A Manager Who Talks To You Is Better Than a Leader Who Doesn't

The shelves of America’s largest bookstores are being continually stocked with new books about leadership. It has become a national preoccupation—management consultants, corporate trainers and public workshop providers are very busy. America is hungry for leaders and there is a leadership theory that fits every perspective. Every company seeking to turn its managers into leaders is going to find a consultant or workshop who’s offering suits their taste.

If you browse the bookshelves at Borders, you are mesmerized by the catchy titles and enticing themes of books purporting to teach you how to become a “leader.” Leader is an auspicious word that connotes skills and abilities that are noble and worthy of systematic pursuit. There are so many choices, you don’t know which book to read and it is hard to decide if one or the other book is right or wrong. They all seem to make sense, but it seems that a good leader has skills, assets, traits and abilities that are superhuman. Can one realistically expect to learn how to do and be all these wonderful things—a superleader?

The books I find most optimistic are the ones that try to teach average guys like me to be a transformational leader. I may be overly skeptical, but I don’t think you can teach someone how to inspire others, or to be visionary. Some people just have the charisma—you want to follow them. They exude moral authority…they have values…they have character…and you can identify with the vision that they so convincingly articulate.

I think most of us can be good transactional leaders—we can work within existing organizational structures—interacting with our direct reports in ways that encourage them to engage in the organizations mission and direction. We can interact with direct reports—have encouraging conversations about their work—about the things they are doing well and how things might be improved the next time. You don’t have to be inspirational to be a good manager.

The intent of leadership development is to train leaders to deal with people in ways that lead to improved profitability. As mundane and mercenary as that sounds, it is true. The purpose is performance. Behind all the leadership consulting and training and writing is the intent to increase a manager’s skill in eliciting high levels of performance from subordinates. All the noble words and high-sounding language seeks to improve manager and supervisor motivational skill—to improve how well they induce employees to meet and exceed organizational performance goals.

I have some good news for anyone confused and demotivated by all these choices and theories. Several organizational psychologists spent many months following and observing managers doing their jobs—in the field, on site. They shadowed them everywhere and recorded everything they did; they were trying to discover what effective managers did that ineffective managers did not do and visa versa. If a leader is someone whose subordinates outperform and over achieve—consistently and predictably, then we need to see what these managers do and say that is different. We don’t need theories, we need facts. How do effective leaders behave?

In my last blog entry, I presented a more effective model for positively reinforcing one’s employees for extra effort, improvement and good results. Positive reinforcement tends to increase employee willingness to exert effort, but if it is not delivered properly, reinforcement comes across as staged and manipulative. Research findings indicate that the best way to deliver positive reinforcement is naturally and casually, during a work dialogue with an employee about their job. Short verbal expressions that verify good work, improvement or some other valued added behavior are superior to longer scripted descriptions. Saying thinks like, “looks good,” or “that will work,” or “let’s keep that up,” all serve as reinforcers if delivered in the context of a “give-and-take” work discussion.

In addition, supervisors and managers who “monitor” employee progress—check with employees to see how thing are going—have better performing units than those who don’t. For one thing, it provides more opportunities to make positive or corrective comments about the employee’s performance, and there is a definite correlation between the number of times employees get consequences (positive statements about value added behavior and results or corrective comments about things they need to change or improve) for their work and how well they perform. You can’t say positive things about good work if you don’t know it happened. That’s why the best leaders tend to do a lot of work monitoring; they stop and look at each employee’s job—doing visual inspections and asking questions about progress.

The research results that are so promising tell us that these behaviors seem to get results irrespective of other factors like ability and personality. That is, supervisors and managers who check on their employees, look at their work and discuss their performance—making positive comments when appropriate and corrective comments in a balanced, give-and-take dialogue—have high performing departments irrespective of personality factors that leadership theories describe as essential to good leadership.

This is not a free ride to leadership excellence, but it provides hope for those of us who would otherwise not fit into the leader paradigm described by theorists or who feel they cannot change themselves to align their abilities with those experts require. An average manager or supervisor can begin to improve their effect on employee performance today by simply taking the time to stop by and check in with the employee, review the job, have an honest discussion about the good, the bad and the ugly and watch as performance improves.

Corporations are spending hundreds of millions of dollars trying to teach managers and frontline supervisors to be “leaders.” One gets the impression that being a manager or supervisor is of lesser value—that one must evolve from these mundane skill sets into the august stature of leader. Real leaders are rare (in my humble opinion); almost as rare are good managers and supervisor. Since I think that one can learn to be a good manager or supervisor, I think that is where we need to be putting the corporate training budget.

