How Effective Are You As A Leader?

How well do you think you are doing as a leader? How do you know how well you are doing and what you need to be doing more or less of. The best feedback you can get is from the people you lead, but how many of us ever think to ask them?

These questions provide a great tool for leaders to "check into" the true experience of their employees. If you are honest with yourself, you’ll recognize areas that you can improve on.

1. I understand the mission/vision of my organization. Yes or No

Please explain answer. ___________________________________

2. I know what I am accountable for. Yes or No

Please explain answer. ___________________________________

3. I know how to measure my progress. Yes or No

Please explain answer. ___________________________________

4. I have the tools, knowledge and support I need to do my job well.
Yes or No

Please explain answer. ___________________________________

5. At work I have the opportunity to succeed daily. Yes or No

Please explain answer. ___________________________________

6. I receive regular constructive communication from my supervisor. Yes or No
Please explain answer. ___________________________________

7. I feel my supervisor cares about me as a person, not just as an employee.
Yes or No

Please explain answer. ___________________________________

8. I am encouraged to continually develop my skills. Yes or No

Please explain answer. ___________________________________

9. My opinions are valued by my supervisor. Yes or No

Please explain answer. ___________________________________

10. I would encourage anyone who is qualified to work for my organization
and for my supervisor. Yes or No


Yvonne Bleakley is the manager's mentor, director of http://www.coachuk.ltd.uk and creator of The Silent Motivator System, the proven step-by-step programme to maximise staff and gain true respect and commitment.

Download your free e-book "How to Maximise your Staff and Gain Respect" at http://www.silentmotivator.com

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Do modern day problems impact on your team’s performance?

These days we all have so much to live up to. We try to be perfect parents, perfect partners, have the perfect social life! Something has got to give or stress starts to creep in.

Do you take the time to listen to your staff member’s problems or issues? Do you show them that you understand, show you care? You may think that it is not your place to care, that they should leave personal issues at home and not let it affect their work. However, it is not always that easy for people to compartmentalise their lives in this way and personal problems often interfere with work performance. Their negative behaviour and moods can impact on the rest of the team. They either bring everyone else down with them creating an awful atmosphere, or they alienate themselves, making them feel even more depressed. As a manager, you have a duty to yourself, your boss and your team to deal with these issues in a compassionate manner.

Take the time to help your employee with their personal problems. Coach them to look for solutions and they will feel closer to you. In turn, they will perform better because you showed them you care. People don't care how much you know, until they know how much you care. This is an important employee retention and employee motivation discipline.

Continually offer them positive feedback whenever possible. From this point on you will notice that employees will go out of their way to do a great job, because you took the time to include them, empower them, to thank them and to show them that you care.

Yvonne Bleakley is the manager's mentor, director of http://www.coachuk.ltd.uk and creator of The Silent Motivator System, the proven step-by-step programme to maximise staff and gain true respect and commitment.

Download your free e-book "How to Maximise your Staff and Gain Respect" at http://www.silentmotivator.com










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I am so exited, Alex is on his way!

I just had to share this with everybody! We are all celebrating today in the Bleakley household. Alex, my eldest son, has been counting down the days, hours and minutes to get his results. We were up at midnight to find out his results online for his STEP exams (these are extra exams he needed to get his place at Queens college, Cambridge). Phew, he passed. Then we were up at 6.30 this morning to log onto the university site to confirm he has his place! He has just been into school to find his A Level result – 5 A’s and 1 B!

WOW, I am so proud, I keep crying.

Yvonne Bleakley is the manager's mentor, director of http://www.coachuk.ltd.uk and creator of The Silent Motivator System, the proven step-by-step programme to maximise staff and gain true respect and commitment.

Download your free e-book "How to Maximise your Staff and Gain Respect" at http://www.silentmotivator.com

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Discover How to Use Deadlines and Improve Your

The deadline is the most underappreciated part of delegation. Too many leaders give people tasks without asking what else they have on their “to do” list. This is a motivation killer. Not only is it disrespectful to the recipient, it is disrespectful to anyone who is depending on the person you just delegated to. Most people are trained to never say “no.” They have been wired to say “yes,” even when they know they already have too much on their plate. Often, the delegator already knows this, but chooses to take the position of “not my problem,” which in the long run destroys trust and respect for the delegator and decreases employee morale, organizational productivity, and profitability.

When you delegate a task, you must sit with the person you are delegating to and make sure that realistic deadlines are being created. It is your job as the delegator to help your people be successful and not set them up for failure. If you are delegating to someone who has a history of over-committing, it is important to help reconcile commitments to make sure that the most important things get done first.

