Close your eyes and take yourself back to your first management job. It´s one of those long, hot summer days and you´re pondering how to get your team to step up, so you may as well give it some thought. When I first began in business I worked as a new manager for a hotel chain: I loved the job and was excited about my new-found responsibilities. Some of the best management lessons I´ve learned were those I learned at the beginning, and I think they still hold true.
Here are a few of my favorites:
Say thank you: One of my first bosses made it a point to say “thank you” to each employee on his team before he left for the day. Sometimes he´d stop and shake someone´s hand, or engage in conversation. Even if we hadn´t done anything particularly noteworthy that day, we felt great that someone in management noticed us and even better, listened to us. It´s a fact that we´re all busier than we ever thought possible. It´s also a fact that people want to work with those they like and trust. We also want to work with people who appreciate the work we do. As my grandma would have said, a little bit goes a long way.
Tackle the tough questions: Have you ever arrived at a hotel in the middle of the night, only to find they´ve overbooked and you don´t have the room you thought you had? As a young Assistant Manager, being on the other side of that fence was tough-I was tasked with explaining to the customer that we were overbooked and would have to place them elsewhere. Not everyone took the news well, as you can imagine! It´s true that filling a hotel´s rooms perfectly is almost as much of an art as it is a science and sometimes it doesn´t work out just right. And in almost any area of business, sometimes our team drops the ball, or we do. I learned very quickly how to deliver negative news with grace and more importantly, how to regain my customer´s confidence.
Have a two-way conversation: There´s a lot of noise out there today about being transparent, but it isn´t always so easy to achieve. Face it, employees these days are wary. Company loyalty often isn´t what it used to be. Good leadership is walking the walk, not just talking the talk. Authenticity is what it´s all about.
I think you´ll agree it´s true: when it comes to good leadership, some things just don´t change.