Excerpted from the Leader’s Guide to the CRM Learning training program, Preventing Workplace Bullying.

Recommended Training Resource: Preventing Workplace Bullying is the brand-new program that teaches people how to recognize and respond to bullies at work (whether the bully is a co-worker, subordinate or leader).

At its core, human motivation revolves around two important factors:
1. How people feel about themselves.
2. How they see others as feeling about them.

The relative importance of these two factors differs with every person. Some care little about what others think, some expect little of themselves…but, by and large, human beings are motivated to meet the expectations of others–to gain love, affection, attention, or approval from those who mean something to us. People become dissatisfied when events transpire to lower their opinions of themselves. Unsatisfying work, lack of recognition, poor working conditions, etc. all speak loudly: “You aren’t worth much.”

Thus, from the standpoint of motivation, there is a difference in those factors that motivate and those that breed unhappiness. Factors that breed unhappiness do so because they make a person feel small, unworthy. Motivation, on the other hand, is what makes a person feel bigger, more like the person he or she wants to be.

Here are some right-way and wrong-way behaviors managers must keep in mind.

Managerial Behaviors That Breed Unhappiness
1. Maintaining an atmosphere that encourages joking, time-wasting.
2. Displaying feigned, phony interest in employees’ lives.
3. Arbitrarily changing work completion times for employees.
4. Covertly assigning the same work to two or more peers.
5. Demeaning subordinates.
6. Not taking time to listen to employees’ input and suggestions.
7. Discouraging transfer opportunities for worthy employees.
8. Vacillating when confronted with uncomfortable decisions.
9. Failure to follow through on past promises to employees.
10. Displaying an “I’m telling you” attitude in communications with others.
11. Exhibiting low expectations of employee performance.
12. Making subordinates feel as if they are standing still, career-wise.
13. Not advising employees as to how they are progressing.
14. Setting up employees to take the blame when things go wrong.
15. Not providing timely feedback on work progress, completion.
16. Appearing to be unhelpful and unsupportive of employees.
17. Assigning menial busy-work tasks.

Managerial Behaviors that Motivate
1. Recognizing employees’ accomplishments.
2. Providing new and stimulating work, requiring “stretch.”
3. Delegating responsibility and authority.
4. Showing an open interest in employees’ work efforts.
5. Taking the time to listen to employee input and suggestions.
6. Providing constructive criticism.
7. Encouraging employees to find their own solutions.
8. Being willing to explore alternatives; avoiding rigidity.
9. Offering periodic coaching.
10. Showing confidence in employees.
11. Stimulating employees to make the extra effort.
12. Being considerate.
13. Encouraging employees to contribute and raise their self-image.
14. Establishing a climate of trust.
15. Communicating thoroughly.
16. Setting high expectations for employees — with their input.
17. Learning each employee’s strengths and work style preferences.
18. Helping employees to further develop existing skills and cultivate new skills.

Excerpted from the Leader’s Guide for the video program More Than Money.

Recommended Training Resource: Managing Me. As the leader of any group, problems are inevitable. When problems arise at work, a manager can choose to react with either impulse or reason, anger or managerial intelligence. In this video, managers will learn that how they react will determine the results they get.

Here’s a quick way to help your teams catch themselves when they’re mired in the past.

1) In the next team meeting, ask someone on the team to keep track of the number of times they hear statements that fall into the realm of the “past” versus those that fall into the realm of the “future.”

Signs a Discussion is bogged down in the “Past”
You hear a lot of opinions (“If you ask me, the problem is that we’ve over-produced.  Installation can’t keep up with sales.”)
You hear assessments (“Last time we tried that we lost money.”)
Your hear interpretations (“I’ve been saying for months now that the marketing team is under-staffed.”)
You hear analyses (“Maybe we should revisit the recommendations the research firm gave us last year–we might have missed something.”)
You hear judgments (“If we change our policy now, we’ll lose our old customers.”)

Statements that reveal a discussion is more “Future-Based”
“What if….”
“I think it’s possible to…”
“We can do….”
“This team is capable of….”

