The dangers of having an arrogant team member

At the beginning of the month I wrote “The dangers of being an arrogant boss,” and a reader emailed me with an interesting comment. She said that she thought the advice was useful, but that it didn’t touch on the opposite—and just as important—issue of arrogant employees. “The fault can’t always be the boss’s,” she wrote.

That’s a valid point: One doesn’t need a management title to be arrogant—or to be destructive. Arrogant employees can be disastrous for teamwork, morale and even retention.  If you’re leading a team with an arrogant member, follow these tips to remedy the situation:

• Do not attempt to “put the person in his or her place.” Tempting as it might be, never respond to a team member’s arrogance with public condescension, sarcasm or chastisement. That will backfire for three reasons. First, it will make you appear petty to your team. Even if your team members are fed up with their arrogant peer, they still will not respond well to a leader who acts immaturely. Second, the arrogant person will likely respond argumentatively, which will elevate the tension without resolving the main problem. Third, insecurity is often at the heart of arrogance, so embarrassing the person will increase the insecurity and, possibly, the arrogance as well.

• Speak with the person privately. Make note of a specific incident in which the person’s arrogance negatively affected the team, and talk to the employee about it privately. Approach the situation as a coaching opportunity. Example: “Matt, I don’t know if you were aware of it, but today during the meeting, you talked about your and Martha’s success as if it were just yours. I want you to be aware of your word choices and how they might be interpreted.” Note: Stick to the individual incident, and do not make blanket statements like “Your arrogance is once again hurting our team dynamics” or “You need to check your ego.” In fact, if you can avoid using the loaded words “arrogant,” “egotistical” and any of their variations, all the better.

• Praise fairly—and generously. Alleviate everyone’s insecurities by regularly praising people’s successes openly. That will lessen the arrogant person’s need to toot his or her own horn all the time, and it will ease others’ fears that you’re missing their contributions. Example: “Everyone, I wanted to make you aware of the huge sale that Matt and Martha just made. It was the biggest we’ve had in six months. Martha, those late nights you spent researching XYZ really paid off, and Matt, you closed the sale like a pro. Let’s give them a round of applause.” In that scenario, you ensure that Martha—not to mention the rest of the team—knows that you recognize her value, and you also fulfill Matt’s need for approval.

• Expect progress, but recognize that real change takes time. Arrogance is a deeply ingrained characteristic. People don’t develop it overnight, and it won’t disappear that quickly either—even if you’re an excellent manager. Keep coaching the person when you see problematic behaviors and celebrating praiseworthy achievements. However, if you don’t see any improvement over time, consider letting the employee go. Do your best to help him or her become a team player, but ultimately you have to do what’s best for your team and your organization.

One final tip: Be aware of your blind spots. Many arrogant employees are average workers, but some are excellent at what they do. It’s much easier to recognize and be annoyed by the former group, but don’t forget about the latter. Sometimes managers turn a blind eye to their all-star performers’ egotism. After all, they really are the best at what they do, and you’re grateful for their contributions. However, their behavior can be just as damaging to the rest of your team members’ morale. If you ignore those employees’ arrogance, others will likely think you are unfair and out-of-touch—and a leader like that is even more destructive to a team than an arrogant employee is.

What tips do you have for managing arrogant employees?

[Image Source: Abe Novy]

Handling employees’ missed deadlines

During a recent dinner conversation, I asked a close friend “What is your biggest complaint about work?” Without hesitation, he said “People who miss their deadlines.” Then he went into a 20-minute tirade about how one missed deadline by one person throws everything off. He talked about how it is almost always up to him to make up for that person’s shortcomings. Finally, throwing his hands up in exasperation, he muttered “The work has to be done, even if that means that I log in over the weekend to finalize everything.”

The person making him crazy doesn’t report to him, and he is not one to go tattling to his boss, so he pretty much has learned to live with the problem. I wanted to be able to offer him some gem of information that would change his life. However, when you get down to it, this is the kind of performance issue that managers must address, so until he is willing to start pointing fingers, he’ll have to live with it.

