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SPECIFIC PEOPLE-HANDLING SKILLS
In this course you will
learn step-based techniques to guide you
to a successful outcome in a range of
managerial situations. The steps provide
the “mechanism”. These skills provide
the “oil” to make the mechanism work
more smoothly.
You will find these
skills useful in all social
interactions. In a managerial context
they have a significant impact on the
success of the outcome.
Ideally, your use of
these skills should appear natural, but
don’t worry if at first they feel
contrived and unnatural. Managing people
is not a totally natural act. People
expect a managerial interaction to feel
different from, say, a friendship
interaction.
The specific skills that
a successful people-manager needs to use
are:
1. Enhance self-esteem.
2. Listen and respond
with empathy.
3. Ask questions to probe
for clarity and understanding.
4. Ask for help or ideas
to solve a problem.
5. Communicate
self-confidence.
1. Enhance self-esteem.
People tend to work well
when they feel good about their
achievements.
Many management
interventions are triggered by something
that has gone wrong. People’s self
esteem takes a dive when they feel they
have failed. They need to be reminded to
feel good about the things they are
doing right.
In some cases, the
self-esteem that people obtain through
work is the only self-esteem they have.
Maintain and enhance
their self-esteem at every
opportunity, even when you want to say
something negative.
When you do need to say
something negative, make sure that you
say it about the behaviour, not about
the person:
Compare:
“You are no good at
time-management.”
“Your time management
skills need to improve.”
The first statement is
perceived as an attack on the person,
and they will react defensively. The
second separates the person from their
behaviour.
When you want to
associate a critical statement with a
positive one, put the positive one
first.
Avoid the word “but”,
because this devalues the positive
statement. Use the word “and” instead.
This is much more powerful.
Compare:
“Your technical
problem-solving is excellent, but your
communication skills need some work.”
“Your technical
problem-solving is excellent, and I’d
like your communication skills to be of
the same high standard.”
Use phrases such as "I've
picked you for this because I know this
is your strong area."
"It's not like you to
have problems in your work."
Suggestion:
Start a notebook, and
write down positive things you could say
about the work of each person you
manage. Then actively seek opportunities
to tell them.
2. Listen and respond
with empathy.
Of course, in any
interaction you will get better results
if you demonstrate active listening by
the use of verbal and non-verbal cues.
However, it is important
to maintain a controlled managerial
procedure, rather than let the
interaction degenerate into an
open-ended conversation.
In most of the
interaction procedures contained in this
course, the person you are managing will
present you with a mixture of factual
information and emotional information.
They will want to tell you about
problems and feelings.
People with problems want
sympathy because this justifies their
behaviour and they feel that a
sympathetic response makes it
acceptable.
Sympathy says "I share
your problem, and I accept it as a valid
reason".
If you do literally share
their problem there is a risk that the
interaction can degenerate into a mutual
moan (“Ain’t it awful”), or a kind of
one-upmanship (one-downmanship?) “You
think you’ve got problems. Let me tell
you about mine”.
Another difficulty with
sympathy is that other people will
sometimes present you with problems,
histories and feelings that you have
never experienced. Under such
circumstances you can only use general
words of consolation, which leads to an
open-ended interaction.
Or you could use empathy.
Empathy recognises that
they have a problem, but returns
attention and accountability to solving
the work problem.
The essence of doing
empathy is:
1. Recognise
what emotion the person is experiencing.
2. Let them
know by putting a label to it.
3. Move on.
Empathy says, "I see that
this problem is distressing you. Now,
what do you think you need to do?".
When used on a negative
emotion it has the effect of putting
"brackets" round the feelings so that
you can get on with resolving the work
problem. The person feels that the
listener has given a satisfactory
response.
A word of caution:
If you label the emotion
incorrectly, the person may get annoyed
that you do not appear to understand.
“My wife has left and
taken the kids. I’m behind with the
mortgage. I’ve been put on tablets for
stress and blood pressure. Yesterday my
dog got run over.”
“Losing a pet can be very
upsetting. I know, my hamster died last
month.”
If you can’t identify the
precise word, use a general purpose word
like “upset”, or probe deeper with
questions like:
“And how does that make
you feel?”
You can also use empathy
in situations where the person expresses
a positive emotion.
When used on a positive
emotion empathy has the effect of
reinforcing the good feeling.
For example: "I can see
that you are pleased about ...."
Empathy is a very
powerful tool. A teaspoonful of empathy
is worth a shovelful of sympathy.
3. Ask questions to probe
for clarity and understanding.
Much of your management
time involves finding out what is going
on. For this you need to ask questions.
The standard probing
questions usually begin with:
What, Who,
When, How, and Why?
Be careful with “why?” It
sometimes sounds like an accusation. If
possible use the phrase “What is the
reason?” This leaves open the
possibility that there could be a valid
reason.
Compare:
“Why were you late this
morning?”
“What was the reason you
were late this morning?”
Ask for information and
use subsidiary questions to probe what
they tell you. Write down what
they say, and summarise for
understanding.
People have a tendency to
not tell the whole story, particularly
if there is a fear of blame. On the
other hand, most people have a
reluctance to tell an outright lie to
their manager, particularly when what
they say is being jotted down. What they
often do is tell part of a story in the
hope that it will be accepted as the
full story.
In some cases you can go
along with a partial story because the
most important element of the discussion
is gaining their recognition of a
problem and their commitment to do
something about it.
Accept what they say;
write it down; ask subsidiary questions.
"And when did you first
notice that your alarm clock batteries
were running down? Have you obtained any
new ones?”
In other cases you will
need to ask many questions and
subsidiaries in order to find out the
full story
Asking questions, without
implied blame, also gives you a rare
opportunity to find out how people
actually go about their work, and what
kind of assumptions and possibly
misconceptions they are working under.
Ideally, your questioning
should yield the real reasons that
something has happened. Do not, however,
become involved in a ruthless search for
absolute truth. In most cases you can
manage the process towards the desired
outcome even when presented with a
flimsy “cover story”
4. Ask for help or ideas
to solve a problem.
Telling people what to do
is very ineffective. They resent it and
will seek ways to fail, or other ways of
getting back at you. Solutions to
problems are more likely to succeed if
the person is activating their own
suggestion.
When a manager says “I
need your help to resolve this”, it
makes the person feel good, even if the
thing to be resolved is a problem that
the person created in the first place.
“I need your help”
equates to “I need you”.
When you specifically ask
for ideas people will usually generate
some. If not, then hints like “Have you
thought about...?” will usually get the
ball rolling
Where possible allow an
employee to run with their own solution,
even if it is not as good as your own
idea.
5. Communicate
self-confidence.
Remember that like
creates like.
Demonstrate confidence
in yourself and your staff.
"I'm sure we
can find a solution to this problem if
we pool our ideas".
"I'm sure you
can achieve it if you set your mind to
it".
“There will be some
problems, and I’m sure you’ve got the
skill to overcome them. I’m here if you
need any support.”
Employees need their
manager to show decisiveness and
certainty. It boosts their confidence.
Say the words even if you don't feel
convinced.
Exercise:
Think ahead to your next
interaction with a member of staff or a
colleague. Work through the interaction
in your mind. Write down a couple of
phrases for each of the skills that you
could use during the discussion. |