For example:
If anything were possible, what would this place look like in a year?
Seems to me, there’s got to be away to decrease this process by half…
Something like this would certainly make things easier for customers and I can see how it might be possible.

2) Bring the findings to the group’s attention and attempt to gain agreement around the concept of moving discussions from the past into the future.  The best way to break out of business as usual is by first envisioning the possibilities the future can hold.

3) After the team identifies and agrees to pursue a future-based idea, explain that they are now ready to move into the “Present.” This is where requests are issued (such as what needs to be done, by when and by whom) and employee commitments are made.

Excerpted from the Leader’s Guide to The Power of Future Conversation training program.

Recommended Training Resource: The Power of Future Conversation. Your teams can use the principles in this program to immediately refocus their communication in a way that will help them, and your organization, achieve positive change and growth. It’s all about getting out of the past, focusing on the future and acting in the present. This program shows how to reframe day-to-day conversations so that breakthroughs can occur.

Chapter 1

I walk down the street.
There’s a deep hole in the sidewalk.
And I fall in.
I am lost. I am helpless. It isn’t my fault.
It takes forever to find a way out.

Chapter 2

I walk down the same street.
There is a deep hole in the sidewalk.
I pretend I don’t see it. I fall in again.
I can’t believe I am in the same place.
But it isn’t my fault.
It takes a long time to get out.

Chapter 3

I walk down the same street and there is a deep hole in the sidewalk.
I see it there, and still I fall in.
It’s a habit.
But my eyes are open and I know where I am.
It is my fault and I get out immediately.

Chapter 4

I walk down the same street.
There is a deep hole in the sidewalk.
I walk around it.

Chapter 5

I walk down a different street.

Recommended Training Resource: Leadership and Self-Deception. Based on the best-selling book, this video and its accompanying materials explore our human tendency to look elsewhere for the cause of our problems when we should really be looking within.

 ACT AFTER YOU PLAN

• start with a written plan of action to avoid getting distracted
• keep your plan simple and straightforward
• start with the one thing you must get done today to feel productive
• should be a manageable item you can complete in 10-15 minutes
• break the day up into a number of “action sessions” for other tasks
• balance the time spent planning with time spent creating or doing
• avoid over-planning — another method of procrastination
• before ending your day, spend 10 minutes reviewing your progress
• take time to plan your actions for the next day

BE VISION-DIRECTED

• your tasks should match your values or purpose
• if not, you will find it hard to summon the energy to tackle them
• bring each task into congruence with your basic mission
• if you can’t, take it off of your list

BITE-SIZED PIECES

• don’t put any “to-do” on your list that takes more than 30 minutes
• if it takes longer, it’s actually a series of smaller “to-do’s”
• break each step out and list it separately
• you don’t have to tackle all the steps of a project in one sitting
• spread a large task out over several work sessions
• you will see greater progress as you check more items off your list
• you will avoid getting bogged down in one large task or project

DECIDE TO SCHEDULE IT

• determine how much you can do or tolerate at a time
• don’t push yourself too far or you’ll get bored or frustrated
• plan these project “pieces” into your daily activities
• set a “completion point” for accomplishing each small task
• completion points give you an end in sight to look forward to

GOOD ENOUGH IS GOOD ENOUGH

• don’t try to do everything perfectly
• perfectionism often causes procrastination
• perfectionists would rather put it off than do an incomplete job
• rather than perfection, aim for progress
• any small step toward completion is an accomplishment

JUST DO IT

• do the worst job (or part of the job) first and get it out of the way
• once you tackle the part you are dreading, the rest is a breeze
• stop spending time planning and just jump into doing it
• set a time limit — “I’ll file papers for 5 minutes”
• alternate unpleasant jobs with tasks you enjoy
• delegate out items you can’t make yourself do

PLAN AROUND INTERRUPTIONS

• interruptions tend to occur in identifiable patterns
• notice when interruptions occur, by whom, and why
• take steps to prevent those interruptions before they occur
• if they can’t be prevented, learn how to delegate to someone else
• if they can’t be delegated, learn how to delay until you are finished