You can make sure your employees don’t suffer the same fate. Things happen and you can’t expect every employee to meet every deadline, but if missed deadlines are becoming a problem in your department, take these steps:

1. Delegate effectively. That means dividing the work up evenly, assigning realistic deadlines and ensuring that people have the right skills and training to do the job. Dump too much work on someone or expect too quick turnarounds, and you are begging for missed deadlines.

2.  Prioritize employees’ assignments. One of the biggest productivity killers is allowing interruptions and seemingly urgent tasks to disrupt your work. As you make assignments, rank them, letting employees know how important and/or urgent it is for them to complete each task. Setting specific deadlines for every task you hand out is critical so that employees can prioritize their own work.

3. Battle procrastination.  Some people thrive on completing tasks at the last-minute. In fact, they may produce their best work then. Others put off tasks they simply dread. Still others drastically underestimate the time requirements of a particular task.You can reverse procrastination habits by monitoring employees’ progress, especially on big or long-term projects. Also, when you make assignments, talk about how much time you think it will require so that employees have a clear picture of what each assignment entails. And finally, break down larger jobs into smaller tasks with specific deadlines. That encourages steady progress, rather than leaving everything to the last minute.

What’s your biggest complaint about work?

[Image Source: Zach Klein]

Good management CREATES good employees; bad management ruins them

This is a guest article by Charlyne Meinhard.

You can hire the right employees for your business, but if your managers don’t manage them well, those good employees may wind up messing up, rather than stepping up.

Jen and Tim are managers of two totally different functions within Mid-Road Company, but they share the same frustrations about their employees.

“You won’t believe it!” Jen grumbles over her morning coffee in the company cafe. “We’ve got to rework the entire proposal that Ronald turned in! I paid for his overtime last week to get it finished, and today I find he didn’t follow the prescribed format. I’m so mad at him for making us miss this deadline!”

Tim nods and snorts, “Yeah, my employees are worthless, too. They all start out so upbeat and sunny, but it doesn’t take long before they’re upset and slacking.”

Quick to blame their employees for mistakes, these two managers seem blind to their own failure to give needed direction and encouragement to their employees. They don’t see how much their poor management skills are contributing to their employees’ low performance.

Bad managers are everywhere. Like Jen, they may be new to managing others or, like Tim, may have been promoted reluctantly into management. Good technical managers can be bad at managing others when they have not received management training or mentoring by a good manager.

What to do about it:

Three decades of field research with 100 mid-large size U.S. organizations across a broad industry cross-section give us seven key behaviors of managers that encourage good employees and help them become top performers.

Jen and Tim became better managers when they learned to:

• Challenge employees with new opportunities. Jen pigeon-holed her employees into routine tasks and offered little chance for them to learn new skills. Jen is applying this better management skill when she identifies which employees are ready for cross-training, are excited to take on additional tasks or show interest in growth opportunities.

• Recognize results in real time. Tim was so immersed in his own work that he ignored the daily accomplishments of his staff members. With management training, Tim knows to observe employees’ on-the-job performance and praise an employee’s good results at the time of achievement. Employees feel appreciated for their efforts and want to achieve even more.

• Ensure a healthy rate of change. Prior to coaching by her experienced manager, Jen regularly changed directions to her employees several times a day. Her manager taught her how to avoid passing down knee-jerk reactions that confused employees and drained their confidence. She now holds short “huddles” every morning with staff to clarify goals and direction for the day.

• Adopt an open climate. Before getting valuable guidance from his boss, Tim would spout the company statement of “open-door policy,” then sputter when no employee would approach him about issues or concerns. His boss encouraged him to set specific times to meet with each employee each week. Tim is now more accessible, and his employees feel empowered to list their questions and issues to cover in their weekly 30-minute individual meetings.

• Transcend the goal of making a profit. Previously, Jen hammered cost-savings so much that her employees began taking short-cuts on time and quality. She saw a bigger picture once she read and discussed the company’s annual report with her director. Jen now heightens employees’ awareness of their role in customer perception and long-term satisfaction. Employees respond readily to meeting and beating customer expectations. They are more committed to accuracy, completeness, and timeliness.

