Help them ‘be their own success story’
Keeping your organization nimble and flexible isn’t easy because it seems like when you get used to something, it changes up, Shoemaker says. Whether it’s technology or regulations, everything is like that. In fact, that’s all the younger generation knows.
“They’re used to this ever-changing model, and I think that sometimes they feel like it’s stagnant if it’s not changing and updating,” she says.
Today’s tight labor market makes the ability to adjust more important.
“Change management is horribly hard for a lot of people, because, again, we have this stigma about ‘this is the way we’ve always done it,’ and people are just accustomed to doing it this way, whether it’s the right away or the wrong way. That’s just what it is,” Shoemaker says.
When you’re looking for new and innovative ways to do something, you have to create trust with your team so they’ll bring you solutions.
So, after you hire people you trust, Shoemaker says it’s a matter of giving them clear direction, expectations and accountability, without stifling their creativity or making them feel like you’re not listening.
“I think you need to give people the freedom to be their own success story,” she says.
In other words, delegation. How to delegate was the hardest skill for Shoemaker to learn. She says her personality tended to be — and still kind of is — “OK, we need to get this done, let me just do it.”
However, Shoemaker says you get to a point where you realize that you aren’t helping your team be more successful. You have to focus on the outcome, and not worry about how they’re doing it. And once you learn to step back, it will make you proud to be a part of that person’s growth.
“We have such tenure within our organization of people that have started out in, let’s just say, entry-level positions and have grown to senior level management because they’ve been able to shine,” she says.