REMEMBER TO MAKE IT FUN

• make the project and environment as pleasant as possible
• play music, open a window, have a cold drink, etc.
• give yourself the best tools and work space for the project
• take a few minutes to organize your work space
• a clean desk allows you to focus without visual distraction
• it’s only a chore if you think of it as a chore

STAYING MOTIVATED

• find an “accountability partner” to track your progress
• schedule a regular time to check in with a friend or colleague
• rewarding your accomplishments encourages productivity
• give yourself a break, a treat, a nap — whatever is a reward for you
• reward every step along the way, not just the end result
• the bigger the accomplishment, the bigger the reward

Copyright 2000-2009 Ramona Creel

About the Author: “Ramona Creel is a modern Renaissance woman and guru of simplicity — traveling the country as a full-time RVer, sharing her story of radically downsizing, and inspiring others to regain control of their own lives. As a Professional Organizer and Accountability Coach, Ramona will help you create the time and space to focus on your true priorities — clearing away the clutter and other obstacles standing in the way of that life you’ve always wanted to be living. As a Professional Photographer, Ramona captures powerful images of places and people as she travels. And as a travel writer, social commentator, and blogger, she shares her experiences and insights about the world as we know it. You can see all these sides of Ramona — read her articles, browse through her photographs, and even hire her to help get your life in order — at www.RamonaCreel.com. And be sure to follow her on Twitter and on Facebook.”

Recommended Training Resource: Accountability That Works! This innovative training program will provide everyone in your organization with the tools they need for a greater sense of responsibility and increased productivity, including teaching the skill of “self-empowerment” – doing whatever is necessary to complete the task, including overcoming procrastination, interruptions and other barriers to completion.

Last month, I shared a very powerful time management tool which has proven to be very successful for those who have attended our time management seminars.

In that article, Start a “Stop-Doing” List, I explained that a “Stop-Doing” list is nothing more than a simple inventory of bad habits or negative actions currently practiced by an individual, team or organization that would provide better results if they were discontinued.

I pointed out in that article that our seminar break-out sessions have clearly demonstrated that everyone’s list is uniquely focused on their own daily routines. While some commonalities emerged from the exercise, most attendees produced examples that differed greatly from others in the session.

For that reason, I chose not to share examples. However, since the appearance of that article, I have received several requests for some examples. Therefore, I’d like to share a few of the more generic samples which have been generated in our “I Hate Time Management” seminars.

Hopefully, one or more of these examples will inspire you to create your own list customized to reflect your own personal daily routine.

“I’m going to stop hiring the first body that walks through the door simply because I’m short-handed.”
Experience has proven that it’s actually much more painful and expensive in the long run.

“I’m going to stop telling employees how to do their jobs.”
Far better that I tell them the results I want and expect, and let them figure out how to attain them. I’ll offer to coach them and provide them with support, but allow them to figure it out.

“I’m going to stop managing people.”
My job is not to manage people. My job is to provide a context within which people can manage themselves.

“I’m going to stop trying to change people.”
I’m going to focus instead on utilizing their existing assets.

“I’m going to stop thinking I have to know the answer.”
I’m going to focus on knowing how to find the answers or surround myself with those who have them or know how to find them.

“I’m going to stop sending employees to training of any kind without explicit expectations.”
I did exactly that after our last session and was embarrassingly shocked at the positive results.

“I’m going to stop treating others as I would like to be treated.”
I’m going to instead treat them as they would like to be treated.

“I’m going to stop doing just annual performance reviews.”
Monthly reviews have proven to be much more effective.

“I’m going to stop thinking of salaries and benefits as an expense.”
I’m going to consider them instead as investments and treat them as such.

“I’m going to stop enabling my staff and start empowering them.”
They’ll never grow until I allow them to do so.
�
Now create your own personal list of things YOU need to stop doing. Significant improvement will never come until we learn how to stop doing things and behaving in ways that are no longer effective. Now is the time to start!

