Wake Up the Empowering Genius Inside You
Why do some managers have self-motivated, productive and cooperative teams while others with the same education, technical knowledge and number of years of experience don’t? Is it the luck of the draw? The people? The company?
If this were true then why could most of those same managers leave their department and within a relatively short period of time turn a new department into a team of self-motivated, productive and cooperative individuals?
Why? Empowerment! They have learned how to communicate clearly, they encourage others to thrive on learning and they inspire each individual employee to excel at what they do. Each team member participates in establishing team goals and knows they're interdependent on each other to reach them.
Your ability to enlist the knowledge, energy and efforts of your team allows you accomplish far more in a shorter period of time. Empowerment enables everyone to succeed; it encourages suggestions for improvement from customers, suppliers, subordinates, peers and superiors alike.
Empowerment doesn’t happen overnight or by chance. You don’t walk in one day and empower others but there are things you do daily to built each person’s trust in themselves, their teammates and the process.
It’s starts by hiring for attitude. It continues by encouraging ongoing training and risk taking. It is reinforced by open, direct and clear communication. It is sustained through inspiration and direction. It is supported by disciplinary actions for non-compliance when mistakes are repetitive, due to sloppiness or haphazard effort.
Be tolerant of mistakes when people are learning new things, when it’s an unusual situation, when someone takes a risk in pursuing an assigned goal or delegated task, when the mistake falls within legal and workplace principles and when proper procedures have been followed. We are human and mistakes happen. Be more concerned about what was learned and how it will be handled more effectively the next time. Encourage team members to learn from each other’s mistakes.
Have high expectations for your people and inspire them to perform beyond their own expectations. Help them to feel good about them selves. Help them feel stronger, confident and supported. Acceptance and respect them. Help them feel valued, important and worthwhile. When their self-esteem is high they’re willing to contribute.
Treat people the way they’d like and want to be treated. Recognized each individual as appreciated, special and unique. Take the time to get to know each person. What do they like? What do they do outside of work? Get to know about their family.
Appreciate everything the person does to help you, the team and the organization. Use “please” and “thank you.” Ask favors rather than making demands on them. Remember birthdays. Be grateful for even the smallest efforts. What is recognized and rewarded is repeated.
Look for ways to make each individual feel valued and appreciated. Speak highly of them and give them a fine reputation to live up to. Don’t refer to employees as your employees – call them your team members.
You were inexperienced once. Remember the need to prove yourself; the challenges you faced learning what you now take for granted; the feeling that you’d never get it. Be empathetic, helpful and respectful.
One person makes a difference – positively or negatively. You never know when or what client might call. It’s not acceptable to be told that’s not my job or try calling.... Each individual, from the receptionist to the department head needs to be in the know about what’s happening and accept the responsibility to get the customer accurate information or to accept the responsibility for directing them to the appropriate person.
Involve people in the decision-making process. Let them know what the obstacles are. Solicit their feedback and listen to their input. Encourage them to challenge your ideas. The best and fastest way to be abreast of everything is to empower each person to accept shared responsibility for the teams success and failures.
Teach them to appreciate individual differences, to handle conflict and solve problems, to become assertive and not aggressive. Encourage them to challenge each other’s ideas without challenging their personalities. Allow them to discuss and understand what’s happening.
They want to be part of the big picture. Someone who places spokes in wheelchair wheels needs to take pride in the fact she provides mobility for the physically challenged. Administrative assistants don’t work for you they are your salvation because they make it possible for you to put your time to more productive use. The receptionist is the first and last person your customer sees. First and last impressions are lasting impressions.
Delegate work to help an employee develop his skill. Delegation demonstrates to an employee your trust in him. Allow him to shadow you or be there to assist him if he’s learning a new process but get out of his way and let him do it if he knows how. Even if you have doubts, keep them to yourself and demonstrate complete confidence in him and your decision to delegate to him.
Empowerment is more earned than given. Each employee becomes empowered at different rates trough encouragement, prodding and by having high expectations placed upon them. Some will accept the challenge willingly while others will fall into empowerment unwillingly. But empowered they will become.
Being empowered isn’t optional it’s mandatory if you expect workers to accomplish more with less. Discuss ways you could help every employee be more effective. Be open to their ideas. Determine what you might be doing that could be negatively affecting their performance. Don’t get defensive when they respond – listen to what is said. Do periodic, informal peer evaluations; you included, to find out what you don’t know, what you do know and what you think you know that just isn’t so.
Thousands of employees were asked to describe their best bosses in a recent study and almost unanimously the responses echoed, “He gave me complete freedom to do the job.” That degree of trust and respect is both liberating and empowering.
Empowerment doesn’t rob you of power it magnifies the power within you.
