"When I Was at X, We Used to Y..."

Suppose you throw a party, and a friend of one of your guests starts off a conversation like this:

"The last party I went to, they had little Beef Wellingtons on tapas plates. Do you have little Beef Wellingtons on tapas plates? You should really look into that, because they're delicious. They also had this really cool game that we all played; it was a riot! What activities do you have planned?"

How likely are you to invite this schmuck to your next party - or the friend that brought them?

Believe it or not, many folks* who move from one company to another do this exact same thing, oblivious to how rude and condescending they sound. Sure, you want to share your expertise, experience, and problem-solving skills, but you're missing 2 key words from the end of that sentence:

...when appropriate.

It's fine to suggest new ideas. It's even fine to suggest old ideas, if you think you know enough about the issue to understand it from your new co-workers' perspective. Usually, though, we don't. We talk when we should be listening and absorbing. As a newbie, that's your main job. If someone asks for your opinion, fine - but don't mention what you did at your old employer or who they were. At best, it comes off as grandstanding. At worst... well, if you don't know, this article is definitely for you.

Even when you do voice an opinion - when appropriate - it's always best to couch it in a way that leaves room for a conversation. Maybe this:

"I'm guessing that you probably already tried Y. How did that work?"

First, you're giving the other person credit for probably thinking of and trying the obvious solution(s). Second, you're acknowledging their expertise by asking for their observations regarding the result. Third, you're establishing that you don't have all the answers, but you're willing to roll up your sleeves and work on it together.

Popping back to our party guest metaphor, the new employee who does this is the one who runs out for beer/wine when you're low, offers to drive the really drunk guest home, and helps clean up afterward.

Those are the folks who get invited to every party.

*Guilty as charged - but I'm much better now.

Manager or Supervisor?

Give some thought to this:

• Do you ever suggest-but-not-really-because-it's-more-like-you-insist that one of your direct reports hire someone?
• Do you ever tell them that you don't want them to hire someone?

If you have ever done either of these, no matter what your direct report's title is, you have turned them into a supervisor.

A supervisor supervises daily work that is defined by someone else. A manager decides what the work is. They also have the power to hire and fire. Take that away, and they're not a manager any more. And the moment their direct reports know that - whether you want to or not - you take on being that team's manager, because they won't bother to go to the supervisor for anything any more. Why should they? You've taken all of that former manager's power away.

If you don't trust a manager to hire or fire people, you have the wrong manager. Fire them. If you don't trust anyone else to hire and fire, you've created a hierarchy with just 2 levels: you, and everyone else. There are some profound ramifications to that:

• Your managers won't own the success or failure of their team members. Why should they? They didn't even get to decide who those team members are.
• Your managers' direct reports will come to you whenever they get a 'no' from their manager. Congratulations! Mom said no, so now they go to dad. You've turned your organization into a dysfunctional family, just like you always dreamed about.
• Turnover: If your managers' direct reports aren't owned by their manager, they won't get what they need. People who don't get what they need leave. And guess what? Managers who find out that they're not really managers leave, too, to go work for organizations where they can be managers. Which is most of them.

The solution: Let go! You hired managers to do what you are either bad at or don't have the bandwidth to do. Let them be managers, for Pete's sake. And if they fail, give them some encouragement and talk it through with them. If they don't improve, replace them. If they do, congratulations - you have an hierarchy that works.

To Move or to Motivate

... that is the question.

If you have an employee that appears to have reached the end of their usefulness or the limits of their abilities (and really, isn't that the same thing?), you have a choice: Do you replace them, or do you try to coach them beyond their existing limitations?

If there is a large labor pool available, as is the case at the time of this writing, the current trend is to 'trade up'. It sometimes takes less effort to find someone with a higher readiness/ability quotient than it does to grow an existing employee. My opinion is that that's part of why the labor pool is currently as large as it is: Many people without jobs don't have the willingness, readiness, or ability to get to the next rung. (I would love to be proved wrong.)

Increasingly, as the education level of American high school and college graduates declines, we find ourselves off-shoring jobs simply because overseas employees have higher skill levels. (English grammar is my pet peeve. How many cover letters and resumes have you read lately that were misspelled, had poor punctuation, and sentence structure that made you cringe?) There is no sign that this downward trend is going to change, at least any time soon and, as a responsible manager, part of your job is to find the best person you can for each position.

But...

If an employee has been with you any length of time, they have acquired knowledge. Often, and especially in key roles where no one else performs the same task, this knowledge exists nowhere else in your organization. Moving that employee out means starting from scratch, and usually at some expense.

Have you ever felt like a given issue or project comes up over and over again, yet never seems to get resolved? Brain drain is likely the culprit - some key cog that had the knowledge necessary to resolve that issue or complete that project is no longer part of the organization, and you are taking two steps back for every step forward as a result.

Is that good corporate stewardship? If not, how do you solve the puzzle - especially when you have so little time to perform your own tasks, let alone mentor someone who may or may not take that next, vital step?

It helps to understand where that employee's limitations come from in the first place. It could be simply a matter of training - something you don't even have to do yourself. But as often as not, there is a deeper root that stands squarely in the employee's way - one that has dogged them their entire life. And to help them climb out of that box, you need to understand the Lifeboat Scenario.

Much smarter people than me have discovered that our reactions to potentially lethal situations (and if losing one's job over and over in this economy isn't lethal, what is?) fall into one of three camps. The scenario is a lifeboat that has sprung a leak and is going down fast, and the passengers self-divide as follows:

• 30% panic, flail wildly, and either die quickly or accidentally find a way to live
• 50% do nothing, and drown
• 20% take stock, rationally determine a course of action, and live, often rescuing others on the way

It's easy to see where this behavior came from, and even why it makes sense from a 'survival of the species' perspective: If a leopard attacks a tribe of early hominids, the ones who panic either draw the leopard's attention and die instantly (leaving the rest to live another day), or accidentally escape and eventually reproduce. The ones who do nothing either die (easy pickings), or fail to draw the leopard's attention and live to reproduce. The ones who are rational pick up a good, heavy stick or a rock, and may succeed in driving the leopard away (resulting in minimal losses, leaving more potential reproductive partners).

In essence, the lifeboat scenario is nature throwing dice in the hope that at least one of the three strategies works. But for modern humans, this genetic predisposition often gets in the way of our rational minds, resulting in a box that is difficult to escape.

It takes time and effort to assess willingness, readiness, and ability. But if at least one of those two traits exist, it may be less costly (in terms of time and money) to help the employee improve and prevent yet another loss/hiring/backtrack cycle.

For more information about readiness, I suggest this article: http://www.projectconnections.com/articles/050905-glory.html.