Leading Older Workers

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Since call centers employ agents of all ages, this article may provide useful information on managing older workers.

What Younger Managers Must Do

Back in 1912, George Bernard Shaw made an observation that stands the test of time, "It's all that the young can do for the old, to shock them and keep them up to date."

 Those words have special meaning for the young person supervising older colleagues. Not only will the appointment of youth over experience be a shock to the more senior associates, it may be a move that they covertly or overtly resist.

A younger person put in a position to supervise older co-workers faces a delicate challenge, that can be managed successfully with a little interpersonal finesse. Here are some suggestions:

Be respectful of the awkwardness the situation may spur. Most likely, one or more of the more senior colleagues was a contender for the job you received. Any gloating or “peacock strutting” will only drive a wedge deeper into the inevitable divide.
 

Don’t apologize for your appointment, you deserved it. But keep it in perspective. For you to succeed over the long haul, you’ll need the cooperation and support of those people who feel as though you bested them.
 

Acknowledge, especially if the gulf is significant, the difference in ages. Do this one-to-one not publicly. Express empathy if an older person seems uncomfortable with the promotion; ask for his or her help:

“I imagine it feels a little strange reporting to someone so much younger. I know I might feel a little resentful if I were in that situation. I’m thrilled we’re going to be working together and I’m hoping that I can count on your sharing your wisdom. You have so much to contribute here. Your experience and insight are invaluable assets. You can make a significant contribution to this company, and I’m hoping that you will find working together to be rewarding experience. I ask for your patience, your guidance, and your help.”
 

Be humble; you are going to stumble. You are going to need the help and support, and maybe the forgiveness, of your more experienced associates.
 

Expect your older teammates to be a bit withdrawn initially. At the start, you are likely going to operate without the benefit of the doubt. Prove yourself to be a good, supportive boss who truly does value input, correction and suggestion, and your more senior associates will eventually come around. They may even be your strongest supporters in time.
 

Be open to suggestion, even criticism. Don’t try too hard to prove yourself. Operate confidently but with an air of approachability. If you come across as infallible, no one will step in to save you from a stupid mistake that will be obvious to everyone but you.

On the other hand, if you make a habit of enlisting the input of your experienced co-workers, and acknowledging their contributions, they will contribute generously and help you accomplish great things.
 

Ask questions (especially early in your assignment), such as: What am I overlooking? What else should we be considering? What’s wrong with this approach? Is there a better way?

Feel free to not defer to the input you receive, and if you don’t take the advice of your more experienced colleagues, tell them why you decided the way you did.

Keep in mind, everyone responds positively to a good leader at any age. Deal with your more mature colleagues maturely, and you will find them to be loyal allies.

The Key to Expert Performance

As call center managers we often look for ways to improve our team's performance. In the article below, Tom Stevens gives his thoughts around the keys to expert performance.

It's not what you think.

In a knowledge-driven economy, chances are greater than ever that the value you offer comes from making use of expertise. Conventional wisdom will tell you that you get the best from your expertise by deeper learning your field, by keeping up with new developments and understanding the nuances and intricacies of your domain – in short, investing in knowing more.

However, I believe using knowing more as your primary strategy for increasing the value of your expertise will likely leave you missing the boat – big time.

In the way knowing is not the same as doing, expertise is not the same as expert performance, i.e. actions in your domain of expertise that are considered to be best-in-class.

Conventional Wisdom tells us natural talent is what drives top performance. Modern research challenges this notion. K. Anders Ericsson, co-editor and contributor to the Cambridge Handbook of Expertise and Expert Performance, notes the common factor of expert performance in almost every domain researched is “deliberate practice” – ongoing practice and repetition shaped by active feedback. For example, there are many talented golfers in the world. It’s feedback driven practice that makes Tiger Woods a consistent champion.

Raw talent can certainly provide motivation and acceleration to feedback-driven practice, but it is the practice that creates the performance. In most domains, people with average talent can achieve expert-level performance by diligently exercising best practices based on ongoing feedback. Kenneth Blanchard hit the nail on the head when he said, “Feedback is the Breakfast of Champions.”

Top performing professionals seek feedback from clients and colleagues. Top performing businesses seek feedback from customers and employees. In all cases, a performance edge is obtained through diligently acquiring feedback, and even more diligently using it to guide performance improvement.

In the realm of leadership and management, executives who want to be top of their game use coaches or 360 reviews to garner feedback, both within and outside of their organization’s formal performance system. Where organizations often go wrong with these tools is using them primarily to shore up weaknesses rather than to accelerate performance of existing strengths and expertise.

