Building an empowering environment
David Quick
Pinnacle Certified Guide | 3x CEO | TEDx Speaker | Leadership Coaching | Team Development | Helping Leadership Teams work fewer hours, be significantly more successful, and build stronger more powerful relationships.
As an employer, do you let your employees assume more responsibility when they demonstrate the ability? Do you know when that is, or do you keep telling yourself that they aren’t ready yet?
I’ve talk with hundreds of people every year who say they want to be treated as “partners” rather than just an employee. They want to be in the know and given additional responsibilities as opposed of just going through the motions day to day. Unfortunately, many employers do not do this. Your employees understand their jobs and what they have to do. They know their tasks, roles, and functions within the company. But there is a critical point that is often missed: It’s not possible for an employer to “empower” someone to be accountable and make good decisions. In addition to building trust with your employees, they must empower themselves. As a leader, your role is to encourage and support a positive decision-making environment, and give your employees the tools and knowledge they need to make and act upon their own decisions. By doing this, you help your employees reach an empowered state.
Part of building an environment that's empowering is your ability to run interference on behalf of your team. A strong leader ensures that people are safe doing their jobs and are given credit when credit is due. To make this happen, ongoing discussions of their needs, opportunities, obstacles, and projects is critical to the development and maintenance of a “safe” working environment. You are likely to spend a lot of time in dialogue with other supervisors, employees, and team members to make this happen.
Below are a few things you can do to build an empowering environment:
1. Give power to those who have demonstrated the capacity to handle the responsibility.
2. Create a positive environment in which people are encouraged to grow their skills.
3. Don’t second-guess your employees’ decisions and ideas unless it’s absolutely necessary. This undermines their confidence and keeps them from sharing any future ideas with you.
4. Give your team discretion and autonomy over their tasks.
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