• Encourage flexibility and innovation. Before his “field trip” to key client sites, Tim demanded that his employees follow the same pattern of processing orders established years ago. Seeing and hearing client problems in real-time opened Tim’s eyes to the need for his department to change. Tim now regularly initiates problem-solving discussions with employees. They are energized by the opportunity to contribute and often surprise him with practical solutions that he never would have thought of on his own.

• Strengthen employee strengths. A significant step forward into good management for Jen and Tim was learning to set individual goals for employee development. Complaining in public about faults previously dominated their interactions with employees. Private discussions on performance strengths now have Jen and Tim working positively with each employee. Building a strength-development plan offers more insight into each employee than either of them imagined.

“Haven’t seen you around the café for quite a while,” exclaims Tim when he sees Jen. “Would you believe my employees just presented to our director the new processing system they designed? I never thought they had it in them, but my extra attention has sure increased their productivity.”

“Yeah, who knew?” exclaimed Jen. “We’re seeing some real improvements in my area, too, since I’ve been communicating more with my employees. They’re actually a good bunch, some with potential that I didn’t see when I used to complain about them,” she admits.

How about you?

Think about yourself as a manager. Do you use the kind of management skills that will help your employees be the best they can be?

Now more than ever, ALL employees and managers need to be the best at their jobs, becoming highly productive problem-solvers who help grow the business. Businesses can no longer afford to let managers get by with bad, or even average, management skills.

Focus on applying the tips above and you will upgrade your management skills for today’s world. You’ll create better employees, get better results and have less rework and frustration for yourself.

About the author: Charlyne Meinhard is a speaker, trainer and Chief Results Officer of Next Level Consulting, a consulting firm specializing in change leadership, talent development and innovation. With more than 20 years of experience, Charlyne inspires and teaches managers to lead successful changes in organizations like Verizon and SunTrust. She is also the author of Change Agentsto the Rescue! and Ahead of Change. To find out more about Charlyne’s speaking and consulting, please visit www.NextLevelForYou.com, email Charlyne@NextLevelForYou.com or call 804-382-5054.

Turn around a slacker’s performance

Slackers can ruin the dynamic of any team—without doing a thing. When workers get lazy, their colleagues have to do more than their fair share. That results in overworked, stressed-out employees and mediocre projects. When they search the Web, make personal phone calls and take long breaks, lazy workers reduce productivity and, when their laziness goes unchecked, morale.

With the tips below, you can stymie the slackers’ toxicity in your workplace:

• Confront the problem. Many bosses are tempted to ignore this issue. They may hope that in time slackers will step up their game and become more productive team members. However, ignoring lazy workers will exacerbate the problem. It sends the message to slackers that you approve of their work habits and to hard working employees that you don’t value their work ethic. Instead, meet one-on-one with the offenders and tell them that their actions—or lack thereof—are not going unnoticed. Cite specific, documented occurrences and tell them that their work habits don’t change, there will be consequences.

• Make note of work habits. After speaking with the slackers, continue to document their successes and failures. When they do good work, reward them with praise and a sincere “Thank you.” If a slacker’s habits don’t change, be sure to record that too, as you will need it as proof should you decide that you need to fire the person.

• Remove any hindrances to their productivity. If their slacking stems from distractions, block recreational websites like FaceBook, YouTube and ESPN. Over time, if their performance improves, you can remove the blocks, but keep an eye on their usage.

• Assign extra work. When you catch your slackers blatantly putting off work, send a clear message. Keep them busy by giving them extra tasks every time they seem to be slowing down. Fill up their “free time” and you will get the productivity out of them that you’ve been looking for.

• Explain your expectations. Set clear goals for what you need to see from them in the future. Say “I expect you to arrive to work on time, leave when your colleagues leave, follow company break policies and become a more productive member of this organization.” Get them to agree to lighten their teammates’ workload by doing their fair share. Then address your timeline for change; you should see a difference immediately and a complete turnaround in two weeks. If you don’t see the necessary improvements, you should replace that team member with someone who is willing to pull his or her own weight.

