So When Do We Lead?

As always, my friends over at HRM Today got me all inspired. I participated in this post on the forums and it brought up, yet another one of my pet peeves on leadership issues.

Very rarely in life when dealing with personal issues between employees, and especially managers, are people going to break through professional communication or interpersonal barriers on the first shot. Jenn Barnes from HR WENCH provides the argument that explaining the standard in a forceful and productive manner should be enough to fix the problem without additional oversight or coaching. While I think perhaps that HR managers may often feel that this is enough, I cannot in good conscience begin to coach or counsel someone without additional follow-up or oversight as a manager. Very rarely is having one discussion enough to fix a complex problem and, even if it happens to work out, I have always made a point to follow up even if it is just to "see how things are going". It is way too easy to simply give someone your take on something or issue directives and simply release them to succeed or fail. As a manager, I have always approached failure as not being an option. Therefore, if an employee brings an issue to my attention....I am involved and invested in the outcome now. I need to coach, I need to train, I need to create an action plan to solve the issue so that I can achieve positive outcomes for my organization as well as the parties involved.

Too often I think we forget to follow up on these issues. We let other priorities take control and as leaders forget about the little ankle biter "personal problems" until it comes to a negative climax of some sort. If an employee comes to you with a problem, most likely it is not just to get your opinion or to get some new set of marching orders, it is to get your involvement in some way. With involvement comes oversight.

I am not saying that it is possible to solve every problem that comes across your desk, I am simply saying that when you choose to help an employee solve a problem you now are making a commitment to that employee to see it through to the end. The WORST thing that can happen is for you to simply give lip service to how and what they are supposed to be acting or doing and then not show them or coach them to success in this endeavor you are requiring them to accomplish.

As managers, I encourage all of you to think about your day to day activities and the employees you talk to and start to police up the issues people have brought up to you in the past few days. Check in with the employee and ask questions to see if a situation has been resolved. Just because they have not come back into your office does not mean the issue has gone away, it may only mean they have lost confidence in your ability or will to deal with the situation which is the absolutely worst outcome you could conceive.

Coincidentally, I think this is something that will make all of us better PEOPLE as well as leaders. Write peoples names down on index cards when they come to talk to you about an issue if you have to, and daily and weekly go through those cards to make sure that your advice or action plan was followed and was positive in the situation. Your employees will immediately notice the difference and so will you.

Coincidentally, sometimes the best thing to do is to refrain from helping someone because of a need to show confidence in a person's abilities or to make them more independent....this is another way of giving someone a challenge and learning opportunity, even if it is covert and you still need to take responsibility for that person's success or failure and make sure your original outcome is achieved.