Questions for leadership insight: What systematic feedback are you providing for yourself and other leaders in your organization? Are you using feedback to develop and polish best practices? Are you seeking expert-level performance as much as expertise?

We can all agree that it is critically important factor to continue learning and keep up in your field. But knowing more in a field does not necessarily contribute to better performance or more value from expertise – for this you need diligent practice based on systematic feedback.

By Tom Stevens  (c)

How to Develop your Managers as Coaches and Set your People Free!

Jan Springthorpe has written the following article on coaching to improve performance. Take a look and see if you find information or an idea that you can take back to your call center.

Are your managers graduates of the “just do it!” school of performance management?

Do they tell, control, instruct, direct and push staff along in the job?

Does your organization want employees who willingly put in their best performance, give the job everything they’ve got? Discover the powerful secret of non-directive performance management and set your people free!

Traditional command and control models of performance management are losing impact. Ineffective middle managers compound the problem. Failing to get to grips with poor performance can drain away the productive lifeblood of your organization.

Developing your managers as coaches opens up a whole new approach to performance management. Instead of solving performance problems for staff, coaching helps people to identify and develop solutions for themselves.

Your managers can help your employees to take responsibility for their performance through raising their awareness and giving them the opportunity to make intelligent choices. Wouldn’t you like to see your people taking ownership of their work, their output and their personal growth and development?

A manager’s job is to get things done through the people they are responsible for. This involves training and developing people so that they can perform to the best of their ability.

The trouble is, managers don’t devote enough time to developing their staff. If that’s the case, how on earth are they going to find the time to coach their people? The beauty of coaching is that it takes the heat off the manager and actually gives them time to think, plan and manage!

So how do managers working as coaches behave differently? Simple – they use a non-directive approach to managing performance.

Managers who tell, instruct and advise push people along, solving their problems for them and holding onto responsibility and control.

Managers who ask questions, listen, suggest and summarize pull people towards greater freedom and responsibility, allowing them to make their own decisions, create their own solutions, grow and develop new skills.

Command and control management stifles employee behavior. Coaching creates the conditions which allow employees to become more involved in decision making, have greater discretion and feel more valued.

The relationship between manager and employee should be mutually beneficial. Employees look to their manager for direction, support and recognition.

Managers rely on their staff to get the job done, achieve targets and satisfy customers.

So, can any manager coach? It starts with good people management and well developed communication skills.

Develop your managers so that they can build rapport, pay attention, keep an open mind, frame questions, hold back, listen, give feedback and transfer ownership to their staff. Turn them into coaches and set your people free!

Jan Springthorpe

Find out how coaching can transform your individual managers and turn around performance in your organisation. Contact us through www.coachingfromclarity.com

Setting Managers Up to Fail – Why Training Before Appointment is so Important When Promoting Managers to New Positions Within Organizations

By Jan Springthorpe

Contact a friendly, highly professional trainining and coaching provider that you can trust. Come and see how we can help you on a personal level, as a busy executive or work with your organisation at wwwcoachingfromclarity.com

Why Doesn't Training Stick?

Have you ever wondered why the training you get on some courses, however interesting and entertaining, doesn't 'stick'? How many course folders have you got gathering dust on your office shelves? And how much of the content can you recall, or more importantly, actually use, without opening the folder?

Of course, after some training, the learning does 'stick'. What crucial skill or ability do you have now, that you know you learned on a training course? What distinguished the course which caused the learning to 'stick' for you?

What's the Key?

There are three critical elements:

1. The information - the contents, facts, knowledge, tips and techniques.

2. The experience or practice you do until the skill is second nature.

3. The mindset shift that takes away the block that stops you using all that information.

If all three are in place, a course can cause remarkable and rapid changes in performance. Many courses, though, concentrate on the information and the experience, but miss the central role of mindset shift in transferring the learning back to the real world and, more importantly, retaining it over time.

It's a principle well-known in sports psychology. Part of the training of a top sports player consists of physical drills, knowledge of the rules of the game, development of tactics and so on. The other, equally critical, work is done on the mindset of the player. For example, how does he/she feel about their opponent? There may be self-limiting beliefs such as:

'I have never won at this venue'

'You can never come from behind and win'

'I'm not quite as fit as I should be'

Without explicitly surfacing, challenging and resolving these beliefs in training, the player, however skilled and fit, will never be truly confident and consistently win matches. It's as if they are trying to play with their foot nailed to the floor!

How Does it Work in Management Training?