Want more tips for dealing with “toxic” employees like slackers? Check out Detox Your Workplace!, which will help you flush out toxic behaviors before they destroy your team.

What other tips do you have for dealing with slackers in the workplace?

[Image Source: Sergeant Killjoy]

Delegating tasks is critical to your success

One of the co-workers I’ve most liked and respected in my career is a hardworking woman who is full of great ideas and ambition and takes a lot of pride in her work. She is someone who you can tell is going to do great things during the span of her career.

That’s why one day, during a particularly stressful week, I was surprised to hear her say that she has a hard time delegating assignments. At a time when she needed to let go of a few tasks so that she could focus on her high priority to-dos, she couldn’t. Her words “I just can’t trust … or maybe trust is the wrong word … I just can’t seem to let assignments go and believe that they’ll get done correctly.” In other words, “If I want something done right, I have to do it myself.”

In my mind, I was thinking that someone who has big-picture thinking capability like she does shouldn’t be caught up in the minutiae of daily office work. Her natural ability to lead and strategize and innovate should be taking top bill. But like her, many supervisors out there really struggle when it comes to delegation, and trust—or lack there of—was indeed the right word for her to use.

Building up that trust in your employees is no easy feat. It’s hard to let go, and especially when you are a new supervisor, it’s difficult to risk failure by putting a project in the hands of someone who hasn’t proven him- or herself to you yet. But with every task you delegate, you offer an employee a valuable learning opportunity—and you free up your time to focus on your goals. Follow these tips to effectively delegate tasks to employees:

1. Assign the right task to the right person. Ask yourself these questions when you are planning to delegate work:

• Who has the skills and experience?
• Who has the time?
• Whose workload can handle additional assignments?
• Who has expressed interest in this type of work? In taking on more work?
• Who needs a challenge or change?
• Who deserves a growth or advancement opportunity?

2. Delegate, don’t dump. Don’t just hand off the assignments you hate doing—or simple menial assignments that you feel are beneath you. Offer rewarding, meaningful assignments that will work toward meeting your goals and support the vision. Those assignments should offer learning and growth opportunities to employees.

3. Develop everyone in your group. Delegating assignments to only your top performers will breed resentment among other employees. Offer assignments to all employees to increase their knowledge and skills.

4. Don’t micromanage. You can’t dictate how they execute the project. Make the assignment, and then give them the freedom to complete the work as they see fit—as long as the results are the same.

5. Ensure that they have all the resources they need to succeed. That means providing adequate directions, information, training, time manpower and equipment.

6. Hold them accountable. Make them understand that they are responsible for the outcome, and that the success or failure of a project is on their shoulders. However, do let them know that you are available to support them if they need it.

What task did you have the hardest time delegating to an employee? What was the outcome? 

The go-to danger

By Amy Beth Miller, editor of The Organized Executive

As a new manager, knowing there are one or two outstanding team members you can rely on in a pinch is a great comfort. The problem comes when you go to that go-to person too often.

I knew I had reached that point one day when I turned to ask Doug to handle another last-minute assignment and could see the frustration in his eyes. He had not only been handling his own responsibilities well but also had been picking up the slack for other team members whose performance was lagging.

Under the pressure of being a new manager, it can feel like you don’t have time to coach poor performers or to further develop your best team members. If you want to be a successful manager, you can’t afford not to raise your entire team’s performance.

Analyze each person’s current performance against the standards for that position. That will show you the gaps. Then consider what new tasks your team could take on with additional training. With that information, you can develop a plan to coach your team members.

Coaching your team is an investment in time, but it pays off quickly in their improved performance.

Start by learning how to become a remarkable coach, by attending the two-day Coaching Training Camp. You’ll learn how to overcome the biggest obstacles to coaching, apply a six-part coaching model and develop your own plan for being an effective coach.

Are you spending too much time in the conference room?

