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Issue 10 · Wednesday, 1 July 2009
A personal message from Joan
Welcome to the July edition of the newsletter. With Ascot over and Wimbledon well underway, we’re well and truly into summer and I hope those of you about to leave for holidays have a wonderful break.
No R&R for us at Ladder yet. I’ll be re-shooting the training DVDs in early July ready for launch in early September. The release date will be exactly 9 months on from when I ‘conceived’ the idea of the videos which may tell you something how I feel about this final phase of the project!
In this month’s article I’m addressing one of the issues managers talk to me about so often – how to tell their staff they want them to do something different. I hope you find it useful and, of course, if you have any questions or feedback just drop me a line.
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You want your staff to change the way they work – but how do you tell them?
There comes a time in every manager’s life when they need to tell their staff that the way they are working isn’t, well, working. They may need to explain that they need their staff to be ‘more effective team players’ or ‘more receptive to change’. The challenge is in how to explain to those staff why you need them to change their behaviours and how.
Research shows that that ‘being clear about what’s expected of them’ motivates staff to perform well. I suppose then, theoretically, then that it shouldn’t really matter how you communicate your need for new behaviours.
But of course it does matter. As I’m sure you already know, most people don’t like having new ideas which relate to the way they work, their behaviours, imposed on them. People usually have more commitment to something they co-create.
Here’s a useful framework for communicating new behaviours.
Communicating new behaviours – 3 steps
Explanation
This is all about setting the context for the change – in this case the changes you need in your staff’s behaviours.
When you want to ask your staff to make a change to their behaviours, the way they work, it’s a good idea to associate this with a change facing the business.
If you want your staff to be more effective team players, how will more effective team playing help the business meet the challenge of the change? Is it about needing to improve efficiency? Will more effective team playing improve customer service?
Most people can understand the need to make a change to their behaviours when it’s related to a bigger change – a business change. It just makes more sense to them.
Exploration
The idea here is to involve your staff in defining what the new behaviours should look like – in order to best build their commitment and motivation. Let’s take the example of ‘effective team playing’.
Options for involving your staff in defining new behaviours:
- Give them your description of effective team playing—as a draft—and ask them to make suggestions for improvement. Here’s a tip: be sure to make the description you’ve written look like a draft. Have some typos, crossing out, and so on. It’s hard to amend something that’s so perfect it looks like the finished version.
- Give them a relevant description of effective team playing that someone else has written. For example, from a colleague, from a definition you’ve found from the internet or from my upcoming e-book ‘176 Behavioural Performance Descriptions’ and ask them edit, amend, improve, add. (Contact me for more information on the e-book.)
- Explain how to define behaviours and ask them to write a draft description of effective team playing.
How do you choose which option?
I’d suggest the most effective way is to ask your staff what they would prefer.
Some staff would really dislike option 1 – they want to define the behaviours (option 3).
Some staff won’t want option 3 – they’d rather you show them what you have (option 1).
Some may want you just to tell them what you want. No problem.
Agreement
This is about you and your staff member bringing together your descriptions of what effective team playing looks like and agreeing a final definition. I’d suggest you then define this as a performance objective and incorporate it into your performance review or appraisal system in the usual way.
And, of course, you’ll need to agree any coaching or support your staff need in applying these new behaviours into practice.
In summary, it’s all about clarity and ‘adult to adult’ conversation.
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Joan Henshaw publishes her monthly Ladder newsletter for business owners and managers. If you want ideas on how to improve your practical people management practices, get your free tips now at www.ladderconsulting.com.
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