\u200bIn the first part of this series, we discussed the pitfalls managers often stumble into during their first months on the job\u2014not giving enough positive feedback, being too diplomatic around tough subjects, and suffocating their employees with directions.<\/p>\n
But those aren\u2019t the only common mistakes. In part two, we\u2019ll cover using the same approach with every employee and leaving out the \u201cwhy\u201d when you make requests.<\/p>\n
1. Treating everyone identically<\/b><\/p>\n
Your employees each have their own unique work styles and preferences. If you ignore those differences and manage everyone the same way, you\u2019ll squash a lot of their potential.<\/p>\n
Case in point: imagine one person wants weekly in-person check-ins to ensure that they\u2019re on the right course. Another would prefer to communicate updates via email, when necessary, and have a formal meeting once a month. Making the first employee wait four weeks for a face-to-face conversation would make him dissatisfied, frustrated, and unproductive, while asking the second employee to talk to you every week would make her annoyed and resentful.<\/p>\n
The solution is simple. Ask people how they\u2019d like to work with you. How often do they want to speak? Do they prefer email, quick meetings, phone calls, virtual calls, or chat? Would they rather receive more direction or less? What motivates them?<\/p>\n
Knowledge is power, and the more you know, the better you can manage your reports. In addition, they\u2019ll be grateful for your thoughtfulness\u2014which will encourage them to work harder.<\/p>\n
2. Being too authoritative<\/b><\/p>\n
If you want to demotivate your employees, then hand out seemingly arbitrary orders. Feeling like they\u2019re supposed to do something \u201cjust because\u201d will lead them to wonder why they\u2019re doing it all.<\/p>\n
Avoid this scenario by giving your directions context. Let\u2019s say your manager has asked you to reduce spending this quarter, so you want to go through each employee\u2019s typical monthly spend and find areas for cutting costs. You could just tell everyone to forward you a line-item spreadsheet of their expenses from the past four months\u2014but the reaction will likely be less-than-pleased (even if they don\u2019t show it).<\/p>\n
Alternatively, you could say, \u201cHi guys. So-and-so reached out to me yesterday; we\u2019re reducing spending across the organization so that we can have a really strong quarter. I want to make sure we\u2019re using our budget as effectively as possible, so can everyone please send me a line-tem spreadsheet of your expenses from Q3? This information will really help me figure out how we can cut back as a team.\u201d<\/p>\n
With this explanation, your reports will be far less irritated about taking the time to create the spreadsheet\u2014all because you explained your rationale.<\/p>\n
Being a new manager isn\u2019t easy. You\u2019re dealing with a lot of responsibility, not to mention many situations you\u2019ve never encountered before. Don\u2019t worry if your first year isn\u2019t perfect.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
\u200bIn the first part of this series, we discussed the pitfalls managers often stumble into during their first months …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":70,"featured_media":551,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[10,26,27],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-550","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-blog","category-client","category-consultant"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n