"A Leader's Protection!"; How to protect your people from themselves and dysfunctional leadership!

Protection, one of the key 5 words I use to describe Leadership: Impact, Influence, decision-making, expectations, and PROTECTION!!! All five are necessary and important for great leadership (professionally or personally), but for the sake of this Blog, I want to focus on the concept of protection and how you can best care for your people, your team, your leadership, and the future!

As parents have the innate calling to protect their children, as animals have a calling to protect their young… true leaders have a calling to protect their people, their vision, and the future. At times, leaders have to protect their people from themselves and natural human behavior; while other times, leaders may have to protect their people from the leaders themselves… I’ll explain!

Protecting Your People From Themselves & Natural Human Behavior

Whether we’re talking about being in a professional position of leadership or a leader in your personal life with family and friends… you know the people around you: their personality, their tendencies, their commitment level, and such. Therefore there should little surprises when our people behave or perform the way they’ve typically shown to be their baseline. Natural human behavior sets in when the individual is allowed to behave at their insufficient or negative-culture spreading baseline without consequence. This factor multiples as others witness the pattern, mimick the pattern, and becomes most damaging when your “Inspired and Motivated” people decide to do and be less due to unchecked or ignored negative patterns. For example… an employee continuously comes in late, or doesn’t meet deadlines, or is not sufficient at their job (I’m sure you can add many more scenarios) and this goes unchecked or ignored… it’s as good as being allowed! Eventually, it slowly begins to trickle into others… even into the “Inspired & Motivated” (the people willing to be more, do more, and excel). Only then does the leader speak up and question the behavior; only to hear, “Well _______ does it, why are you only talking to me about it”. This epidemic plays out in companies and homes alike… it’s everywhere! So what to do?

1.    Be clear regarding the high expectations and standards of your vision

2.    Accept full-responsibility for allowing things to slide and declare a new day

3.    Enforce responsibility and accountability

4.    Continuously speak the language (The Leader’s 7!) of your people in casual times and in tough conversations; being willing to meet their needs as much as possible while maintaining the vision, goals and high standards! Doing this allows #5 to be a bit easier; as you know you’ve done all you could and can sleep in peace knowing it was the other person’s decision to do or not to do.

5.    Follow through on plans of action and consequences when necessary

This is not suggesting cold-hearted leadership or that there won’t be circumstances to address on an individual basis. It suggests knowing your people whether you’ve chosen the team, inherited the team, or gave birth to the team and leading accordingly. Here’s a question, what do they want to get out of the experience of working with or for you?  Maybe it’s experience, advancement, or maybe it’s as simple as a great dental plan! As leaders, It’s a great awareness lead-in for when you have to motivate and challenge your people; protecting their vision of success and your standards and expectations.

Protecting Your People from Leadership

Over the years, I’ve seen this form of protection become more and more necessary in two areas:

1.    Overworking & Overwhelming our “Inspired & Motivated” Employees

2.    Employee Vacation Angst

Overworking & Overwhelming our “Inspired & Motivated” Employees

Too many times an underwhelming employee; in regards to knowledge-base, positive company progressive output, and/or poor rule-compliance is not expected to improve or is monitored from afar for an undetermined time period while their work and the duties of their position are dumped onto the “Inspired & Motivated” Employee. Over time, more and more underwhelming employee’s work continues to pile atop their desk and backs of the “Inspired & Motived” until they either become another burnt-out, negative, gossiping, underwhelming employee or they swipe-left, quit, and become an All-Star for someone else’s organization!

If you’re the employer in this situation, protect your great people by being honest, active, and appreciative. Be honest as you inform the “Inspired & Motivated” employee that you’re aware of the issue and others not getting their work done in a reasonable fashion. Be active in your praise for their work and ability, but most importantly be active in addressing and fixing the issue. Everyone is responsible for doing their job, pulling their weight, and making an impact within the organization by being positive, doing their best, and being their best. If their best is not good enough; the question becomes, “Why”?

1.    Do they need more training and practice? If so, are you willing to be patient with their progress and mistakes as they learn to become efficient and impactful in their job and it’s no longer passed on to someone else?

2.    What is their superpower? Are you asking them to do something outside of their ability or skillset?

3.    Are they in the Right-Seat within the organization?

4.    Lastly, is it time to create a win-win? A win for the employee to find another job they would be more effective in and happy at. A win for your company; allowing space for a person that fits the vision, standard, and expectations of your organization.

If you’re the employee in this situation, perhaps it makes sense to have a positive conversation with your employer to detail the work you’ve been doing and that you are happy to take on the responsibility of others but would appreciate a form of compensation (income, position, and/or time). It may be cheaper for them to have one “Inspired & Motivated” person getting the job done on-time and in an excellent manner compared to paying multiple people to do sub-par work that has to be corrected, redone, and late; damaging the reputation of the organization and leadership as a whole. Tip: As the employee… before having this conversation; be sure your current workload is up-to-date, you are exceeding the expectations of the organization, and have the time-management skills to deliver on your offer! Just a thought for employees and employers!

Vacations

I write about this in my upcoming book, 7 Ways to Lead! I love vacations; cruises especially… they are my favorite thing! However, I’ve never seen a generation so scared to take a vacation… The scamper to get everything done professionally and personally before leaving, the pending dome of returning to an overflowing desk and hundreds of emails, not to mention the new work that’s expected to be addressed as soon as you step foot back into the job. I’ve seen it drive employees crazy to the point they don’t even take vacation or… keep their phone and email on while vacationing… That’s fun!!! The employee can’t fully relax as they can hear their phone or computer buzzing, ringing, dinging, and chiming; having work constantly looming in the back of their mind… pulling them away from family;  only to have a possible fight about that with their significant other. Finally, the most dangerous aspect… once you respond once to a text, call, or email… you’ve opened the flood gate of expectation that it’s ok to intrude on your time when you’re off on vacation, cruising, or simply sitting on your couch doing nothing. If you don’t answer, will there be flack for that and you’re not a team player?

Can we, companies and leaders, protect our people from this madness; allowing your wonderful people to return to work lighter, joyful, relieved, reinvigorated, and ready! You know they weren’t at work… is it possible to allow an acceptable and agreed amount of catch-up time before hitting the ground with the new thing on the first or second day back. Is there a contingency plan for when the employee goes away? Ultimately, are your leaders developing other leaders to manage some of the details of the job in the absence of others? An employee that doesn’t take vacation or enjoy vacation can quickly become a burnt-out or bored-out employee that eventually creates havoc in your organization.

Remember, leaders protect! Protect their people from themselves, natural human behavior, and dysfunctional management! Enjoy your evolution!

“Leaders have to protect their people from themselves and natural human behavior; while other times, leaders may have to protect their people from those in positions of leadership and dysfunctional management” – Andre Young

written by: Andre Young

www.youevolvingnow.com