Constructive Work Discussions

For a manager or supervisor to effectively verbally positively reinforce an employee, there must be a pre-existing positive relationship. A supervisor cannot approach an employee with whom they have had innumerable negative interactions and credibly say something positive about the employee’s performance; suspicion, distrust, and disassociation prevent a positive comment from having the desired effect.

Many supervisors have no experience saying positive things to their employees about job performance and training classes that attempt to encourage that behavior are modestly successful. I believe that the training solution is misdirected; managers and supervisors should first learn how to engage their direct reports in constructive work discussions. Effective work dialogs will naturally evolve into contexts in which employees hear positive statements about their performance—without the strained and uneasy feeling both the supervisor and the employee feel when positive statements spring from a planned agenda.

Most organizations are attempting to develop a “total rewards,” culture to ensure that employees perform at their peak. There are five elements of total rewards, each of which includes programs, practices, elements and dimensions that collectively define an organization's strategy to attract, motivate and retain employees. These elements are:

• Compensation
• Benefits
• Work-Life
• Performance and Recognition
• Development and Career Opportunities

Interestingly, survey data from disparate sources confirms that the positive effect of these elements can be negated by a poor supervisor-employee relationship. Well paid employees who like the company and their job often leave because they do not like their supervisor. These research data have maintained in every business and industry over the last 50 years. Most companies believe that the training programs they have in place have solved this problem, or they have given up and incorporated the turnover and lost profitability to the category of “uncontrollable.”

Business and industry has found little success in improving supervisory skills through training, programs or books. Billions of dollars have been spent to change supervisory verbal behavior with little success. There are several realities about changing human behavior that provide some insights about why efforts to change supervisory behavior fail and point the way toward success.

• You cannot change a supervisor’s personality, but you can change the things he or she says
• Behavior cannot be changed in a class or workshop—it must be changed in the workplace—in a real work setting
• New supervisory verbal behavior must be slowly shaped “in real time,” during interactions with employees; change take time
• You must “set the stage,” for a supervisor to say the right things; it evolves out of context of work discussion; it cannot seem contrived
• Supervisors will develop constructive work discussion skills over a period of months, not overnight
• Each supervisor must be provided with a prescription for change that is constructed from an evaluation of their current skills
• To effectively shape a leader, manager, or supervisors verbal behavior requires accurate feedback from his or her employees and/or a personal coach

What the Best Performing Supervisors Do

1. The supervisors with the best records of motivating others to excel and perform make it a point to be where the work is happening; they walk among their employees. They amble and peruse and observe. Amongst the activities, they look and ask questions. They are casual; they don’t carry a clipboard or take notes. They monitor the work and find out how things are going. And, they make it a point not to look just for problems. They do not ask questions meant to trap employees in order to correct them for an infraction.

Monitoring employees while they are working is what you might call real-time supervision. It is a form of work-sampling—being there to watch the employee do their jobs—interact with the equipment, the product, and the customer. The best supervisors find a way to be there when their employees are doing the job.

2. During daily visits, the highest performing supervisors have natural, casual conversations about the work, the equipment, resources, tools, schedules—anything that might influence the employee’s performance. And, most importantly, the supervisors make comments about what the employee has done—some positive, some neutral, and some corrective.

A positive comment might sound like, “That will work,” or “It’s a good start,” or “We got to try to do it that way every time,” or “OK,” or “That’s going to save us a bunch of time.” The point is, positive reinforcement does not have to be staged or artificial sounding; in fact, high-sounding praise may come across as less than sincere. To build a relationship with an employee to the point where he trusts your comments requires a history of interactions—interactions that have natural mix of positives, neutrals and corrective statements.

Questions or comments that encourage an effective work discussion:

• Is there anything I can do to help you today?
• Did maintenance recalibrate the gages for you?
• Did the Tech Dept. come by and help you with your computer problem?
• Do you want me to get the engineer out here to take a look?
• Did you see any improvement after we changed the setting for you?
• Did procurement locate the new parts for you?

Although most managers and supervisor have attended an “active listening,” or interaction skills workshop at some time in their career, classroom learning seldom elicits changes in participant’s words, phrases, and interaction skills. The ineffectiveness of interpersonal skills training is iconic in America. “Charm school,” “touch-me, feel-me,” and “love-ins,” are a few of the derogatory phrases used to describe the futility of these training models.