Meetings can be a complete waste of time. But even when meetings are useful and necessary, spending hours in the same conference room week after week can make you and your staff a little stir-crazy. Consider these alternatives to shake things up:

• Chat with employees. You can discover a lot by simply talking with your team members in casual settings. Stop by their workstations for status updates. The conversations will be more efficient and genuine, since they won’t be swayed by their co-workers’ opinions.

• Go to the source of the problem. If you’re meeting to address a particular issue or mistake, meet where it happened. If customers are complaining about the state of your fitting rooms, meet there. If the kitchen is confusing orders, meet there. Your employees will be more focused on the issue at hand, and being on location often illuminates the cause of the problem.

• Hold a walking meeting. If you’re meeting only with one or two people, walk while you talk. The exercise will stimulate your brain, and you won’t be tempted to let the meeting go longer than it needs to.

• Go outside. As the weather gets nicer, schedule an outdoor meeting. The sunshine and fresh air will invigorate your team. Note: Choose an outdoor location that offers plenty of shade. Sunburns shouldn’t be a side effect of a meeting!

Discover more ways to improve your meetings with the brand-new multimedia training kit Meeting Makeover: Say ‘Good-bye’ to Inefficient, Poorly Run Meetings.

What tips do you have for breaking out of a conference room rut?

Employee social media use: How to minimize your risk

This is a guest post by Jon Strother, Senior Copywriter/Editor and Social Media Manager at Global Compliance.

You’ve probably heard the stories. There’s the one about the employee who was terminated for criticizing her employer on Facebook … and then sued the organization for wrongful termination.  And of course there’s the one about the congressional staffers who tweeted updates about being drunk at work and other inappropriate topics.  In short, if you pay attention to the news, you know the use of social media by employees poses a risk. But do you know how to minimize that risk?

First, the bad news—the problem may be worse than you think.  Recently, the Ethics Resource Center’s 2011 National Business Ethics Survey revealed surprising statistics showing that active social networkers—defined as those employees who spend 30% or more of their working hours on social networking sites—have very different ideas about ethics than most other employees. For instance, 42% of those networkers indicated they would post negative information about their employer or co-workers on Twitter or other social media sites versus 6% of non-networkers. Similarly, 46% of networkers said they had no qualms about using company software on their home computers compared to 7% of other respondents, and 51% were willing to compensate for reduced wages or benefits by performing less work compared to 10% of non-networkers.

Why do social networkers behave the way they do? The survey didn’t capture what percentage of self-identified social networkers were using social media sites as part of their delegated job duties as compared to what percentage were doing so without authorization from their supervisors. If the numbers in the latter category were large, then the statistics may reflect a general disposition towards noncompliant behavior from those employees. In other words, being an active social networker may not be the source of their views on ethics; instead it could simply be one more example of how the employees bend or break the rules.

On the other hand, if legitimate, authorized social networkers are reporting similar attitudes towards ethics, we have to look for a deeper explanation. Could it be that social networkers just naturally view ethics in a different light? The free and open exchange of information is often viewed as a cornerstone of social networking and the internet age in general, so it only makes sense that many networkers would embrace a value system where property rights—intellectual or otherwise—are downplayed, sharing is encouraged and old 20^th century rules are meant to be broken.

Now for the good news. There are steps you can take to limit the risk employee social media use poses for your organization. Follow these guidelines to protect your organization:

• Adopt a social media policy that defines what social media activity is acceptable in the workplace.
   
• Determine if part of your policy is to limit internet access to social media sites on company computers.
   
• Ensure that all employees are not only aware of the policy but also trained on its details.
   
• Also train your employees on your organization’s Code of Conduct and the possible ramifications for behavior that violates the Code (you should be doing this already anyway). If appropriate, make sure employees realize this behavior may include public activities they engage in outside of work that reflect poorly on the company, such as bashing the company on social media sites.
   
• Determine who is actively using social networking sites at work and whether their networking has been approved by management.
   
• Keep a list of approved networkers.
   
• Determine what the appropriate response is to unapproved social networking, and be consistent with your response.
   
• Avoid “gray areas” where employees adopt social networking roles for themselves without proper authorization from management.