Recommended Training Resource: Time Challenged follows Kent, a harried supervisor, as he joins a self-help group for time-challenged individuals, and learns skills to better use his time, including giving up tasks and meetings that aren’t absolutely vital to his top priorities. This program also now available as an e-learning course.

If you do not have vacation time blocked off on the company schedule now for the end of the year, do not despair.  It seems everyone wants to have the holidays off, yet when we submit our annual vacation request, we may be turned down.  If you are glum over the prospect of limited holiday time off, console yourself with what you will actually be facing:

Reduced traffic
Quiet atmosphere
Limited interruptions
Greater concentration
Shortened hours
Lower stress
Sympathy from others

Throughout the year, it is easy to be swept up by the crisis du jour.  You may be responding to constant interruptions, multitasking all the time.  There is often no opportunity to pause for thinking and planning.  More involved projects get set aside for a “better” time when you can concentrate.  Many times these delayed activities are the most “important” projects, the ones that will actually make a difference.  However since they did not have a deadline or an “Urgent” tag attached to them, they were shuffled aside. 

• 51% of workers rate their productivity as just as high during the holiday week.
• 25% say it is even higher. (Harris Interactive Survey)

What can you do that would make you feel energized for the new year?  After catching up on key projects, look around and see where organizing could help you be even more productive.  Areas to examine:

Daily Systems:  Do you have an effective system for handling all of your daily incoming items?  A good system allow you to easily prioritize each day and ensures that you will never overlook and opportunity or miss a deadline. 

Desk:  Only what you use on a regular basis needs to be close to you.  Remove the accumulation from the past year.

Email:  When was the last time you zeroed out your inbox?  Set up folders both for Daily Action items and for reference files.

Filing:  Are your file folders stuffed and drawers overflowing?  Clean out unused, unneeded items.  Do you hesitate to file anything because you will never find it again?  A good program to help with that is the Paper Tiger filing system.

When you find yourself at the office during those holiday lulls, enjoy the peace and look forward to another time when you really need a break.  Hopefully it can be a time without peak fares, overbooked resorts, crowded slopes, and too many obligations.  Meanwhile you are organized and ready for a productive new year!

About the Author: Denise Landers is the author of Destination: Organization, A Week by Week Journey and the owner of Key Organization Systems, Inc.  As a national speaker, trainer, consultant, and writer she provides clients and audiences with the time management training tools and techniques that improve daily work flow and increase productivity.

Recommended Training Resource: Celebrate What’s Right With the World.  Rather than let ourselves feel glum about the hand we’ve been dealt, this program reminds us to celebrate what’s going right. How your employees view the world at large has a great effect on how they view their jobs, their coworkers, and their employer. In this program, National Geographic photographer Dewitt Jones shows them how to choose views that include bright possibilities for themselves and the organization.

Using the worksheet below, ask participants to record a few words or phrases they can say to themselves — and to the others involved — when they feel a conversation heating up and moving in an unpleasant and unproductive direction.

Worksheet

Many of us hear advice that suggests something like this: “When you get angry at a co-worker, and before you fly off the handle, take a deep breath.” 

Disagreement is not something to be avoided; a definite advantage in diverse workforces is, in fact, diversity of opinions and perspectives. Yet discussions that include disagreement require a bit of extra care. If not respectfully managed, these conversations can easily create tensions that become non-productive and have effects far past the initiating conversation.

In the space below, record a few words or phrases to actually say to yourself — and to the other person(s) involved — when you feel a conversation heating up and moving in an unpleasant and unproductive direction.

Share your results with a colleague.  See what questions or statements they use, and compare these to your own.

 Excerpted from the Leader’s Guide to The Respectful Communicator.

Recommended Training Resource: The Respectful Communicator. With the increased diversity present in today’s workplace, the potential for miscommunication has never been greater. This program shows how taking a few extra steps can keep misunderstandings to a minimum.  Onscreen hosts and dramatic vignettes demonstrate five respectful communication guidelines that participants can put into practice immediately.

