Sean McGorry
Contributing Writer
Direct Energy/Success Academy

As a child, I remember sometimes getting the answer  “Because I said so”  as a reason why my parents wanted or expected me to do something.  Another example is the classic song “Cat’s in the Cradle” by Harry Chapin. The point I am trying to make is that as a leader, as you go, so goes the ship.

Do as I say. As a leader, your employees look to you to set the example for the operation. If you don’t follow a procedure, policy or worse yet something you have instructed others to do, why would you expect the team to do it? Managers push, leaders pull.

The walls have ears. If you are looking to eliminate the trust of your team, talk about one team member to another. As leaders we try and eliminate this from our operation, but are we feeding the beast? Don’t get me wrong, managers need to discuss employee performance and attitude within management structure as well as with that employee, but does it stay there?

The sky is falling. When you have a challenge in your operation, do you walk up and down the halls telling everyone about it, or do you (or a member of your team) handle it and move on? We all know that there are team members that you can rely on, confide in, but there are also those that don’t want to know about certain issues within the organization. Money, payroll, and insurance are areas that should never be talked about in the halls of the business. Nothing gets a resume polished faster than when employees worry about money. That being said, does the team need to know revenue goals? Absolutely! The team needs to know what the goal is and how well they are doing in helping to meet that goal.

Complacency kills. Do you have complacency in your operation? Don’t wait for the team to fix it, rally the troops and find out what the issue(s) are, come up with collective solutions and implement them.

Attitudes are Contagious. Good or bad, they will spread. Your responsibility is to recognize both. Recognize good attitudes publicly, counsel bad ones privately. Sometimes easier said than done I know, but at this point, you might want to skim back up to the walls have ears section. If you have a tight knit team and a strong culture, many times they address the bad attitude amongst themselves. If you don’t have that, and you don’t address it, you are condoning it. Or worse yet, perhaps you are complacent.

Wait a Few Days, it Will Change. Do you change direction frequently? Do you create a new procedure or introduce a new feature, and look back 6 months later and wonder why it’s not being done? If you have a habit of doing this, your team knows it and just waits for it to change.

Every Battle Plan is Great Until the First Shot is Fired. So you introduced a product, procedure or idea to the team, rolled it out and it’s not working. Did you involve the team in the first place? If they are the ones that will be presenting the product or conducting the procedure did you get input from the ground troops? It’s ok if it didn’t go as planned, gather feedback and empower the team to provide suggestions and solutions.

Managers Push, Leaders Pull. Create an environment where your team acts because they want to, not because you made them do it.

Leadership is challenging, conversely, it can be twice as rewarding as it is challenging. Be clear in your vision, expectations, and goals. Know your team, let your team know you, that way you both know what can be expected of each other. Don’t do this because I said so, do this because you want to!