The Management Files-It's Time to Shift

Comment

Comment by Brandon Sobotka on March 11, 2009 at 2:34pm

I've developed several successful leaders throughout my career and almost all of the development is through communication. Like Greg stated, it's always thrown into a "soft skill" category and many times considered ineffective because of it's difficulty to be measured. As I look back through my life I've noticed that you can get results now by scare tactics and being harsh and up front, but in turn I also noticed in association with these types of managers a higher employee turnover, bad workplace morale and decreased customer satisfaction among other things. Talk about unwanted stress!!! I firmly believe in honesty and support the idea of informing employees of their weaknesses, but in tactful ways as you and Greg have expressed. This is what leads to long term consistent results in the workplace. Happy employees alot of time lead to happy customers.

Comment by Lindsay Manfredi on March 9, 2009 at 1:33pm

Greg, I totally appreciate your input, and I definitely agree with you. My favorites have not always been the coolest, etc. I am not talking about management that is pushover. I am talking about management that can MANAGE. Not allow the pressures of the outside to effect the way you manage your team. I am talking the ones that are mean, the ones that use fear tactics, and the ones that don't really care about how they are coming across to those they manage. There definitely needs to be moderation. Afterall, you don't have to necessarily be friends with those you manage, but you should be friendly, courteous, and respectful.

Comment by Greg Hiatt on March 6, 2009 at 3:16pm

Lindsay, my favorites haven't always been the nicest, coolest, and most fun, but they have been fair and they are the the ones that pushed me to do things that I didn't know that I could. They moved the big roadblocks out of my way, while letting me move some of my own. They gave me more work to do than I thought I could handle, and gave me honest feedback. As I said, they weren't "nice" but they were friendly. They were the ones that taught me to make a difference to the business.

I now do a fair amount of leadership development and a large part of that is communication skills. People want to automatically lump that into a "soft skill" but if you know a few tricks to help get around the emotion that sometimes gets in the way of productivity and results, you'll be much more effective. It pays to listen. It pays to acknowledge the good work of others. It pays to hold people accountable while giving them your support. It pays to care about them. And it's just the right thing to do, too. That's what I think.