For example, there's no real mystery to time management. Most people know the rules, which are some version of: 'you list the things you have to do, prioritise the list, do the 'A' priority things first, and say no to all the rest'. Easy, right? Well no, because the world is full of people who have attended two, three, or even four time management courses! What they seem to be looking for is the magic 'tip' or 'hint' that will transform their time management forever. But there are no magic tips and hints; these are 'information', and will not make the critical difference to how you manage your time.

What's needed, as with the sports player, is an exploration of your mindset - of where your 'foot is nailed to the floor'. This is a very different type of training, targeted at exposing and exploring your beliefs, attitudes, values and 'rules' in life. The sorts of thoughts that stop people following the simple rules of time management set out above might be:

'But what if I fail?'

'It's got to be perfect every time'

'I can't say 'no' to that person'

'There's just too much to do'

'It's impossible to hit that deadline', and even..

'But what if I succeed?'!

Thoughts like this need to be challenged and 'reframed' before it's possible even to start to use the information content of the course.

Why is Mindset-shift the Key?

Very often, in modern large organisations, people have already received much of the basic skills training they need. They are just not using the knowledge and information they learned because their 'foot is nailed to the floor'. After a training course centred round surfacing and resolving limiting or negative mindsets, they actually perceive the world differently. Things that seemed impossible before now look very different, and suddenly it is possible to apply all that knowledge and information in completely new, creative ways. The 'nail' is removed and suddenly those years of training become usable; remarkable changes in behaviour and outlook occur.

To make a truly lasting impact, training must be designed to challenge and shift the mindset of the course participants. Bear this in mind, and you will always be able to choose courses which are truly worth the time and money you spend on attending them.

How to Choose Training

Look for courses that explicitly challenge existing beliefs, attitudes and values. This ensures that participants are freed up to act on the information content of the programme, and supports new skills with new mindsets.

Choose a course which uses practical real-world experience that consists of exactly what you face in your day-to-day job (This does not mean 'case-studies' or 'exercises'. I don't suppose many readers have day-to-day jobs involving abseiling, or building Lego towers!)

Look for a course in which the participants are personally coached, not treated as just one of a group and left to make the connections for themselves. The path to shifting a mindset is a very personal journey, and needs an outside view, just as it does in the world of sport!

Kate Mercer

At Shine Consulting, we work with leaders who are consciously engaged in designing their organisations to be places where people:
- are consistently passionate, inspired and committed
- produce results well beyond the predictable norm
In short, organisations that really shine!
http://www.shineconsulting.co.uk

 

Leadership - 6 Essentials of Effective Performance Management

Duncan Brodie of Goals and Achievements (G&A) works with individuals, teams and organisations to develop their management and leadership capability.

With 25 years business experience in a range of sectors, he understands first hand the real challenges of managing and leading in the demanding business world.

Linking Employee Performance to Results - How it Works

Barbara Brown, PhD

You want your employees to consistently and continuously perform at high levels but they are not. You find that performance issues vary. Some employees do a great job of communicating with customers while other employees do better at managing time. In other instances, the same employees perform well in one area and not so well in another. As for inconsistency, that happens as well. You cannot always depend on the same employees to deliver the same level of performance on a continuous basis.

Unfortunately, your performance discussions are not effective. When you talk about performance improvement, employees become defensive. You even find yourself on the defensive as you try to explain the changes you want. So what do you do? You identify mutually positive reasons for improving performance by linking performance improvement to: results that are important to employees and to results that are important to the organization. Follow these three steps:

Step 1: Identify the Performance you Want

Start by identifying the areas where you want each employee to improve his or her performance. You may want some employees to stop doing certain things, while you may want others to start doing certain things. Or perhaps a small change is necessary. Consider the behaviors that are important to you and your organization.

For example, if your focus is communication, then determine specific communication behaviors. If your focus is teamwork, then determine specific teamwork behaviors. The operative word is specific. Employees cannot deliver the kind of performance you want if you are not clear about what you want.

Step 2: Identify Results of Performance

Once you have identified the performance you want, determine what happens if the employee performs satisfactorily or does not perform satisfactorily. For example, if an employee completes all assignments timely: he or she could receive an improved performance rating; other employees might be able to complete their assignments more timely; or the office might receive fewer complaints about product deliveries.

Go beyond the traditional results by thinking about who and/or what is impacted by employee performance. For instance, a change in performance could impact the organization mission, external customers, workplace accidents, team profits, internal departments, community groups, and others. Do not just consider what could happen to the employee or to his or her workload. Consider what could happen to other employees and to the organization as well.

