration or working toward a common goal. Taking the time to build a cohesive leadership team will not only separate you from the competition; it will make your organization nearly unstoppable.
A cohesive leadership team is evident by 5 must haves:

  • Team members trust one another – not because they have known one another for years, but because they can comfortably admit to the team that they made a mistake, they failed to deliver on an assignment or they need help.  They are not worried that their colleagues will swarm around their weakness like sharks in a tank.
  • Team members can have healthy conflict – an atmosphere where all opinions are expected and welcome, they will be openly debated on their merits, and not based on one person’s preferences or selfish desires.
  • Commitment to the decisions made – this can only happen when everyone feels that their opinion has been adequately heard by the group and the team leader and that the decision made, whether by consensus or by the team leader, has been made with the best interests of the organization in mind.
  • Holding one another accountable – this happens easily when there is trust and commitment to take action. Peer to peer accountability is more effective than accountability handed out by the team leader.
  • Focus on results – that the leadership team has agreed to rather than their individual results.  Team members focus on how the organization does rather than how good one individual performs over another. To establish and sustain a cohesive leadership team, the team leader must be open to the fact that each individual on the team has different strengths and weaknesses and will most likely differ in opinions from time to time. Rather than dwell on shortfalls, the team leader must capitalize on the diversity of these thoughts and perspectives.

Are you ready to reap the benefits of a cohesive leadership team? Integrating the DiSC® into your leadership development plan is a productive way to start. To be an effective, the leader must believe and demonstrate that everyone has something to bring to the table; in turn, the people at the table must feel that the team is a place where their opinions are welcome. All of your leaders will be more effective if they have an awareness of their own communication style and the style used by their colleagues and team members. At EDS, we integrate the DiSC® into many of our core programs.

EDSI has worked with several organizations whose leadership group (the word team is intentionally not used) is not at all unified in purpose.  In some politically charged organizations, these meetings are dead before they start because members of the leadership group simply do not trust one another.  The reasons for the distrust are not important.  What is important is that there is no progress made and the dysfunctional organization continues to decline, eventually leading to financial loss, turnover of the best people because they can’t deal with team politics, resulting in significant decline of the organization’s value. Who really wants to work in that kind of environment?

Take a look at the leaders on your team. Are they functioning as a cohesive unit? If the answer is no, what can you be actively doing to rebuild trust, gain real commitment, establish accountability and have a unified focus on results?

Leaders with the most impact are those who can build and successfully manage great teams. Every day, we help our clients and colleagues achieve their highest levels of professional presence and personal effectiveness. That includes everyone on the ladder, from company presidents to project managers, to staff members. Contact us at 800-282-3374 to find out how we can help you impact your own productivity and the productivity of your entire organization.

Employee Development Systems delivers results-oriented training programs that increase productivity, effectiveness, & performance.

Coaching and the DiSC Assessment

Posted by & filed under Communicating To Manage Performance, Communication, DISC Personality Styles, Employee Development.

EDS_ConflictTaking a coaching mentality to your management process is the answer to many kinds of organizational ills. It is about making sense of complex experiences, unlocking a person’s potential to solving their own problems and is more often about asking good questions than giving right answers. If you want a commitment culture rather than simple compliance, successful coaching may provide a lot of the keys. At EDS, we start with the DiSC assessment to help managers understand themselves and how they interact with others. That is, helping them increase awareness of their own communication styles, and those of their counterparts.

Coaching is a key component alongside goal setting, regular reviews and reward. We provided training in questioning, active listening, giving and receiving feedback, generating options and implementing action plans.  We believe that coaching skills alone are, however, insufficient to engender and support change at individual and organizational levels.  The spirit of coaching is about establishing a special quality of relationship and conversation that engenders awareness-raising, learning, responsibility and commitment that extends well beyond simple task achievement.  It demands conscious attention to personal intention, ethos, empathy and relational climate.

By fostering a genuine spirit of coaching, developing a deeper level of inquiry and ensuring individuals have the space to find their own solutions, managers and coaches can make a significant change to the culture of an organization. People typically experience greater personal satisfaction at work, grow in their ability to deal with complexity, ambiguity and change, and develop emotional intelligence alongside practical skills and enhanced performance.

Here’s how to embed the spirit of coaching in your workplace:

  • Engage in personal development to understand and address your own motivations, anxieties, hot spots etc. so they don’t impinge negatively on the coaching process.
  • Establish a coaching relationship that is underpinned by positive intention, empathy and genuine commitment to the coachee’s development.
  • Encourage the coachee to take responsibility for his or her own learning and performance, albeit with your support alongside.
  • Agree on goals and standards together, giving the coachee first opportunity to scope out requirements, explore issues, work out solutions etc.
  • Challenge coachees to grow in awareness of how they are learning and performing, e.g. by seeking feedback from stakeholders and developing the practice of reflection.
  • Review the organization’s culture as a whole to ensure consistency with a coaching spirit.