America has adopted a “program” approach to dealing with employees; supervisors and managers are taught to use tactics to “get people to be more productive,” when honest discussion would work better. Behavioral discussions are the most productive—work discussions where the employee and the supervisor talk about what was “done or not done,” as opposed to personality-driven discussions about “the kind of person” the employee is, or their motivation, or attitude.

Leaders Are Actively Interested

The shelves of America’s largest bookstores are being continually stocked with new books about leadership. It has become a national preoccupation—management consultants, corporate trainers and public workshop providers are very busy. America is hungry for leaders and there is a leadership theory that fits every perspective. Every company seeking to turn its managers into leaders is going to find a consultant or workshop who’s offering suits their taste.

If you browse the bookshelves at Borders, you are mesmerized by the catchy titles and enticing themes of books purporting to teach you how to become a “leader.” Leader is an auspicious word that connotes skills and abilities that are noble and worthy of systematic pursuit. There are so many choices, you don’t know which book to read and it is hard to decide if one or the other book is right or wrong. They all seem to make sense, but it seems that a good leader has skills, assets, traits and abilities that are superhuman. Can one realistically expect to learn how to do and be all these wonderful things—a superleader?

The intent of leadership development is to train leaders to deal with people in ways that lead to improved profitability. As mundane and mercenary as that sounds, it is true. The purpose is performance. Behind all the leadership consulting and training and writing is the intent to increase a manager’s skill in eliciting high levels of performance from subordinates. All the noble words and high-sounding language seeks to improve manager and supervisor motivational skill—to improve how well they induce employees to meet and exceed organizational performance goals.

I have some good news for anyone confused and demotivated by all these choices and theories. Several organizational psychologists spent many months following and observing managers doing their jobs—in the field, on site. They shadowed them everywhere and recorded everything they did; they were trying to discover what effective managers did that ineffective managers did not do and visa versa. If a leader is someone whose subordinates outperform and over achieve—consistently and predictably, then we need to see what these managers do and say that is different. We don’t need theories, we need facts. How do effective leaders behave?

In my last blog entry, I presented a more effective model for positively reinforcing one’s employees for extra effort, improvement and good results. Positive reinforcement tends to increase employee willingness to exert effort, but if it is not delivered properly, reinforcement comes across as staged and manipulative. Research findings indicate that the best way to deliver positive reinforcement is naturally and casually, during a work dialogue with an employee about their job. Short verbal expressions that verify good work, improvement or some other valued added behavior are superior to longer scripted descriptions. Saying thinks like, “looks good,” or “that will work,” or “let’s keep that up,” all serve as reinforcers if delivered in the context of a “give-and-take” work discussion.

In addition, supervisors and managers who “monitor” employee progress—check with employees to see how thing are going—have better performing units than those who don’t. For one thing, it provides more opportunities to make positive or corrective comments about the employee’s performance, and there is a definite correlation between the number of times employees get consequences (positive statements about value added behavior and results or corrective comments about things they need to change or improve) for their work and how well they perform. You can’t say positive things about good work if you don’t know it happened. That’s why the best leaders tend to do a lot of work monitoring; they stop and look at each employee’s job—doing visual inspections and asking questions about progress.

The research results that are so promising tell us that these behaviors seem to get results irrespective of other factors like ability and personality. That is, supervisors and managers who check on their employees, look at their work and discuss their performance—making positive comments when appropriate and corrective comments in a balanced, give-and-take dialogue—have high performing departments irrespective of personality factors that leadership theories describe as essential to good leadership.

This is not a free ride to leadership excellence, but it provides hope for those of us who would otherwise not fit into the leader paradigm described by theorists or who feel they cannot change themselves to align their abilities with those experts require. An average manager or supervisor can begin to improve their effect on employee performance today by simply taking the time to stop by and check in with the employee, review the job, have an honest discussion about the good, the bad and the ugly and watch as performance improves.

A meta-analysis of job satisfaction and retention surveys conducted over the last 40 years corroborate the fact that the single, most critical factor in employee engagement is the supervisory/employee relationship. The old school assumption was that “people-oriented” supervisors and managers would always create better relationships with employees and keep them happy. We now know that supervisory leadership is more dependent on levels of respect and trust than likability.