Delegation Assignment

· Identify the key points of the project or dates when you want feedback about progress. This is the critical path that provides you with the feedback you need without causing you to micromanage your direct report or team. You need assurance that the delegated task or project is on track. You also need the opportunity to influence the project's direction and the team or individual's decisions.

· Identify the measurements or the outcome you will use to determine that the project was successfully completed. (This will make performance development planning more measurable and less subjective, too.)

· Explain how a task fits into the overall organizational picture, describe the measurable results you are looking for, and let them know how you will rate their performance. It is essential to let the person know how they are doing and whether they did a good job. In the end, as the leader, you should take the blame for failure and pass on the credit for success.

· Lastly, make sure that the team member knows that you want to know if any problems occur, and that you are available for any questions or guidance needed as the work progresses.

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How to Be a Motivational Leader

Management and leadership is all about motivation. There have been many books written about how good leaders are born and are down to personality traits. In my experience, once you learn the secret to motivating others, then it really doesn't matter what your personality type is. Yes, motivation can be learned.

So what is motivation? Motivation is certainly more than a motivational speaker who holds a seminar, hypes people up and then moves onto the next event while the delegates go back to their lives and roles in the work-place and quickly forget what it was that hyped them up. They are back to square one!

Without motivation, talent is nothing more than wasted potential. To be an effective motivator you need to offer on going support, follow up and accountability but you also need to be able to empower your team and raise their confidence within themselves. This is when you go from just being a mere manager to becoming an effective and inspirational leader.

So, how do we distinguish between a manager and a leader? Let's take a look:-

Managers

Provide clarity in short term objectives

Perpetuate historic control structures

Solve immediate problems personally

Maintain or improve the status quo

Plan, organise and control

Power comes from position

Authority comes from the organisation


Leaders


Establish the long-term vision

Create a climate of trust

Help their team to solve problems

Challenge and change the status quo

Coach and develop people

Power comes from influence

Authority comes from trust and respect

You cannot motivate another person to do anything. You can only provide the means and the atmosphere in which others motivate themselves. You are the leader and you must set the example by demonstrating appropriate behaviours. Take the time to define the appropriate behaviours you want to see in your employees, and then start demonstrating them. This is an important employee retention and employee motivation discipline.


Yvonne Bleakley is the manager's mentor, director of http://www.coachuk.ltd.uk and creator of The Silent Motivator System, the proven step-by-step programme to maximise staff and gain true respect and commitment.

Download your free e-book "How to Maximise your Staff and Gain Respect" at http://www.silentmotivator.com

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Manager or Coach?

The role we as managers adopt as coach can probably be best understood by the old adage "give someone a fish and feed them for a day, teach them to fish and feed them for a lifetime." In practice, coaching is about asking questions and never being the next person to speak! It is about helping individuals and teams to achieve their agreed objectives by maintaining or improving their own performance. As managers, this means creating the right conditions that will allow people to become self-motivated.

Being an effective coach at work could be compared to a sports coach. During any match there are three possible positions a coach can choose to position themselves, depending on their personal style of leadership and the situation. They can be on the pitch, in the stand or on the touch line.

In the first position, the coach is on the pitch and takes over from the players when they see things going wrong. Many new managers act like this shortly after promotion. They do this because they have not yet learned how to let people make acceptable mistakes and how to support them in understanding how to get it right the next time, without their direct intervention.

In the second position the coach retreats into the stand and adopts the role of the spectator watching the game from a distance. As a spectator the coach will get a good overview of the teams performance, but communication will be difficult and they will be seen as just another face in the crowd. When the game is over, spectators usually walk away, and some managers do this too, often misinterpreting for delegation what can be an abdication of their responsibility.

The third role is that of the coach who is determined to develop their teams performance. The coach stands at the touch line communicating with but not taking over from their players. In this position they share all the pleasure and the pain of their teams performance.

Most of the coaches work has of course been done long before the game began. During the individual and team coaching sessions, improvements to personal performance were planned and agreed, the tactics were clarified and positions people would play were notified.

Assignment

1. Think about how the example above relates to your role as a manager.
2. Which role are you playing?
3. Analyse the gap between who you are now and the manager you would like to be.
4. What new skills do you need to bridge this gap?
5. Compile an action plan and set some goals.

Yvonne Bleakley is the manager's mentor, director of http://www.coachuk.ltd.uk and creator of The Silent Motivator System, the proven step-by-step programme to maximise staff and gain true respect and commitment.

Download your free e-book "How to Maximise your Staff and Gain Respect” at http://www.silentmotivator.com

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How To Stop Constant Interuptions From Your Staff

Getting constant interruptions from their staff is one of the biggest complaints I get from my clients. You have just planned your day, written you tasks to be completed on your to-do-list and you are all set to tackle your list and have a productive day when one of your team members complains that they are not sure what to do with their task. Do you explain it all again to her for the fourth time or do you just take it off her? It would be quicker to do it yourself!