Learning to coach by first learning one’s own communication style sets managers up for success-and by association, management and coaching will have be more effective.

Leaders with the most impact are those who can build and successfully manage great teams. Every day, we help our clients and colleagues achieve their highest levels of professional presence and personal effectiveness. That includes everyone on the ladder, from company presidents to project managers, to staff members. Contact us at 800-282-3374 to find out how we can help you impact your own productivity and the productivity of your entire organization.

Employee Development Systems delivers results-oriented training programs that increase productivity, effectiveness, & performance.

Find & Manage Your Conflict Style with the DiSC

Posted by & filed under Conflict, Conflict Resolution, DISC Personality Styles, Personal Effectiveness.

EDS FightYour personality and communication style impact how you understand conflict. When you are aware of how you handle situations -and even more- how your colleagues handle conflict, you can flex communication and conflict management styles to make more effective choices when you when you encounter or witness conflict and ensure the best outcome.

Many organizations use the DiSC® personality tests help provide employees with the ability to work better in teams, avoid conflicts, increase sales by understanding customer behavior, improve relations, and more.  Among many other benefits, the DiSC® provides insights into an individual’s behavioral style within their workplace, leadership style, management approach, and conflict resolution style.

By embracing conflict as a part of life, you can make the most of each situation and make use of it as a learning or leadership opportunity. You can also use it as an opportunity to transform a situation into something better.

The model organizes 5 conflict management styles based on two personality dimensions: assertiveness and cooperativeness. Here are the five conflict management styles. Which one best fits you?

  1. Accommodating – This is when you cooperate to a high-degree, although it may be at your own expense, and actually work against your own goals, objectives, and desired outcomes. This approach is effective when the other party is the expert or has a better solution. It can also be effective for preserving future relations with the other party.
  2. Avoiding – This is when you simply avoid the issue. You aren’t helping the other party reach their goals, and you aren’t assertively pursuing your own. This works when the issue is trivial or when you have no chance of winning.  It can also be effective when the issue would be very costly. It’s also very effective when the atmosphere is emotionally charged and you need to create some space. Sometimes issues will resolve themselves, but “hope is not a strategy”, and, in general, avoiding is not a good long term strategy.
  3. Collaborating – This is where you partner or pair up with the other party to achieve both of your goals.  This is how you break free of the “win-lose” paradigm and seek the “win-win.”  This can be effective for complex scenarios where you need to find a novel solution. This can also mean re-framing the challenge to create a bigger space and room for everybody’s ideas. The downside is that it requires a high-degree of trust and reaching a consensus can require a lot of time and effort to get everybody on board and to synthesize all the ideas.
  4. Competing – This is the “win-lose” approach. You act in a very assertive way to achieve your goals, without seeking to cooperate with the other party, and it may be at the expense of the other party. This approach may be appropriate for emergencies when time is of the essence, or when you need quick, decisive action, and people are aware of and support the approach.
  5. Compromising – This is the “lose-lose” scenario where neither party really achieves what they want. This requires a moderate level of assertiveness and cooperation. It may be appropriate for scenarios where you need a temporary solution, or where both sides have equally important goals. The trap is to fall into compromising as an easy way out, when collaborating would produce a better solution.

By knowing your own default patterns, you improve your self-awareness. Once you are aware of your own patterns, you can pay attention to whether they are working for you, empowering you to explore alternatives. By using a scenario-based approach, you can choose more effective conflict management styles and test their effectiveness for you and your situations.

Leaders with the most impact are those who can build and successfully manage great teams. Every day, we help our clients and colleagues achieve their highest levels of professional presence and personal effectiveness. That includes everyone on the ladder, from company presidents to project managers, to staff members. Contact us at 800-282-3374 to find out how we can help you impact your own productivity and the productivity of your entire organization.

Employee Development Systems delivers results-oriented training programs that increase productivity, effectiveness, & performance.

How to Model Others’ Behavior for Increased Effectiveness

Posted by & filed under Actively Engaged Workers, Communicating To Manage Performance, Communication.

Titles are granted, but it is your behavior that wins you respect.

EDSI_MillennialLeading means you have to be a good example, and live by what you say. This sentiment has been shared by all across the long history of leadership. Exemplary leaders know that if they want to gain commitment and achieve the highest standards, they must be models of the behavior they expect of others and how to better communicate to manage performance.

