“People are people” the old saying goes. That means everyone brings his or her own personal baggage with him or her to work. People make poor choices, act rashly and defend their own comfort zones. People have agendas all their own that often have nothing to do with the work agenda that you, as the manager, are promoting.
The best managers try hard to motivate and guide their people to meet agreed-upon goals. Procedures, protocols and guidelines are put in place to help keep things fair and organized. Feedback, motivation and direction are given. But at the end of the day, good managers realize there is no good way to manage people.
But since managing people is the key to any business success, you have to try anyway.
There are many books on people management, and you may have practiced all the different styles. There are really only two things to do. One is to make sure your staff is getting ongoing training, feedback, correction and motivation for all their work-related behaviors. The other is to leave your people alone and let them work. The trick is to know when to do which with each person.
Here are some ways you can try:
Best practices
Create models of best performance and best practices for employees to learn, copy and aspire to. You can create goals, requirements and performance thresholds to use as measurement tools.
Be fair and consistent in enforcing performance requirements and work rules, and be honest with them in your assessment of business conditions, in communication of company policies and your feelings about their performance.
Know your people
Get to know your people individually so you can find the right way to approach them, motivate and correct them. Spend a little time with each of your direct reports and encourage them to spend time with each of their direct reports.
Spending time together helps solidify teamwork, helps clarify any issues and helps to make sure you and your people are being accountable to each other.
Communicate
Stop relying on email and memos. Have personal conversations with the people in your group. Allow your people to be honest with you. Spend a little personal time with each person every month if you can.
Learn to be a good listener. You will learn a lot about how to deal with your people if you hear what they say.
Leave well enough alone
Sometimes managers feel that people can perform better and can produce more, but if employees have found a comfortable and satisfactory balance, it is best not to disturb it. Resist the temptation to over manage.
There are times your people just need to be left alone to do their jobs. Some days you will work hard to mold people’s behavior and performance when what they really needed was to be left alone to do their jobs. Some days you will leave people alone when what they really needed was to be working with someone. Try to ask yourself each day, Who needs time from me today?, Who needs to be left alone?
If you allow yourself to admit that there is no good way to manage people, you can do your company a lot of good by trying to be a better manager every day. Work on best practices, get to know your people, communicate personally and above all, leave well enough alone.
Tron Jordheim is CMO of StorageMart, one of the world’s largest privately held self-storage companies with locations across the U.S. and Canada. He has helped lead the company to double-digit revenue growth for the last four years by embracing digital marketing and call center support. With 40-plus years of experience in sales, marketing and training, he continues to be sought after as a public speaker, sales trainer and consultant. For more information, visit www.tronjordheim.com.
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