Give people the opportunity just before they are ready for it. In hospitality we either promote too soon or not soon enough. The key is to give people the opportunity at a time when they are almost there. This will push them out of their comfort zone so they are challenged, but just enough so that they achieve success.
- Sarah Derry for HospitalityMagazine.com.au
Topics: Goals, Leadership and Management
"Do unto others as you would have them do unto you." The Golden Rule concept exists through hundreds of cultures and is known by millions; therefore, it should come as no surprise that it intersects with your business practices and behavior. It should be your ethical pillar upon which your business sits.
Do you consciously consider with each business move that is made what impact will be felt, how will your decisions and actions show up, and what chain of events/emotions will occur because of them? If not, you should. For your business to earn the respect it deserves, you should carefully choose which steps to take and which words to speak. You should handle the business and treat your employees, coworkers, vendors, and customers with the same regard that you would like for them to handle their work and treatment of you. What, in the least, should we consider as we put the Golden Rule into practice in our businesses?
Topics: Listening, Respect, Honesty and Trust, Leadership and Management
Now that you've delivered all the good news - the ways in which your employee has shone in the past year, the positive expectations you have established together for the coming year, the road map you have outlined for fulfilling those goals - the timing is opportune to raise any and all problematic issues you need to address. The key is to lay our your case in language that is straightforward yet not withering.
- Beverly Ballaro, Dealing with Difficult People
Topics: Business Skills, Quality Assurance, Leadership and Management
After you have identified for an employee both a range of goals and the mindset necessary to achieve them, the next logical step is to map out, in a pragmatic fashion and with employee input, different possible paths to success. The idea here is to describe actions, resources, and plans of action in terms as specific as possible...you want to provide your employee with a "nuts and bolts" repertoire of approaches that he or she can draw upon in the coming cycle.
- Beverly Ballaro, Dealing with Difficult People
Topics: Goals, Leadership and Management
Most people are not comfortable being judged themselves and therefore tend to err on the side of caution when they have to put their personal assessment of a colleague in writing. What they don't realize is that an excess of diplomacy can actually produce consequences just as damaging as those created by an unduly harsh approach. By squandering an opportunity to deliver meaningful criticism, they deprive both themselves and the employees they are evaluating of any practical benefits. They turn the process into an exercise in futility, and a time-consuming one at that.
- Kelly Robertson, V.P. of Sales for Art Merchandising
Topics: Business Skills, Goals, Leadership and Management