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Opinion: Solutions for the skilled management shortage

Smart Ways Series

Posted online

People leave good jobs when they have bad bosses.

Many studies have corroborated this assertion and most people likely have experienced it for themselves, as a manager or employee.

Like many, I was thrust into my first management role with no training on how to lead people. As a result, I was a terrible boss. Turnover ran more than 300 percent the first year. It wasn’t until years later that I learned more effective ways to lead people.

Most managers possess a range of technical, organizational or project management skills. But, they also need to possess strong interpersonal skills today. Employees may tolerate a lack of technical or organizational skills, but they’re much less forgiving if the boss is ill equipped for effective communication, listening or collaboration.

When a manager lacks the necessary people skills, some employees will quit to look for another job, while others will quit but forget to tell you. This creates turnover and employee disengagement issues, costing the business both time and money.

The labor shortage problem is critical, with some surveys reporting nearly 50 percent of employers reporting they cannot get the skills they need. Workforce development will help, but it also would help for organizations to stop promoting their most skilled employees to management positions without sufficient people-skills training.

Here are four ways I see smart leaders manage people successfully.

1. Effective interpersonal communications
. Interpersonal communication is essential to leaders because it influences their relationship with others.

The best communicators focus on clarity and timeliness. They also make a deliberate effort to create meaningful conversations with people. One way to have meaningful conversations with employees is to ask about their spouse, family and their interests away from work, or express appreciation for the job they do.

Communication is all about relationships, and building valued relationships requires making time for regular personal interactions.

2. Effective listening. It’s crucial for managers to be good listeners. From our national millennial-employee study, colleague Bette Price and I discovered that 86 percent say their manager’s willingness to listen is a significant influence on how long they’d stay at a job. And 82 percent say they would leave if their boss didn’t value their opinion or ideas. 

Suspending judgments, giving undivided attention and being present (no multitasking allowed) are simple ways to demonstrate a willingness to listen and respect people’s opinions. Listening and respect build trust, and those are vital people skills for managers.

3. Humility. Employees want a work climate where relationships matter, not just results.  Focusing on others involves humility. A great example to me of humility was a female manager for a manufacturing client of mine. At a time of high turnover and low morale in the company, her department had no turnover and the highest performance.

She wasn’t concerned about her reputation or being liked; instead she focused on meeting her people’s needs for a positive, collaborative work culture. She also valued her people’s opinions, and she cared, praised and appreciated her people openly. But she also had the strength to correct an employee when needed.

4. Clear direction and goals. There is an enormous positive influence on employees when a leader communicates their direction and goals clearly. It reinforces the employee’s role, clarifies priorities and provides a motivating purpose people will rally around.

If, however, the direction or goals are unclear, it’s a recipe for several potential problems. For example, it can slow team progress and introduce anxiety into the culture. Levels of trust, problem solving and risk taking also may decline.
 
I’ve also seen clients lose some of their very best people because direction and goals were unclear for too long.

Obviously, there is a need to improve the people management skills in many organizations.

Consultant and professional speaker Mark Holmes is president of Springfield-based Consultant Board Inc. and SalesRevenueCoach.com. He’s also the author of “The Five Rules of Megavalue Selling.” He can be reached at mark@salesrevenuecoach.com.

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