The number one reason that your staff say that they are not sure what to do is lack of confidence. They are looking for you approval. Your role as their manager is to build their confidence and aid their personal development. This will give you a strong team who are able to think for themselves and carry out their tasks with ease and confidence.

So, how can you help them do this? Answer: Ask Questions!

Asking quality questions and really listening to the answers are in my book two of the most important skills you need to master in order to motivate people into action.

When we ask the right questions, we encourage people to have their own insights, to have their own aha moments. If we want the other person to do all the thinking then asking questions is the only way to encourage this. By asking the right questions, you will get them thinking about the problem, whilst you just concentrate on getting them to do the thinking and come up with their own solutions. This will build their confidence in their ability as they realise that they do know the right answers and they are more than capable of carrying out their job.

How to ask the best questions

There are no right or wrong questions. However, the following will help you to ask useful questions:-

Staying in the present - don’t try to anticipate what their answer may be. Make sure that you are actively listening to them when they give you the answer.

Listen without judgment – the most important thing is that their answer is accepted by you as being true for them and that you move on. They may otherwise start to tell you what they think you want to hear and not what they are really thinking and feeling.
Don’t be attached to the outcome – like with staying in the present, you have to ensure that you don’t place getting the right answer to you, over the importance of hearing what the right answer is for them.

Staying focused on asking open questions – questions such as who, what, were and how are all open questions. These will give you more information in the answers that you receive than closed questions such as did, are, and can which are more likely to just produce a yes or no answer. A why question is sometimes useful to get them to see different motives of others or themselves in a situation but you need to be aware that it can also sometimes take them into their own fears and not expand their perception of what is really going on. Why questions can also lead to a blame or excuse culture so use them sparingly.

Stay curious – our natural state is to be curious. Remember when you were a child. Almost every other word was a question as we explored the world around us. We almost unlearn our natural state of asking questions. Stay away from the how to frame of mind when you tell them what they should be doing or try giving advice. Instead, stay curious with questions and get them to find solutions for themselves.

To receive a free subscription to the monthly Silent Motivator e-zine go to http://www.coachuk.ltd.uk You will receive regular tips on managing and motivating your team as well as access to a number of free resources and articles which can help you in team meetings to get the most out of your staff.

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5 Steps to Improving Performance

Lack of performance in a member of your staff can be attributed to one of two things. Either they have a competence problem, a commitment problem or both.

Competence is relatively easy to deal with. Once you have identified the issue, you can set about producing a training programme to help develop their skills, spend some time supervising them until they become competent, allow them to observe others, there are any number of ways that you can develop your staff with direction and support. Competence is learned over time as people develop their skills through experience.

Commitment, however, is a little bit more difficult to deal with as this is down to a combination of a person’s confidence and motivation. When a job is new to us and we are in learning mode, we have little or no competence but oodles of commitment. We are enthusiastic and eager to learn and determined to perform at our best. As we start to learn the job, our competence increases but out commitment diminishes as we realise that maybe the job is more difficult than we thought, or maybe not as challenging or as interesting as we thought, or maybe we are just not being recognised for our efforts. Human nature is such that we start to think “well why bother?”

Keep your people’s commitment by:-

1. Developing a learning and action plan that is right for them. Find out what their preferred learning styles are.
2. Be aware of how quickly they learn and adapt. Don’t allow them to become overwhelmed but just as importantly, keep their interest if they are a fast learner and they thrive by having responsibility.
3. Focus on the positive by catching them doing something right and acknowledge them for it.
4. If they do do something wrong while they are still inexperienced or they have a new task, then apologise for not making it clear to them. Yes, I do mean apologise! It is not their responsibility to understand you; it is your responsibility to be understood.
5. Keep them in the loop. People like to know what is going on and are more likely to be committed if they understand the bigger picture.


Yvonne Bleakley is the manager's mentor, director of http://www.coachuk.ltd.uk and creator of The Silent Motivator System, the proven step-by-step programme to maximise staff and gain true respect and commitment.
Download your free e-book "How to Maximise your Staff and Gain Respect" at http://www.silentmotivator.com

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How Do You Manage You Boss?

As a manager, obviously a huge part of your role is to be able to manage your team effectively, take responsibility for their development and wellbeing and get them onside to working towards a common goal. This of course starts with managing yourself. Effective leaders are first of all effective in managing themselves, their time, their focus and their emotions. But if you are in middle management, have you considered that you may also be responsible for managing your boss?

Just being good at your job doesn’t cut it when it comes to your annual rise, bonus or promotion. If your boss doesn’t know you exist or what your do, what you want or you just don’t have that rapport with them, then you will always be overlooked.

