Too often, in the attempt to increase profit and drive efficiency, business leaders look to external solutions to enhance company performance. Yet in doing so, they are ignoring their greatest strategic asset: their own people.
Peter Drucker, business guru and author, said: "I like to think that a lot of managers and executives trying to solve problems miss the forest for the trees by forgetting to look at their people -- not at how much more they can get from their people or how they can more effectively manage their people.”
In leveraging this asset, however, leaders have to strategically position themselves to influence staff through persuasive conversation. They also need to be able to identify the strengths of others, and enhance and maximise those strengths. Furthermore, leaders need to know how to have the tough conversations in which they are able to discipline where necessary and redirect focus to critical delivery.
While this sounds straightforward, most leaders find the ‘people’ aspect of their jobs difficult. This is primarily because we have the least control when it comes to people. We may build processes and policies, programmes and practices that stabilise our business to a degree, but ultimately, we cannot force our staff to behave in the way we would like them to. Rather, we need to confidently lead others to support and meet our objectives.
Here are some key questions that leaders should ask themselves when it comes to people management:
- Do I have a clear and simple business strategy?
- Can each of my employees articulate that strategy?
- Does each employee know how they contribute to accomplishing our business goals?
- Is the performance management of my staff matched to our business strategy?
- Have I made a concerted effort to develop my staff for effectiveness?
- Do I have the right people in the right positions within my company (ala Jim Collins)?
- Am I utilising the strengths of my people to maximum impact and effectiveness?
- Do we celebrate our accomplishments together?
- Do we seek solutions to our shortfalls together?
By communicating clearly – and often - with employees, business leaders can also create a more unified and dynamic company culture, which ultimately translates into a more profitable and productive organisation.
