Most employees wonder what their management and leadership teams are doing day to day. Constant commands of new requests rain down from above constantly. When employees state that they are too busy the response from management is that they just need to prioritize.
The funny thing about prioritization is that each day it changes to the new fire that has popped up as being the most prioritized issue. Employees are just asked to do more without clarity or help in some cases. This is a huge frustration with employees and typically drives burn out.
Employees want to feel like they matter. When management tells the employee to do a new task that has popped up without support that feeling of frustration sets in. It can feel like a hamster on a wheel every new day. When it comes time for the end of year review the main goals that were requested at the beginning of the year have been missed. The only trigger for a raise, promotion, a future with the organization was missed because of the ever changing priorites.
What can employees do? Can they fight back? Should they push back to management? Will management accept this stance? What is management doing to help the employees become more successful?
Most employees think of management as people sitting on a couch enjoying their favorite cereal, in their comfy pants. Meanwhile the employee is struggling to keep going. The employees become resentful that the manager is just barking orders to keep from being on the hotseat like an underperforming NFL coach.
Managers are meant to keep things moving forward by managing people and processes to maintain the flow. Just like a flowing river, if something gets jammed up then the water becomes stagnant and smells awful. Managers are there to keep things flowing. They manage a group of employees typically called the span of command.
Managers are working hard trying to manage priorities of the organization as those issues arise. They don’t want to keep pushing new orders, but they have to so they can stay in their position and collect their paycheck. Far too often new managers are not equipped to grow trust and influence with those that they manage driving dissention and hate in their groups. This then turns into having to fill another spot on their team when employees have had enough and leave.
Gallop did a poll and found that this lack of loyalty to the company can cause turnover, which can cost businesses approximately 1.5 times the annual salary of every person who quits.
What managers need to think of themselves is team leaders. Leaders help their teams by pouring into them and helping the team grow together. By investing into the team and helping them get better as well as fighting for their team, the leader will be rewarded with trust and influence. Leaders don’t just bark orders, they serve the team members. They serve by going the way and showing the way.
If you are in a management position, think about how you can serve the team so that they can improve. By serving you will get higher levels of engagement and success with your employees. Heck, they may even stay with you instead of chasing a pay raise at another organization.
Employees want to feel like they matter. If they feel like leadership and management does not care for them, they will ultimately disengage and look for other opportunities. We have just gone through what people are calling the great resignation. Leadership and management need to look themselves in the mirror and evaluate how they are leading their teams. They are costing the organization a great deal of money if they don’t take this hard look in the mirror.
Sincerely,
Kevin Sidebottom
“Businesses wonder why the majority of their sales teams struggle at winning profitable business. I equip your sales team to walk with the customer through the five buying decisions, and in the correct order to generate explosive revenues with greater profits!”
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1lWIVasmkFsoYL4h0AqIZgH6LC3qaw_gI/view?usp=sharing – client profile sheet
https://www.amazon.com/Sales-Process-Uncovered-Success-Influence/dp/0578421518 - Book
https://kevinsidebottom.kartra.com/page/5AF12 - Sales Process Uncovered Online Training
https://kevinsidebottom.kartra.com/page/68N10 - Trustworthy Online Training