Managing your boss is no different to managing your staff. It is all down to the way you communicate with them. Remember, that the one asking the questions is the one controlling the conversation. It shows that you are taking an interest, and coupled with practising active listening skills, makes the other person feel important, respected and interesting. If you can make someone feel like that, you will be remembered for it.

Your boss will also regularly ask you questions to find out exactly what is happening and to check that you are competent. Make sure that you are always prepared for their questions so that you are able to give them a direct answer with confidence.

Some bosses have been in business for many years and have got into a managerial rut. They may not have had the advantage of learning how to manage effectively and get the most out of people, and they are managing the way they have always managed and how they were managed. If this is not your preferred style, then take the responsibility in teaching them how to manage you by finding out exactly what they expect from you, how they would like to be kept informed and how often. This will help if they have a tendency to micro-manage. Learn to predict what information they will want and present it to them before they ask for it.

If have a disagreement with your boss then you must never confront them. Instead, organise a convenient time for a discussion and again, control the conversation by asking question, then put your view across calmly and methodically. Take any criticism as a lesson in how to perform better rather than a personal attack. If you have a difficult boss with unreasonable behaviour, then remember that there is nothing you can do to change their behaviour but what you can do is manage your own. Learn how to manage your negative emotions and self defeating behaviour.

It is up to you to take personal responsibility for your destiny.

Finally, look at your boss as a partner rather than the enemy. You are all in the same business, working for the same company, towards the same goals.

Yvonne Bleakley is the Manager’s Mentor and creator of The Silent Motivator System, a 10 step system designed to turn managers and business owners into effective leaders and maximise their staff.

To receive a free subscription to the monthly Silent Motivator e-zine go to http://www.coachuk.ltd.uk You will receive regular tips on managing and motivating your team as well as access to a number of free resources and articles which can help you in team meetings to get the most out of your staff.

See Yvonne's blog http://silentmotivator.blogspot.com


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Executive Assistant - What Executives Want in Their Assistants

Being an Executive Assistant isn't about money or glamour. It's about providing valuable support to a person and an organization you believe in. Being an EA is a unique position and it takes a unique set of skills to achieve long term success. It isn't easy and it isn't always fun. It takes commitment and a drive to succeed. Having said that, it can be extremely rewarding and give you a great sense of achievement.

You will need to constantly improve your abilities and update your skills, remain flexible and level headed, even in the face of chaos. The EA provides nearly invisible support for the executive, acting with little supervision, anticipating needs while managing the day to day workflow and prioritizing various projects.

Here are a few core competencies required for such a role:-

Adaptable
Organised
Team player
Judgement
Computer skills
Customer Skills
Communication Skills
Knowledge of Business Concepts

Yvonne Bleakley is the manager's mentor, director of
http://www.coachuk.ltd.uk and creator of The Silent Motivator System, the proven step-by-step programme to maximise staff and gain true respect and commitment.

Download your free e-book "How to Maximise your Staff and Gain Respect" at http://www.silentmotivator.com

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Traing Without Follow-up is Just Entertainment

We humans are very lazy. We let projects slip and make unfulfilled promises. We get easily distracted, come up against obstacles and always manage to find more interesting things to do, rather than what we should be and have committed to doing, even though these things will take us toward our goals.

So, you have recognised a need for training, you have found the right course, but how is the learning from the course going to be sustained by the delegates if there is no follow-up? Most delegates will return back to the workplace, be thrown back into the routine and pressures of office life with the usual practices that they know and are comfortable with.

Companies spend millions on training but is all this money wasted if the Training Providers do not provide adequate follow-up support or the line managers do not take the time to agree learning objectives with regular reviews to ensure the implementation of the new learned skills?

Training is only as good as the follow-up. Without follow-up, delegates will retain no more than 20% of what is learned. That means that they forget 80% of what they learned on the course if it is not followed-up and implemented straight away.

So how can you ensure that you are getting the most out of your training?

1. Firstly note that you are to follow-up not check-up. Follow-up requires commitment to an ongoing relationship, supporting the delegate to the end with their success in mind. Checking-up implies a lack of trust and often results in losing sight of the objective.

2. Help the delegate to devise a plan of action on how the learning will be implemented being sure to have an overall objective or goal.

3. Be responsible for holding others accountable. If they are not fulfilling their promises then it is your job to find out why and what might be holding them back.

4. Make sure that the follow-up is consistent and on time. A regular appointment should be made and stuck to.

If you or your line managers are not able to take on this commitment, then get outside help from a coach. Coaching works through a rigorous follow-up process and an accountable relationship. The coach is able to take an outside view in a completely non-judgemental way.