  1. Clarify values by finding your voice and affirming shared ideals. Leaders model the way. To effectively model the behavior they expect of others, leaders must first be clear about guiding principles. They must clarify values. They have to open up their hearts and let people know what they really think and believe. This means talking about their values. Leaders must find their own voices and must clearly and distinctively give voice to their values. As personal-best stories illustrate, leaders are supposed to stand up for their beliefs, although it’s not just the leader’s values that are important. They are not just representing themselves, they speak and act on behalf of a larger organization. Leaders must forge agreement around common principles and common ideals.
  1. Set the example by aligning actions with shared values. Eloquent speeches about common values, however, are not nearly enough. Leaders’ deeds are far more important than their words when one wants to determine how serious leaders really are about what they say. Words and deeds must be consistent. Exemplary leaders go first by setting the example through daily actions that demonstrate they are deeply committed to their beliefs. A leader discovers that their actions speak volumes about how the team needs to ‘‘take ownership of the things they believe in and value.’’ There will not be anything the leader asks others to do that they will not be willing to do themselves, and as a result, while they always trust their team, their team in turn trusts them.

Exemplary leadership looks back on a history of personal-best projects, all distinguished by relentless effort, steadfastness, competence, and attention to detail. One can’t help but be struck by how the actions leaders took to set an example were often simple things. Sure, leaders had operational and strategic plans, but the examples they gave were not about elaborate designs. They were about the power of spending time with someone, of working side by side with colleagues, of telling stories that made values come alive, of being highly visible during times of uncertainty, and of asking questions to get people to think about values and priorities.

Modeling the way is about earning the right and the respect to lead through direct involvement and action. People follow the person first, then the plan.

Leaders with the most impact are those who can build and successfully manage great teams. Every day, we help our clients and colleagues achieve their highest levels of professional presence and personal effectiveness. That includes everyone on the ladder, from company presidents to project managers, to staff members. Contact us at 800-282-3374 to find out how we can help you impact your own productivity and the productivity of your entire organization.

Employee Development Systems delivers results-oriented training programs that increase productivity, effectiveness, & performance.

4 Benefits to Increasing Creativity in Your Workplace

Posted by & filed under increasing personal effectiveness, Personal Effectiveness.

EDS_4_24_16v2We talk about creativity in business like a buzzword. In reality, bringing a bit of creativity into the mix can be the secret to success. You may think that in order to be taken seriously as a business you need to do everything with a straight face, however, in the age of Generation Y and Millennials, bringing a bit of color into the office through creativity can completely change an environment. Creativity in your business:

  • Keeps you switched on – Getting creative may not be everyone’s cup of tea, but it’s something we should all find time to do. Taking a few minutes a day or a week from your desk to create a mind map of ideas can help boost your brain power; keeping you sharp.

Being creative makes you happier. Happy employees mean increased effectiveness!

  • Allows for new ideas – New ideas can come from anywhere at any time. That ‘eureka’ moment is often not as a result of hard thought and pondering, but a stroke of luck from other more interesting tasks.

Taking a step back from something and looking at it in a new, creative way can help lead to new ideas; creativity is all about making connections.  Use this connective thinking to come up with new ideas from the old and see what success may befall from it.

  • Makes things more fun – Getting creative is guaranteed to make things more fun! The standard 9-5 routine can become unbearable so mixing it up can help maintain staff morale. Being creative doesn’t always have to be work related.

Giving that positive and fun association with the workplace is much more likely to result in better employee wellbeing and retention. Bring something into the office that gets people engaging in a fun and creative way; a great way to get to know colleagues as well.

  • Shows that you’re different – Employer branding is all the rage; with 56% of talent acquisition leaders saying that employer brand is one of the top priorities for their organization. Top employers such as Google and Facebook are giving their employees more space to be creative or break away from traditional working environments. Use this trend and take creativity to a new level to make yourself an employer on the path to success.

Creativity is your friend – don’t see it as a distraction but embrace it to ultimately keep focus. Use it to drive innovation and idea generation, create a more fun and engaging environment. Use it as a tool to attract the next generation of employees.

Leaders with the most impact are those who can build and successfully manage great teams. Every day, we help our clients and colleagues achieve their highest levels of professional presence and personal effectiveness. That includes everyone on the ladder, from company presidents to project managers, to staff members. Contact us at 800-282-3374 to find out how we can help you impact your own productivity and the productivity of your entire organization.

Employee Development Systems delivers results-oriented training programs that increase productivity, effectiveness, & performance.

 

Get Your Team Engaged Today!

Posted by & filed under Communicating To Manage Performance, Communication.

EDS_4_24_16Getting a handle on employee involvement will maintain the momentum your company needs.

  • What does it encompass? Employee involvement encompasses the effort by management to include employees as part of a strategy to improve itself. Once employees understand that their input will be taken and honestly considered within the company, enthusiasm will proliferate throughout the ranks. The payoff in employee involvement can turn a company into a leading marketplace venue for how to motivate employees and keep fresh ideas coming on a frequent basis.
  • Get them involved! A company can make its employees feel that they are part of the production process by actually taking their suggestions and implementing them. The mere fact of having some kind of repository for idea collection in strategic areas will allow the employees to give their personal ideas on how best to improve work conditions for productivity. Employee suggestion boxes can be placed in areas where the employees congregate throughout the day. The idea of having these suggestion boxes has to be supported by management to ensure that plenty of ideas are continually coming in.
  • What is the long-term advantage? Having employees interact with management and its decision making process will ensure that motivation will always be there. Customer-based relationship marketing is important for the company to survive in tough economic times but the marketing aspect of a company can only be accomplished through improved employee engagement.

