Good bosses know when to be leaders

Not too long ago, I met a man who was drowning in his small business. He was simply overwhelmed by the demands of his employees, and his business wasn’t doing well.

Tim McGuire
United Media -The Spokesman Review

When we first started to talk I was impressed with how important his employees were to him and how much time he spent nurturing them. You didn’t have to listen for long before you realized this poor guy spent all of his time covering for his employees, making up for their deficiencies, and actually doing the things he had hired them to do.

His people weren’t growing, he was growing resentful, and worse, and so was his spouse. This fellow was blocking his employees by always being there to solve problems. He wasn’t forcing them to earn the money he was paying them.

In this era of selfish entrepreneurs and mean-spirited bosses this may sound like an odd problem, but it is indeed problematic for both the employer and the employees.

Work can only be rewarding and spiritually fulfilling if individuals doing the work grow and develop. Two basic responsibilities of a business owner, entrepreneur or supervisor are: to create and design jobs that aid that growth and development; and to coach and mentor those employees to success.

In this case the entrepreneur needs to create a vision for his life and for his business. Once he envisions the kind of future he wants, the role he wants to play and the goals he wants to achieve, he can start building his business to accomplish all of that.

Throughout that process he should realize his own needs are not only legitimate, they are paramount. Last week, I quoted a man named Peter Henry who said, "Happy owners are perhaps the most important thing in keeping everything else happy." Henry is absolutely correct. The owner must be happy, triumphant and purposeful if he has any expectation that his employees will feel the same emotions.

When you look at the unrest in public corporations these days, I contend much of it is caused by all the nervous, frustrated and powerless executives at or near the top of those corporations. Certainly their rewards are handsome, if not obscene, but the pressure is often onerous and obscene, too. Far too few of those executives feel as if they are fulfilling their own vision in their companies. Their frustration cascades downhill and everybody becomes frustrated and angry.

Once the entrepreneur or owner creates a vision for his own life and the business, he needs to figure out how his employees can help him attain his vision and how those employees can fulfill their own visions of growth and development.

Well-designed jobs with firm expectations are essential. As simple as it sounds, employees must know what is expected of them. Many don’t. It’s amazing how many companies tacitly expect people to pick up processes, guidelines and expectations out of the air. Formal training and sharing of expectations is essential.

The man I talked to cared deeply about his employees, but he confused being nice with helping them succeed in their jobs. The two are not the same thing.

A good-coaching boss will help people get to where they want to be as employees. He will be realistic about an employee’s prospects for growth and advancement. He will also listen, give support and be honest and straightforward.

That candor is essential. It would have saved the man I met a lot of grief. He was not always being candid with his employees. They were not doing the job or meeting his expectations, and he was letting them get away with that, to his own detriment.

Tip for your search

Being candid does not give us a license to be hurtful. Practice ways to be straightforward about a person’s job performance without demeaning them as human beings. Be clear about expectations and reinforce the good things they do while you are being honest about their shortcomings.

Resource for your search

"The Servant Leader" by James A. Autry (Prima Publishing, 2001), especially pages 99-155.

Tim McGuire is a past president of the American Society of Newspaper Editors and former editor of the Minneapolis Star Tribune.

http://www.spokesmanreview.com/news-story.asp?date=100403&ID=s1419872&cat=section.business