Setting the ground rules with your employees

- [Instructor] Setting the ground rules. Purpose: to promote stellar performance by aligning yourself more closely with your employees. Am I structuring work thoughtfully enough so that individual team members can thrive and outperform? Legendary Philadelphia Inquirer Executive Editor and super boss, Gene Roberts, had his own unique way of working. He would keep a messy desk, stroll about having casual conversations with staff, convene late night meetings over dinner at his house, and pull pranks on subordinates. But Roberts also enabled his people to cultivate their individual work styles, too. As protégés related, he expected extraordinary results, but as long as his people provided them, he was generally content to stay out of the way and let them get the job done as they saw fit. As he once told a protégé, his whole philosophy of running a newspaper was to figure out how to let other people do the work so that he didn't have to do everything himself. Smart management. Are you alert to and supportive of team members' specific work styles? If not, you might be missing an important opportunity. When people are allowed to operate in ways that fit their unique temperaments and affinities, they perform better. Unencumbered by seemingly arbitrary rules and restrictions, they're able to make the most of their talents. And because the organization values them enough to encourage them to work as they see fit, they're more motivated to put out extraordinary performance. None of this means that your team members should just go through the motions without producing at a world-class level. The performance part is non-negotiable, but as the old expression goes, there are different ways to skin a cat. This exercise will help you explore work styles with your team members and construct individualized ground rules for high performance. And if you struggle with delegation, this exercise could prove particularly helpful in cementing a healthy partnership with each team member. Step one: start talking. Sit down one-on-one with each of your direct reports to explore how they like to work. These conversations should be short, only 15 minutes each, but don't be surprised if they go longer. When you see the energy from team members who probably haven't been engaged around this topic in years, if ever, you'll want to keep talking. Your goal here is to gain a deeper sense of each employee's personal work style and preferences. Does he or she like to receive feedback? How much or how little? How does he or she handle interpersonal conflict when it arises? What are his or her pet peeves? How does he or she tend to go about solving project-related problems? What are his or her key priorities outside of work, and how might he or she structure work to support those priorities? When does he or she tend to work best? When is he or she least productive? How much support does he or she like to receive from others, and in what areas? What existing rules and processes can you bend to accommodate his or her desires, absolutely without crossing any ethical boundaries, and without compromising individual or team performance? What are his or her preferences concerning technology? When collaborating, does he or she prefer texting, email, or talking on the phone? Feel free to add additional questions that reflect your particular industry, job function, or management role. If you're in a creative field, you might pose tailored questions around the genesis and communication of ideas. If your team's job function requires regular contact with customers, you might want to explore how your employee likes to handle negotiation, dispute resolution, and relationship management. Make this an honest conversation. Will the job responsibilities allow each individual to work as they might wish at all times? Probably not. Let your employee know that, but consider too what you can do to become a more empathetic manager. How might you better accommodate your employees' preferences, needs, expectations, and desires? End the session by agreeing on three to five ground rules that take into account the employee's most salient work preferences and your own most critical needs or expectations. These rules should be specific and on point. For instance, a rule might be, Susan will be available for phone calls until 9:00 PM on weeknights, but I won't call after that time, and I also will refrain from calling on weekends, although a few emails over the weekend are okay. Another might be, I will give Susan her space while she is dealing with a customer, but each week she will proactively email or call me to review outcomes and next steps. Step two: ongoing maintenance. Check in with team members every six months to determine whether your management behaviors and their work styles remain well aligned. Are you giving them what they need? Do they find their work environment supportive and engaging? Have their preferences changed? Are they delivering the high performance that you expect? What more could you do to meet their reasonable needs and expectations? Do any specific problem areas exist where you are poorly aligned? How might you remedy those? How might each team member boost performance even more? Don't just talk about work styles once with team members, and then forget about it. There's a risk that team members will be less engaged if they perceive that you've ignored their preferences than if you had never had the conversation at all. Stay on this, and stay aligned. Takeaways. Super bosses have unique work styles, and they encourage employees to have them too. As super bosses know, employees are more motivated and better able to perform when managers respect how they like to work. Many bosses fail to align work conditions and their own management behaviors to the work styles of individual team members. Their result: subpar motivation and performance. Discussing work styles with employees gives you an opportunity to forge a deeper, more satisfying relationship with them. You can't satisfy everyone at all times. Do your best to empathize and accommodate, but not at the expense of lowering performance expectations. Preferences around work are constantly evolving. Check in on progress and make necessary revisions every six months.