It’s true that there are limits to how much control you can exert over your employees’ social media activity. You can block access on their work computers, but they can still use their smartphones while sitting at their desks. And of course you can’t really control what employees tweet or blog about your company outside of work. That being said, by adopting, disseminating and enforcing a comprehensive social media policy, you let employees know what the rules are and what is expected of them. That gives them—and your organization—the opportunity to make social media a net plus rather than a potential source of disaster.

About the author:

This article was written by Jon Strother, Senior Copywriter/Editor and Social Media Manager at Global Compliance. Global Compliance provides whistleblower hotline services and corporate compliance training, including up-to-date courses on sexual harassment training and diversity training. Global Compliance has merged with ELT and EthicsPoint to form a new leading player in the governance, risk and compliance (GRC) industry.

My biggest mistake as a new manager

By Amy Beth Miller, editor of The Organized Executive

I’ve had to dismiss only one employee for poor performance, and my only regret is that I didn’t do it sooner.

I wanted her to succeed, and for weeks we struggled with no progress. It was stressful for everyone, including other team members, whom I had to rely on to pick up the slack.

When an employee’s performance falls short, start by asking yourself whether you have been clear about your expectations and provided adequate training. Do your part to set the person up to succeed, and then it is the employee’s responsibility to follow through.

Develop a performance improvement plan with specific benchmarks, deadlines and consequences. Meet frequently with the person to discuss progress.

Then if you have to terminate the employee, it won’t be a shock. And just as important, with a well-organized process, the problem won’t drag on too long and you will have documented the reasons behind your decision.

Bud to Boss: A New Supervisor’s Guide to Turning Around Poor Performers shows you how to correct performance issues and manage the most difficult people. Learn more at BudtoBoss.com.

The best thing you can do about your worst employees

Dan McCarthy recently wrote a post for his Great Leadership blog titled “The 10 Mistakes Every Leader Should Make (and learn from) Before They Die.” The post and the comments that followed it were insightful and thought-provoking.

The regret that Dan claims to hear the most is “Taking too long to fire a poor performer.” I don’t think firing employees comes naturally to anyone—except perhaps Donald Trump. Many new leaders avoid making this tough call. But keeping a poor performer on staff is detrimental to your bottom line as well as your team’s productivity and morale.

Your staff knows when a teammate isn’t pulling his or her own weight, and that can lead to laziness (“If she can get away with that, why am I working so hard?”) and bitterness (“Why am I wasting my time working for an organization that doesn’t value my hard work any more than his under-performance?”). Furthermore, the longer you keep a poor performing employee on, the more respect you lose from your team.

If you have a poor performer on your team and have been avoiding pulling the trigger, follow these steps to take care of the problem and move on:

• Find the source of the performance problems. Discover whether your employee doesn’t understand the requirements, isn’t capable of doing the work or is choosing not to do the work well.
   
• Help the employee improve his or her performance. Give the person honest, direct feedback. Clearly define your expectations. Provide necessary training. Adjust your motivation techniques to his or her style.
   
• Document, document, document. Make notes about the employee’s performance and your feedback, especially regarding missed benchmarks.
   
• Recognize when enough is enough. If you’ve done everything in your power to help the employee but there’s no significant improvement, accept that the person just isn’t a good fit for your organization.
   
• Have a plan in place. Be prepared to delegate assignments so that the employee’s unfinished projects are covered. Make a list of items to collect from the person, including keys and equipment, and of any items that will need to be updated, such as passwords.
   
• Rehearse the meeting. Especially if this is your first time firing someone, don’t “wing it.” Plan exactly what you will say, where and when you will say it and who will be there, such as an HR representative.
   
• Remind yourself that this is the best decision for everyone involved. You’ve already determined that letting go of this employee will be better for your organization, the team and yourself, but keep in mind that it is also good for the employee. The person might not think so at the time, but you’re releasing him or her from a position of failure, which is inevitably diminishes self-respect. You’re giving this person an opportunity to start fresh.

Have you made the mistake of holding on to a poor performer for too long? How did it turn out? Or, if you’ve been quicker to cut the dead weight, what tips do you have for easing the firing process?