Yvonne Bleakley is the manager's mentor, director of www.coachuk.ltd.uk and creator of The Silent Motivator System, the proven step-by-step programme to maximise staff and gain true respect and commitment.

Download your free e-book "How to Maximise your Staff and Gain Respect" at www.silentmotivator.com

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Have you set your own objectives?

If you don’t know what you’re doing, where you’re going or what you want then you can’t expect anybody else to? What do you want out of your role as a manager? What do you want out of your team? How do you want to be seen? How would you like to come across? How will you know when you have achieved it?

Set yourself some goals. This is so important, I can’t stress this enough. If you are not working towards your own goals and agenda then you are working towards somebody else’s. This goes beyond your targets and objectives set in your annual appraisal or quarterly review, and I’m not talking about the goals that your CEO has set for the company.

Of course these targets and goals are important. If they are not achieved then your company probably won’t achieve the overall goal, you won’t get your bonus or rise and it will do nothing for your self esteem. But what I am talking about is having your own personal goals.

You can use your targets as a starting point and ask yourself:-

· “What sort of person do I need to become to achieve these targets?”
· “What do my team need to do?”
· “How can I support them/who do they need me to be?”

Once you have answered these questions you can then start thinking about how you are going to bridge the gap between where you are now and where you want to be. What needs to happen? What help do you need? Can the company help with this? Do they provide training or funding for help?”

Now set about drawing up an action plan and don’t be afraid to ask your boss for help, it is in their interest after all.
You can find an article in the membership area of the Coach UK Ltd website to help you write your goals using my SPADE™ criteria. If you are not currently a member you can join for free by clicking on resources

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Overcoming the Challenges of a Manager

Do you end up solving the problems that your team members are supposed to?
Do you finish the unfinished or half finished work of your team members?
Do you allow your team members to delegate their work upwards to you?
Do you check for or chase for progress of work every few minutes
Do you end up saying, "Never mind, I will do it myself."

If you were to watch many managers at work, you may begin to wonder whether the traditional notion of the manager being the one who gets things done through others still exists. The problem is that when an employee’s title changes and now contains the word manager, they are suddenly expected to start to act like managers, yet receive little help and support in making the transition.

The lack of training and mentoring shows up in their struggle to plan, organise, prioritise, delegate and solve problems. More important, it also shows up in their struggle with managing people, especially in influencing them to do what they want them to do.

Learn to give a good brief and allow your staff space to grow

If you need a task done, it is important for the manager to first give his employee a good brief. The brief not only needs to be clear, specific and actionable, it also needs to be inspiring. The inability of managers to set the task against the right context and be able to show the big picture leaves employees confused about why they need to do the job and how it will help them and the organisation.

Managers tend to swing between two extremes in their style of securing results — at one extreme, you have those that nurture their staff and are almost patronising in their style. They are so frightened of not being liked that they are too helpful and eager to give advice and complete the work on the employee’s behalf.

At the other extreme, we have managers who believe that employees learn to swim when they are pushed into the water and therefore offer little support and can come across and condescending and arrogant.

Another common problem is that managers can tend to micro manage their employees in the anxiety for results, thereby robbing them of the elbow room and the opportunity to learn.
All this can be very exhausting and does nothing toward gaining the respect of your team. Get into the habit of taking a step back and allowing your team to grow and perform at their best, asking them questions or opinions rather that constantly instructing them.

Yvonne Bleakley is the manager's mentor, director of http://www.coachuk.ltd.uk and creator of The Silent Motivator System, the proven step-by-step programme to maximise staff and gain true respect and commitment.

Download your free e-book "How to Maximise your Staff and Gain Respect" at http://www.silentmotivator.com

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How to Recognise and Deal with Stress in the Workplace

Stress, simply put, is a person’s natural reaction to the demands and pressures of everyday life, both in the workplace and in our personal lives. Appropriate amounts of stress can stimulate and motivate all of us into action. This in itself is not a harmful or dangerous thing; indeed it is quite necessary.

However if the demands and pressures we face are too great, or are prolonged, the stress we experience can become harmful. In this difficult economy, workplace stress is a very real occurrenceStress in the workplace reduces productivity, increases management pressures, and makes people ill in many ways, evidence of which is still increasing. Workplace stress affects the performance of the brain, including functions of work performance; memory, concentration, and learning.Typical causes of workplace stress

· Lack of job security
· Lack of recognition
· Bullying or harassment, by anyone, not necessarily a person's manager
· Feeling powerless and uninvolved in determining one's own responsibilities
· Continuous unreasonable performance demands
· Lack of effective communication and conflict resolution
· Long working hours
· Excessive time away from home and family
· Office politics and conflict among staff
· A feeling that the reward is not congruent with the responsibility

How to Recognise Stress

Stress can be the cause of certain behavioural changes and as managers, it is not only important to recognise this in your self, but also those around you. Here are some clues as to what may be going on:-
· It may be hard to concentrate and remain focused on tasks in hand.
· It can become easy to lose the thread of what is being thought or said, even in mid–sentence.
· Memory, even for familiar things, declines.
· As a result of all these above, more errors are made than was previously the norm.
· The ability to relax, to feel good or happy, to ‘switch off’ anxiety reduces.
· Personality traits or standards might change
· Feelings of self-esteem and competence might diminish.