Having employees feel they are part of the decision process of the company, and actually seeing some of their ideas and suggestions being implemented, gives greater assurance to employees and the company that it is first class. Involvement of the employees will result in attitude changes by employees who will in turn give extra effort and loyalty to the company’s products and services that provide its customer base.

When a company puts people first, whether they are employees or customers, then the groundwork of a successful corporation has been set. The interaction of employees with management and customers allows a self-worth to happen that cannot be measured in dollars and cents. Give employees the chance to be creative and feel that they are part of management. The prospect of having an employee base that is loyal and hardworking will comprise the base operations of the company.

Never underestimate the power of employee loyalty when it comes to involving them in the everyday processes that affect company policy and the direction that it is destined to travel.

Leaders with the most impact are those who can build and successfully manage great teams. Every day, we help our clients and colleagues achieve their highest levels of professional presence and personal effectiveness. That includes everyone on the ladder, from company presidents to project managers, to staff members. Contact us at 800-282-3374 to find out how we can help you impact your own productivity and the productivity of your entire organization.

Employee Development Systems delivers results-oriented training programs that increase productivity, effectiveness, & performance.

 

Mindfulness & the Feedback Process

Posted by & filed under Communicating To Manage Performance, Communication, Feedback.

EDS_Mindful1As a manager it is critical to be able to effectively manage a feedback session so that you get positive results and improved performance instead of a disgruntled employee. Are you prepared for unexpected reactions from employees? Make sure you have the ability to respond appropriately and leverage your feedback for growth!

There are two key strategies that can be employed as part of feedback to prevent a negative or defensive response from an employee.

  1. Be Mindful of the Process – When facilitating feedback it is critical to be mindful of the wording being used. There are certain key phrases that can negatively impact a feedback session. Avoid starting a sentence with the word “you” during a feedback session as it places blame on an employee and will immediately put the employee on the defensive.
  • Instead of saying “You are always late for work.” Try saying, “I am concerned about your current start time. I have you on the schedule to be at work for 9:00 am but I notice that you have arrived at 9:30 am every day this week.“
  • Instead of saying “You are not meeting the company’s performance expectations. You will need to make some immediate improvements.” Try saying “I have outlined the company’s performance expectations and I notice that you have missed a couple of the targets. Let’s review them together and come up with an action plan for improvement.“
  • Instead of saying “You need to start being more polite to our customers.” Try saying “I notice that you have been short with some of our customers lately. Can you help me understand why?“
  1. Avoid Assumptions – Sometimes a manager will hear from other employees about an incident, a professionalism issue or ongoing inappropriate conduct. Rather than making assumptions or taking the information at face value it is critical to talk with the employee first and then come to a decision as to whether or not a plan of action is required. There is always two sides to the story and it is the manager’s responsibility to get a clear understanding of exactly what has occurred from all parties involved.

    The following phrases can be used to open up a feedback session involving second hand information

  • “I want to discuss some information that has been brought to my attention and I am hoping you can help me by providing some clarification.”
  • “I was made aware of a situation that occurred last week and I wanted to take some time and talk with you about it.“
  • “I was wondering if you could help me understand what happened between you and Bridget the other day.“

When discussing second hand information with an employee be prepared for the employee to express confusion or deny that the issue even occurred. When an employee feigns ignorance or denies the occurrence of an incident a manager can ask the employee “Do you have any idea why someone might want to make a false complaint about you?” or “Is there anything going on with the team that may make them believe that you did this?“

It is important for managers not to make assumptions as to why an employee chose to do or say something. Instead of making assumptions the manager should schedule a feedback session to discuss the issue with the employee and then provide feedback and create an action plan for improvement.

A person’s life experience and personality traits will play a role in how he or she responds to constructive feedback. It is important for managers to tailor the feedback session and delivery to the employee that they are meeting with. Some employees prefer feedback delivered in a direct and to-the-point manner while other employees prefer delivery of feedback in a more empathetic and understanding manner with significant time set aside for discussion.

Leaders with the most impact are those who can build and successfully manage great teams. Every day, we help our clients and colleagues achieve their highest levels of professional presence and personal effectiveness. That includes everyone on the ladder, from company presidents to project managers, to staff members. Contact us at 800-282-3374 to find out how we can help you impact your own productivity and the productivity of your entire organization.

Employee Development Systems delivers results-oriented training programs that increase productivity, effectiveness, & performance.