Recommended Training Resource: Anyone Can Be An Ally  Featuring subject matter expert Brian McNaught and commentary from numerous individuals, this program puts a face on issues that confront LGBT workers. Viewers learn about unwelcoming vs. welcoming behaviors and are shown how to build a workplace where everyone feels comfortable and fully able to contribute.

This must be one of the most feared phrases that a good recruiter can hear, unfortunately, it and phrases like it are not uncommon. A better name for it is “reckless hiring,” as such demands are essentially a directive to source candidates who are the real-world equivalent to Homer Simpson. While I certainly understand the pain a vacancy, particularly one in a highly visible role, can cause, such shortsightedness often ends up backfiring.

The cost of hiring a weak employee like Homer Simpson in many cases exceeds the cost of leaving the position vacant until you can get a top-quality hire. Superior recruiters rarely cave to pressure and find ways to talk managers out of this silly request. Following are some arguments that I have developed to respond to “butts in chairs” recruiting requests.

(Incidentally, the same arguments can also be applied to existing weak employees in cases where layoffs or terminations are being considered.)

The Top 30 Arguments against Hiring “Butts in Chairs” a.k.a. Warm Bodies, “C” Players and Homer Simpson

Business Impacts of Butts in Chairs

• Lost productivity — a new hire who produces in the bottom quarter of employees in a position can produce between 25% and 600% less than a top performer. The quality of their work may even be lower than the volume of their output.
• Reduced revenue — if the new hire happens to be in a revenue-generating or revenue-impact position, the loss of revenue could be significant.
• Lost innovation – in a fast-moving world, high rates of innovation are critical to maintaining competitive advantage. Organizations cannot tolerate employees who are resistant to change and whose work may actually distract other employees.
• Customer impacts — customers know when they are dealing with a weak employee, so hiring a subpar employee into a role that interfaces with customers can measurably reduce sales, customer satisfaction, and increase customer turnover.
• Error rates – poor performers make many mistakes generating work that must be redone. Weak employees may also cause more accidents, hurting themselves and others.
• Slower time-to-market — weak employees are slower in both their work and their thinking. As a result, they can slow the progress of the entire team, especially in important areas like product development.
• Competitive advantage – hiring weak employees sends a message to competitors that you are getting weak. This might encourage and empower them to become more competitive and confident.

Increased Management Time and Effort From Butts in Chairs Employees

• More management time — weak hires are “high maintenance” requiring more coaching and concern. The time spent on weak employees can’t be spent on the best employees or on business planning.
• Weak hires must be replaced — even though “warm bodies” may appear to help in the short-term, eventually (when their weak performance can no longer be tolerated), they will have to be replaced. Unfortunately, weak hires have little chance of getting poached, so if your organizations is averse to firing, they may stay with you forever.
• Performance management and termination costs — weak employees require frequent performance management, sucking up management/HR time and development resources. Unfortunately most statistics reveal that such efforts fail, so all invested resources are essentially lost.

The Hiring Manager’s Image Is Impacted

• Being branded as a “C” manager — it’s a well-known business axiom that weak managers routinely hire weak employees (C managers hire C players). Hiring weak employees will send a clear message to everyone in the organization validating that a manager has become a “C” manager.
• Loss of your colleagues’ respect — Once a manager makes the decision to go down the butts-in-chairs road, they will instantly lose the respect of other managers. This loss of respect may negatively impact their willingness to cooperate, to share ideas, as well as their responses to 360° reviews.
• Reduced bonuses — for managers who hire and retain a significant percentage of weak performers, performance bonus opportunities will be significantly reduced.
• Impacts on promoteability — hiring weak employees will be noticed by superiors, which coupled with poor business results will limit chances of promotion. It may also limit opportunities for jobs at other firms.