How to Deal with Stress

· Improve communication
· Share information with employees to reduce uncertainty about their jobs and futures.
· Clearly define employees’ roles and responsibilities.
· Make communication friendly and efficient, not mean-spirited or petty.
· Consult your employees
· Give workers opportunities to participate in decisions that affect their jobs.
· Consult employees about scheduling and work rules.
· Be sure the workload is suitable to employees’ abilities and resources; avoid unrealistic deadlines.
· Show that individual workers are valued.
· Offer rewards and incentives
· Praise good work performance verbally and institutionally.
· Provide opportunities for career development.
· Make management actions consistent with organisational values.
Stress is just an emotion and it is important that we feel no attachment to it. When you notice any of these clues to stress, just allow either yourself (or your staff member if applicable) to become aware of the emotion and to feel it rather than try to ignore it. It is when we ignore and stuff down our emotions that we incur problems.

Yvonne Bleakley is the manager's mentor, director of http://www.coachuk.ltd.uk/ and creator of The Silent Motivator System, the proven step-by-step programme to maximise staff and gain true respect and commitment.

Download your free e-book "How to Maximise your Staff and Gain Respect" at http://www.silentmotivator.com/

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Do You Play The Blame Game?

When something goes wrong, most organisations and managers need someone to blame and almost instigate a hunt to put a name to the culprit without ever thinking of the impact that this has on employees. If this is what is going on in your organisation then all employees will do is try to cover up mistakes and hide problems hoping that no one will find out. Genuine mistakes may go unnoticed and un-reported which may lead to even greater problems in the future. The result is that nothing ever gets resolved.

However, the impact of harnessing a blame culture is far greater that unresolved issues. Staff will lack initiative and creativity in case they make a mistake and are more concerned with covering their own back rather than engaging in more productive actions. If any staff member receives negative feedback for their actions, then this will soon become common knowledge within the workplace, especially if they have been dealt with harshly. They will start to loose trust and respect for their leaders.

If you use or hear such language as “who is responsible for this” or “when will they ever learn?” then this is the language of a blame culture. Rather than being focused on learning how to improve the situation or on the solution, this is focusing on finding someone to blame because it is always someone else’s fault.

So how do you move from a blame culture towards a culture where people feel empowered to take responsibility and feel personally accountable to solving problems?

Recognise that everybody makes mistakes.
Thank people for bringing problems to your attention.
Praise what people have achieved.
Take responsibility for your own actions.
Clarify what lessons can be learnt.
Recognise staff for identifying problems early and for suggesting improvements.

There is no such thing as failure, only results. If we learn from our results, then we can never fail.
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4 Steps to Dealing with Difficult Staff

Most managers will do almost anything to avoid having a "difficult conversation" with an employee, because they simply don't know how to do them!
Why? Well, most good managers were promoted into management because they almost always did the right thing - without being told. They had initiative. They produced results..
Every manager in their career stumbles across a challenging employee….one who frustrates them and takes a lot of their energy to manage such as:-
· Someone with an “attitude”
· Doesn’t work well with other members on the team
· Challenges everything
· Fail to meet expectations
· Great at some things and weak in others
· Attendance issues
· Fail to follow procedures
As anyone who has had to put up with difficult behaviour knows, it is not funny when a colleague causes problems at work, and the effects can ripple out, having a negative effect on relationships, productivity, and general staff welfare.
Managers fear that if they speak with employee they may react defensively or the issue seems minor and mentioning it could de-motivate the employee. The stress brought about by difficult behaviour at work can be serious. Many people lead pressured lives anyway, without the unnecessary stress of having to cope with the behaviour of someone who sapps our energy and enthusiasm.
The cost of disputes at work goes far beyond the direct impact on those involved. The trouble isn't necessarily the fact that conflict exists. It's the damage that it causes when conflicts aren't resolved. The impact of an ongoing dispute at work can be catastrophic to those in the dispute, but also to their colleagues and the business as a whole.
Difficult people exist in every organization and although your natural instinct maybe to ignore and avoid them, you do so at your peril. As a Manager you’re not only responsible for your own success and job satisfaction but also that of your team. Challenging people should be a top management priority as they can adversely affect self-esteem, workplace happiness, business success and team member retention.

