There are times when managers listen to their employees complain and feel it’s part of their duty to make themselves “available” to their crew.
It’s as if complaining is a sacred personal right of staff and as a manager it would be cold and hard-hearted not to hear them out.
We all want to “be there” for our employees.
Hmm, how much time are we spending here and where actually does all this listening to complaining lead?
I’m not talking about legitimate concerns or bona-fide complaints that deserve management attention or maybe a visit to HR.
I’m talking about repeated “just blow some heat” complaining over issues or co-workers that are a common part of everyday working life.
This type of complaining can become habitual in the culture and tie up everybody’s time during our day.
Let’s think about taking that time back by not being so casual about complaining.
To begin, our first step is managing ourselves.
Here are some questions we can ask ourselves.
Do I have expectations in place for how staff can bring information to me? When and where? Does it wait for a planned one on one meeting or is it a right now thing? What are the parameters for a stop everything interruption?
Then we need to clearly inform staff of these expectations.
When we meet with someone who has concerns, we need to ask for specific facts and examples of things that are impacting the co-op as a whole in terms of work flow, outcomes, or team agreements and be ready to take some serious notes. Have a worksheet to keep things on track and aiming toward specifics, possible solutions, responses and outcomes. Be formal and active.
If they don’t have specifics and are mostly feeling impacted personally by a person or a situation that is driving them crazy and neither the person or situation are operating outside performance and behavior expectations then the conversation changes to how they can manage themselves better in the situation or with another employee. In other words, the conversation shifts back to them. Be active and coach for development away from complaining.
The important thing here is that complaining comes with expectations on the employee to be prepared and ready to follow some guidelines and structure.
Our job is to manage ourselves and to provide that structure, and not to fall prey to indulging the complaining or finding ourselves refereeing.
There are so many better ways that we can build relationships with our staff then allowing casual complaining.
Our time, staff’s too, is way too valuable for this.
If there is something legit, we’ll be there bringing coaching, direction, clarity of expectations, and accountability.
Our job as a manager is to discern what is needed and guide things accordingly.
It’s as if complaining is a sacred personal right of staff and as a manager it would be cold and hard-hearted not to hear them out.
We all want to “be there” for our employees.
Hmm, how much time are we spending here and where actually does all this listening to complaining lead?
I’m not talking about legitimate concerns or bona-fide complaints that deserve management attention or maybe a visit to HR.
I’m talking about repeated “just blow some heat” complaining over issues or co-workers that are a common part of everyday working life.
This type of complaining can become habitual in the culture and tie up everybody’s time during our day.
Let’s think about taking that time back by not being so casual about complaining.
To begin, our first step is managing ourselves.
Here are some questions we can ask ourselves.
Do I have expectations in place for how staff can bring information to me? When and where? Does it wait for a planned one on one meeting or is it a right now thing? What are the parameters for a stop everything interruption?
Then we need to clearly inform staff of these expectations.
When we meet with someone who has concerns, we need to ask for specific facts and examples of things that are impacting the co-op as a whole in terms of work flow, outcomes, or team agreements and be ready to take some serious notes. Have a worksheet to keep things on track and aiming toward specifics, possible solutions, responses and outcomes. Be formal and active.
If they don’t have specifics and are mostly feeling impacted personally by a person or a situation that is driving them crazy and neither the person or situation are operating outside performance and behavior expectations then the conversation changes to how they can manage themselves better in the situation or with another employee. In other words, the conversation shifts back to them. Be active and coach for development away from complaining.
The important thing here is that complaining comes with expectations on the employee to be prepared and ready to follow some guidelines and structure.
Our job is to manage ourselves and to provide that structure, and not to fall prey to indulging the complaining or finding ourselves refereeing.
There are so many better ways that we can build relationships with our staff then allowing casual complaining.
Our time, staff’s too, is way too valuable for this.
If there is something legit, we’ll be there bringing coaching, direction, clarity of expectations, and accountability.
Our job as a manager is to discern what is needed and guide things accordingly.