People-management and Team Impacts

• Resentment by co-workers — better-performing employees often resent being on the same team with “losers.” They may have to spend a significant portion of their time helping out or fixing the mistakes of weak employees, ultimately reducing their productivity.
• Lost leadership and promotional opportunities — every weak hire is a missed opportunity for building leadership bench strength. If your organization’s attrition rate is high, you may be faced with a situation where a long-tenured weak hire may by default eventually become a team leader. Over the long term your internal candidate pool for promotions will be dramatically reduced.
• Increased turnover — hiring and keeping weak employees may send a clear message to high-quality employees that standards are being reduced and performance is no longer important. This may cause them to transfer or to quit the organization altogether.
• Reduced internal transfers — as other employees learn of reduced standards through informal channels, the number of quality employees who will consider transferring into affected departments will drop like a stone.
• Opportunity costs — every slot taken up by a weak employee can’t be filled with a great employee. Without as many great employees as possible, you won’t have an effective team that produces superior results.
• Negative impacts on future hiring — when candidates meet and interact with weak employees, they may reconsider and pursue other opportunities.
• Legal issues increase — weak hires are much more likely to file formal complaints and grievances. In addition, they often require extensive discipline. If a lawsuit or government complaint results, the cost of making a bad hire will be significantly amplified.
• Hiring costs — it costs no more to hire a better performer. The salary costs of weak hires are not lower than average employees.
• Lost agility — if your organization operates in a fast-changing business environment, every team needs to have agile members. A weak hire cannot contribute to that competency and will slow down everyone else on the team.
• Longer ramp-up time — weak new hires will require more intense and time-consuming onboarding, taking longer for them to reach minimum levels of productivity if even possible. As their salary will not be reduced during this time, your ROI will.
• Reduced learning — other members of the team can’t learn anything positive from weak employees, thus reducing overall team learning speed. If weak employees do coach others, they may actually hurt their productivity by steering them in the wrong direction.
• A loss of competitive intelligence — new hires who come from direct competitors can provide you with intelligence and best practices. Unfortunately, any “hurry-up” hiring is unlikely to capture even a single employee from your best competitors.
• Lower technology competence — candidates with the most technology experience and skills are difficult to land. As a result, a butts-in-chairs approach will likely yield fewer candidates with advanced technology skills and experience.
• More training is required — throughout their lifecycle, weak hires will require more access to training and retraining, which in addition to their lower levels of productivity may result in them costing more than they produce.
• A loss of diversity — rapid hiring of any kind without sufficient pre-work almost always results in lower-quality candidates. If you expect to hire diverse candidates, expect any “butts-in-chairs” approach to have a well-below-average yield in this area.
• More temporaries required — weak employees are more prone to absenteeism and tardiness, which will require more use of costly temporary workers to fill in.

Final Thoughts
Although it’s quite common for individual shortsighted managers to request that you stoop to a “butts-in-chairs” level, resist such demands. If momentary drops in standards catch on, it could decimate the organization. While not a scientific study, most informal assessments peg the cost of a bad hire to be 150-300% of their annual salary each year they remain employed. Professional recruiters have both a professional and fiduciary responsibility to their organization’s shareholders to ensure that new hires not only perform but also have the capability of continuous learning and eventual promotion. For external recruiters, the battle is even more difficult, but it still must be won unless they are willing to permanently damage their reputation.

Almost all “butts-in-chairs” hiring can be attributed to a failure to plan ahead. Forecasting hiring needs, developing candidate pools, and building candidate relationships are tried and true approaches that can prevent reckless hiring. If you are ever forced into a “butts-in-chairs” mode, it is essential that you use a “quality of hire” measure so that next time you a request, you will have supporting data demonstrating the dollar cost of the damage done by use this approach.

About the Author: Dr. John Sullivan is a well-known thought leader in HR. He is a frequent speaker and advisor to Fortune 500 and Silicon Valley firms. Formerly the chief talent officer for Agilent Technologies (the 43,000-employee HP spin-off), he is now a professor of management at San Francisco State University. More recruiting articles by Dr. Sullivan can be found in the ER Daily archives. Information about his numerous other articles, books and manuals about recruiting and HR can be found online.

Reprinted with permission of ERE Media.

Recommended Training Resource: Actions Speak The latest on behavior-based interviewing from thought leader, Dr. Paul Green. Content and examples are presented in an entertaining style perfect for a new generation of interviewers!