1. Create some notes around the behaviour or performance issue you find disturbing or challenging. This helps keep you focus especially if the employee gets defensive.

2. Sit down with the employee and find out how they feel about their job and do they have any concerns or issues they want to discuss.. Don’t rush into your agenda, but rather be open to what they have to say. This open conversation can potentially eliminate a lot of stress for both of you.

3. State clearly the behaviour or performance issue you want to address with them and provide no more than three examples to support your concern. If they become defensive, listen to them for a while to see if there you can gather information to further understand how to support the employee. If they are rambling, bring them gently back to the issues and ask them what they think they need to do to correct the situation. Help them come up a suitable solution.

4. Follow Up! No matter what the outcome of the meeting, always follow up with the employee. If you need to provide further clarity for the employee, then do so. If the employee has solved their problem, then acknowledge them. Let them know that you are available to help them with any of their concerns, your role as their manager is to support them.

Yvonne Bleakley is the manager's mentor, director of http://www.coachuk.ltd.uk and creator of The Silent Motivator System, the proven step-by-step programme to maximise staff and gain true respect and commitment.
Download your free e-book "How to Maximise your Staff and Gain Respect" at http://www.silentmotivator.com
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Are You Delegating for Success?

Have you ever noticed that great leaders are also excellent delegators? Delegation saves time, develops and motivates people, and makes an organization more productive. Therefore, it is fair to say that this is one of the most critical skills for any leader or manager to acquire. For this reason, I encourage every leader to become a master delegator.

On the surface this seems like an easy task. Give your work to someone else; sounds nice, doesn't it? So why are so many leaders so reluctant to delegate? And when they do, why do so many leaders delegate so poorly?

The problem is that many leaders have acquired the skill of delegation through on-the-job learning. There is no course in school and only minimal reference to delegation in textbooks at school. Delegation is not easy and is a process that has a sequence of steps. Like any process, if you miss a step, it does not work properly.

There are Seven Steps in the Delegation Process:

Defining What to Delegate - There are really three reasons to delegate work: to better control our use of time, to build our people, or to motivate our people. So the first question you will need to answer is: why are you delegating? When looking through these three lenses, we usually find a reason to assign most of the work on our desks to others. The higher you are in the organization, the more your role should be growing and developing the organization and less "doing." Delegation is the primary tool!

Selecting the Individual or Team - Too often leaders go to the same people over and over again. They get too comfortable with specific individuals or teams. This is usually a mistake as it de-motivates other team members in the organization and may even compromise the performance of your best team members. Your team usually depends on support from the rest of the organization to get things done. If you are not using other members, this may prevent the organization from coming together to its fullest potential. While I think we should always give our most important projects to our best players, we need to involve and delegate to the entire team at some point. With each person, consider why you are delegating (motivation, growth, or time management) a task, and match the appropriate tasks to that person's capabilities.

Assess Appropriate Level of Delegation - Typically, leaders delegate using the same style for every person on their team and this is a mistake. The level of delegation should be adjusted based on the task and the person being delegated to. Delegation is not just telling people what to do and expecting them to do it. There are many different degrees of supervision and involvement required of the person who is delegating the task. The more experienced and reliable the other person is, the more freedom you can give. The more critical the task, the more cautious you need to be about extending a lot of freedom, especially if the company's financial future or reputation is on the line.

Communicate Tasks In Specific Terms - This is where most delegation fails. Many leaders and managers do not do a good job of expressing what they want. People are not mind-readers. Many hours have been wasted doing re-work because leaders failed to explain what they wanted up front. If you want something done a specific way, tell them. If you are not clear about what you want, take the time to brainstorm with your colleague before they start working. Ask for feedback to ensure that your instructions have been understood.

State Measurable Results - Explain how a task fits into the overall organizational picture, describe the measurable results you are looking for, and let them know how you will rate their performance.

Agree on Deadlines - The deadline is the most underappreciated part of delegation. Too many leaders give people tasks without asking what else they have on their "to do" list. This is a motivation killer. Not only is it disrespectful to the recipient, it is disrespectful to anyone who is depending on the person you just delegated to. Most people are trained to never say "no." They have been wired to say "yes," even when they know they already have too much on their plate. Often, the delegator already knows this, but chooses to take the position of "not my problem," which in the long run destroys trust and respect for the delegator and decreases employee morale, organizational productivity, and profitability. When you delegate a task, you must sit with the person you are delegating to and make sure that realistic deadlines are being created. It is your job as the delegator to help your people be successful and not set them up for failure. If you are delegating to someone who has a history of over-committing, it is important to help reconcile commitments to make sure that the most important things get done first.