So your supervisor doesn’t need to be your buddy; he needs to be genuine, fair, flexible, and actively interested in your work—your ideas for improvement, barriers to performance, hazards and safety issues, daily problems and achievements—and anything else that influences your ability to perform well. As a supervisor or manager, you will be more effective if you discontinue looking for opportunities to say “good job,” and actively seek opportunities to say, “What can I do to help you today?”

Employees expect their bosses to be actively interested in their work; when they are not, it leads the employee to feel that they neither them nor their work is important. You may say, "I want to be a positively reinforcing supervisor who recognizes people for their work." Recognition is not a direct act--it is not one behavior--not one verbal statement about someone's work. Recognition is a result--the cumulative expression of supervisory interest and support.

Employees judge whether you value them and their work by the active interest you show in the daily issues of their work. You will not positively effect employee satisfaction and retention by saying nice things to them; you will have a profound effect on those factors by becoming a performance partner--someone they can count on to help them over hurdles and barriers.
Oh yeah...and someone who talks to them like a human-being, not like someone who just got out of charm school and is practicing new ideas.

Coaching Performance with Positive Reinforcement

If don’t have people skills, if you are a manager or supervisor who is perfectionistic, impatient, and thinks that employees should do what they are paid to do without any need for motivation or positive reinforcement, then you are among the 75% of managers who feel the same way. But, don’t feel that you are doomed to be at odds with all the management development initiatives and consultants that ask you to positively reinforce your employees for improvement, extra effort or outstanding achievement.

Recent research presents a different perspective on the best way to encourage employees to perform their best. It seems that supervisors and managers who talk to employees frequently about their work, who stop by during the day to check on “how things are going,” supervisors who make casual but specific comments about what they see the employee doing right or wrong, have better performing departments and work groups than managers who intermittently apply more dramatic positive reinforcers to employee behavior or results. This is good news for managers who do not want to change their personalities and who are uncomfortable with delivering verbal praise for employee work behavior.

It requires a manager to spend more time talking to employees about their daily work experience, but the time is productive—its allows the manager to know in advance if there are issues related to the machinery, the process, materials, resources, etc. It provides the manager with a natural context for presenting an employee with information about how the employee is doing—a balanced discussion of the work. The reason that this approach works, is that positive reinforcement is not best applied as dramatic, positive verbal pronouncements that traditional approaches have led us to believe.

For instance, in the midst of a work discussion, if a supervisor responds to something an employee says that he or she did with an, “OK,” the effect is positive—an expression that is short affirms an employee's performance as well as a statement like, “Great Bill, I think that adding that information to the work sheet will help the next shift get started without the confusion that we sometimes have.” There is nothing wrong with the second statement. It works to let the employee know that a specific behavior has added value. However, if an employee says, “I added several comments about recalibrating the gages at the end of the shift to make sure that the evening shift can get kicked off smoothly,” there are several types of supervisory responses that will work as well to positively reinforce the employee. One or two word positive reinforcers like “Great,” or “That will work,” or “Good idea,” will get the same result and most importantly, come across more naturally than an out-of-character, lengthy sentence might.

At the same time, statements that request the employee to change the way they do something to improve the outcome can easily become part of balanced dialogues. For instance, a supervisor can coach an employee toward a new approach by saying, “That’s a good approach Bill. Ask maintenance if they can come up and do that for you. It would free up your time if they handled it.” Or, “I’m not sure that’s going to work for everyone Bill, but I think you need to keep trying these types of ideas. I think you’ll hit on the right approach after a few attempts.” Or, “No, that won’t work, but try this. Jim made it work last week.”

The point is that the context of positive and negative input needs to be natural to eliminate employee and supervisory discomfort. The old positive reinforcement model that presents the supervisor as someone who has “changed their ways,” or “just back from charm school,” is uncomfortable and unnatural. Asking supervisors and managers to stop by and say something positive, or teaching management techniques that make supervisors nervous and reluctant to give employees corrective input on their performance, are not practical and they come across as contrived and manipulative.

This improved positive reinforcement model depends on the supervisor and the employee having a real dialogue—a discussion between two people about the work. It does not work if the supervisor stops by to tell the employee what to do. For most supervisors, initiating a conversation about practical issues about the days work is easy. If the supervisor gradually increases the content of the conversation to include some yeps, OKs, and other signals of approval then we have the beginning of positive reinforcement without embarrassment—a natural way of letting employees know they are doing the right things—a means of encouraging continued improvement and extra effort.