John Wayne once said, "Life is tough, and it's even tougher if you are stupid."...maybe not the nicest or most motivating thing that one could say to an employee...but something that gets said or inferred in many places, at many times and by many people. In today's digital world, with social networking, mobile computing devices, and an aging workforce, people are becoming important capital to many businesses. A few years ago I was watching a program on Report on Business television where the guest on the show was asked to summerize the most prevelant theme of the business books that had been published the previous year. His response was quite simple, if business managers, bosses and owners wanted their businesses or business units to be more successful they had to " be nicer to people". The problem that I have see when working with some small business owners is that they have difficulty with this concept because they feel that by "going easy, they will be taken advantage of", as one owner put it. Being nice to people doesn't mean going easy or giving too much latitude to them...being nice is about showing respect to people and allowing them to try and fail and then show them how they might make the correction and succeed the next time. People are ok if you set the bar high, that you push them to increase their work pace, and that you expect performance. They expect you however to do the same and remember, as Peter Bruker said..." the leaders who work most effectively it seems to me, never say "I". And that's not because they have trained themselves not to say "I". They don't think think "I", they think "we"; they think "team". they understand their job to be to make the team function. they accept the responsibility and don't side step it, but "we" gets the credit...this is what creates trust, what enables you to get the task done."
Work with your team...be one of them...don't make it all about you.
JB