Step 3: Link Performance to Results

Here, you want to link the performance you want to the results that will be achieved if employees deliver the performance you want. For instance, improved time management could affect customer service, individual productivity, or office goals. The more results you can link to performance the better. Just make sure the results are meaningful to employees. That means if you link performance to goals in the organization strategic plan, employees need to know about the goals in the strategic plan. On a personal level, if employees are interested in more time off, offering opportunities to do more exciting work may not be very motivating.

Go For It!

You have identified areas for performance improvement, you have identified workplace results, and you have made meaningful links between performance improvement and workplace results. Now, you are ready to talk to your employee. This approach gives you a whole new way to handle that performance discussion. You have multiple ways to explain the importance of cooperation and contributions. So the discussion is not just about the performance you want. The discussion is about how the performance you want can lead to positive results for the employee and for the organization where the employee works. Go for it!

Barbara Brown, PhD shows managers how to improve employee performance by linking performance to results. She publishes handbooks that contain phrases for discussing performance. Handbook topics include Linking Time Management To Results, Linking Customer Service To Results, and others. Dr. Brown also offers E-Courses and E-Consulting as well as onsite training and consulting. Website: http://www.LinkToResults.net Email: Barbara@LinkToResults.net

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Barbara_Brown,_Ph.D.

Rewarding Performance Management

By Robert II Smith

Contingent pay is any form of financial reward that is added to the base rate or paid as a cash bonus and is related to performance, competence, skill or service. Contingent pay may be consolidated in base pay, in which case it forms the basis for allowances such as sick pay and for pension arrangements. Alternatively, schemes other than skill or service-related pay may provide for awards in the form of cash lump sum bonuses. The latter arrangement is called ‘variable pay’.

It is sometimes referred to as ‘pay as risk’, which has to be re-earned, as distinct from consolidated pay, which is usually regarded as continuing as long as the person remains in the job and performs it satisfactorily (Armstrong & Murlis 2004).

The most powerful argument for contingent pay is that it is right and proper to recognize achievement with a tangible reward rather than just paying people for ‘being there’ as happens in a service-related system. Pay should be related to contribution, who contributed more and who get more pay (Armstrong & Murlis 2004).
The other arguments commonly used in favor of contingent pay are that:
• It acts as a motivator
• It encourages and supports desired behaviors
• It delivers the message that performance, competence, contribution and skill are important
• It provides a means for defining and agreeing performance and competence expectations
• It can reinforce the organization’s value
• It can help to achieve culture change by, for example, assisting with the development of a performance culture

The extent to which contingent pay schemes motivate is questionable. The amounts available for distribution are usually so small that they cannot act as an incentive. The requirements for success as set out below are extracting and difficult to achieve.

Money can assist in the motivation process but it is a mistake to believe that by itself it will result in sustained motivation. As Kohn (1994) points out, money rarely acts in a crude, behaviorist, Pavlov’s dog manner. People react in widely different ways to any form of motivation. Contingent pay schemes can create more dissatisfaction than satisfaction if they are perceived to be unfair, inadequate or badly managed, as they often are.

The ‘line of sight’ criterion, as originated by Ed Lawler (1995), sums up the key requirement of any contingent pay scheme, especially one related to performance. This is that individuals and terms should have a clear line of sight between what they do and what they will get for doing it.

A line of sight model adapted from Lawler is shown below:
Effect—Performance—Result—Measures—Pay-out
A contingent pay scheme is more likely to motivate people if:
1. The reward is clearly and closely linked to accomplishment or effort people know what they will get if they achieve defined and agreed targets or standards and can track their performance against them.
2. Reward are meaningful
3. Fair and consistent means are available for measuring or assessing performance, competence, contribution or skill
4. People must be able to influence their performance by changing their behavior and they should be able to develop their competences and skills.
5. The reward should follow as closely as possible the accomplishment that generated it.

Article Source: http://www.leadershiparticles.net

Robert Smith was born in New York City in 1956. He has spent more than 12 years working as a professor of English at New York University. He is always ineterested in helping students writing essays and papers. Now he spends most of his time with his family and shares his experience in writing cheap term papers. He is a right person to ask about cheap reports.

How To Deal With Problem Staff And Poor Performance

Iain Mackintosh is the managing director of Simply-Docs. The firm provides over 1100 legal documents and small business templates covering all aspects of business from holiday entitlement to managing poor performance. By providing these legal documents (with content provided by leading commercial lawyers, HR and health & safety consultants) at an affordable price, the company intends to help small businesses avoid costly breaches of regulation and legal action.