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Yesterday, I rode with a sales rep who had finished in the top 1% or her company the last 3 years. I'd say that's a pretty good rep, wouldn't you? I thought I'd pick her brain about what she was doing in the field to facilitate her sales, or what she liked about the company culture, or could she offer me any advice to help other reps. Do you want to know what we talked about for the first 2 hours? We talked about another rep, who is in the same region, who gets much more attention because she's a "problem child".
Guess what? I wasn't shocked. I see this all that time, and with every company I've worked with. It's a big issue, especially for management. Companies are neglecting their best people...in every industry. Why?
Reactive Management - The truth is that managers pay more attention to their problem children than their best employees. It's a natural tendency. I remember as a kid, my parents would pay much more attention to my brother, who was always in trouble. The other 4 kids, including myself, resented the preferential treatment. He was sent to a psychologist, and different specialists because he was "yearning for attention as a middle child". Which was exactly what he got, and lots of it, which in turn reinforced his behavior! I was just six years old, and even I could see what he was doing...he even admitted when we were older he knew exactly what he was doing and why. He felt special.
The same scenario applies to employees. Managers must not be reactive, but instead proactive. If you are a manager and you have an employee who is taking up most of your time, you should let that employee know right away, that you have other people working with you who are in need of help as well. Don't let a troublemaker monopolize all of your time, because if you do, I guarantee the other employees will feel neglected and harbor resentment towards both you and the employee. Nip it in the bud.
Survey Junkies - If I hear about one more stupid company survey result I'm going to vomit. They're not accurate! Why? Because people are afraid to be honest in those surveys. When I was in an Advisory Board meeting at one such company, they asked me what I thought of the surveys and my answer was simply, "They're bullshit.". Which elicited quite a response, with lots of murmuring and comments.
The reasons many surveys don't work is because despite the good intentions, the beginning questions are sometimes too specific to a person's role in the company and the employees feel like there will be repercussions if they answer honestly. You may ask, "well why would they feel that way?" Listed below is a series of questions from a survey I reviewed a month ago, and I paraphrased the questions, so I don't reveal the company or the survey.
1. Which division of the company do you work for?
2. What region of the USA do you work in?
3. Are you a regional manager, district manager, or sales rep?
4. What are your focus products in your region?
Those 4 questions alone might narrow the person taking the survey down to a select few individuals within the company, and therefore the expose employee's identity. If I was taking that survey there is no way in hell I would answer honestly, especially if I had negative things to say about my immediate supervisor. Many people taking surveys feel like they are a form of intrusion rather than the means to a solution.
Out of Sight, Out of Mind - If you're in management, unless someone is either performing wonderfully or performing horribly you really don't notice them. As a matter of fact, you're probably not even thinking about them at all. The sales rep I rode with for a day, said that her boss never calls her except to complain about what a pain in the ass the other reps are in her region. First of all, a manager should NEVER SHARE ISSUES with employees. In addition, relating personnel issues to an employee is just plain stupid. People talk...a lot. She told me he was looking for advice on the best way to manage his reps, but if he needs her advice then why isn't she the manager and not him!
If the only time you contact an employee is to let them know they suck or they're great, than as a boss you're simply an absentee manager. You might as well be like ET and just phone home because that's where you'll be once your employees start leaving...at home without a job.
The Rules of Engagement - I like that the word engagement is the new catch phrase for getting employees involved. It has a lot of different meanings:
en·gage·ment
inˈɡājmənt,enˈɡājmənt/
noun
noun: engagement; plural noun: engagements
- 1.a formal agreement to get married.
synonyms: marriage contract; More - the duration of an agreement to get married."a good long engagement to give you time to be sure"
- 2.an arrangement to do something or go somewhere at a fixed time."a dinner engagement"
synonyms: appointment, meeting, arrangement, commitment; More - 3.the action of engaging or being engaged."Britain's continued engagement in open trading"
An engagement could be a fight or battle or a formal agreement to get married. Two seemingly opposite ends of the relationship spectrum. However when engaging employees it is important to know that it's not always about the job. It is about forming business relationships. It doesn't mean you have to be married to your job or the people you work with, but it does mean you must foster relationships with people in order for everyone to be successful. Listed below are a few tips for managers on engagement:
- Be engaged yourself - I remember a long time ago in a business far, far, away, my boss called me in because he wanted to "get to know me". I sat down in front of his desk and he asked me a series of questions, but not in the normal course of conversation. More like a list that he had to check off. I felt like I just arrived at Customs in an airport. He wrote down my wife's name, my families names, where I lived, what I liked to do outside work, but he rarely looked up from his desk. It offended me rather than made me like him more. A good manager is engaged themselves.
- Share - The best people I have ever worked with shared their lives with me. I don't mean I went to their homes, or played with their dogs, but they shared a piece of themselves. It made the relationship that much stronger, and I'm still friends with many of them to this day. Don't just view your employees as numbers, but rather as people and if you share with them, they won't see you as just a manager or supervisor. However if you have some weird and creepy hobby or fetish, please keep that to yourself.
- Care - 15 years ago, I had been a manager for a few years, and a new management trainee came into my office and shared that he had an aging grandmother with a slew of medical bills. He asked if he could get an advance on his check for $1500. Well, the company I worked for never gave advances, especially ones for $1500, so I loaned him the money myself. Everyone thought I was crazy, but I knew he was good for it and it went to a good cause. He paid me back in 6 month, and he was one of the hardest working and loyal people I had the pleasure to work with. Just a great person.
I can't guarantee that this post will help you keep all your best people, but I can guarantee that it will make you think twice about neglecting them. And if you follow some of the tips, it will make them think twice about leaving.
Have a good day!
SFTD
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