Follow-up and Feedback - It is essential that you have a feedback system in place so that you know that things are on track. Provide support should they need help in getting the task accomplished. It is essential to let the person know how they are doing and whether they did a good job. In the end, as the leader, you should take the blame for failure and pass on the credit for success.

Delegation is one of the most important tasks as a leader. When done correctly, it develops your succession, increases your personal productivity, and motivates your people. Many leaders develop excuses not to delegate that include: they can do things faster themselves; they like doing things themselves; their people are not ready. These excuses and others all have short-term benefits but long-term adverse consequences. However, the investment in delegation is usually worth the positive long-term benefits.

Actions

1. Start keeping a time log. Record everything you are doing every 15 minutes. Be completely honest with yourself. You will be surprised at how much time you are spending doing simple tasks.
At the end of each day look down your log and make a note of all the tasks that you could have got someone else to do.

2. If they are regular tasks, create a system or instruction sheet. This allows you to delegate the same task to different people at different times without too much effort. You may have to put in a little effort with this at first but it will save you heaps of time in the long run and means that you always have a contingency if your regular assistant is unable to complete the task, or indeed, leaves the company.

3. Delegate!

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How to Lead a Team and Gain Respect

Most of us start at the bottom of the career ladder and work our way up. We become so proficient at our job, earning respect of the management and becoming a valued member of our team. Eventually promotion is offered, usually within the same team and we can find ourselves leader of the team we were once part of.

This does have its advantages, however, doesn't come without its problems. There is nothing that can gain respect more than people knowing that you have been there and done the job for yourself. You know the systems and procedures, what is expected and the problems that your team may encounter. You can see things from their point of view. This can be a great advantage when leading a team. You know when to cut the slack because of genuine difficulties, but you also know an excuse when you hear one.

The problems arise though when some of the team members may have been there much longer than you, may be older with more experience, or may feel that they were the ones that deserved the promotion. You may find it difficult to be assertive and to feel that you are taken seriously as a manager. Since you were once in their position,you will know how hard the job is and may feel guilty for enforcing deadlines. So how can you gain respect from your team and get them to do what you need them to without them thinking that power has gone to your head?

Firstly, stop beating yourself up and congratulate yourself on your promotion. It is quite normal to feel this way when you have been used to working on the other side ofthe fence, as it were. The dynamics of your team have now changed so now you need to embrace this change and take control. In order to gain respect, you have to give it. Show your team that you value them and support them by listening to how you can help them. Listen to any ideas that they may have. Think back to when you were in their position. If you had a problem, how would you have liked your leader to have handled it? Remember that the only way to get what you want is to ask for it. Never assume that anyone in your team knows exactly what is expected of them. When enforcing a deadline, explain to them when it has to be done by and why, then ask how they think they can achieve it, what do they need to make this happen, how can you best help them?

Once they know that they have your full support, then they will do whatever they can for you.

Goal Setting - 6 Simple But Effective Steps to Get What You Want When You Want It

Happy new year to you all!

What goals have you set for yourself this year? How determined are you to achieve them? Here is a reminder of the criteria we use to set powerful, achievable goals.

Did you know that 70% of people who set new years resolutions will have abandoned them by the 3rd week of January and of the 30% that don’t, 90% of them will have given up by June?

SO……..what can you do now to ensure that you arrive at the end of 2009, in the top 5% of those that do follow through and achieve what they set out to achieve at the beginning of the year?

Follow my top tips for setting and achieving goals and notice the difference when you see yourself still on track as the months go by.

Step One
Always write your goals down on paper. It is proven that you are 70% more likely to achieve your goal if it is written down.

Step Two
Use my SPADE criteria when setting your goals:-

S stands for specific. Be as specific as you can. If your goal is to earn more money, then exactly how much? If you earned an extra £1 you would be
earning more so your subconscious needs to know exactly how much more.

P is for present and positive tense. Write your goals as if they are happening now and always in the positive so don’t write what you don’t want, write what you do.

A is for achievable, you don’t want to set yourself up for failiure.

D is for date, When are you going to achieve this by?

E is for emotional evidence. You need an end step so that you know that you have got your goal and put some feelings into it.

SPADE - The essential tool for digging great goals!

Step Three
Now you have your goal you need to chunk it down into manageable milestones and diarise them.

Step Four
Read your goals every day and visualise yourself there. Imagine that it’s happening now. Remember, you get what you focus on so focus on what you want to be happening.

Step Five
Take action. Ask yourself everyday, “what can I do to get me closer to my goal.” “Is what I am doing now moving me closer or further from my goal?”

Step Six
ENJOY THE JOURNEY

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