Summary

You want to improve staff performance. You read: you listen: you attend seminars, webinars, even conferences. Take care of yourself. Don’t follow everything the gurus tell you. Be especially careful with these “management truths.”

1. Consult employees about their training needs

Your staff need proper training. No doubt about that. But training usually won’t solve performance problems. These occur mainly because people don’t want to and can’t do it. Identify the performance problem first. Then build a solution. For the most part, it will not involve training.

2. Employees resist change

Real. But it’s interesting that change is a part of everyone’s life these days. Overall, it looks like we managed. Please note this. Employees resist change only if they perceive that it will hurt or make them uncomfortable. Point out the benefits for them personally. Stop talking about the “good of the business.” Emphasize personal benefits. And gain their cooperation to “test” the changes for, say, 30 days and seek feedback after the trial period.

3. People learn from their mistakes

This is also true. What is not said is the next award. “They learn to repeat them.” Habits are hard to break. It’s best to develop good work habits and practices early on and learn to repeat them. “But, Leon,” you might be thinking, “what about that old saying that the man who makes no mistakes does nothing”? Has it ever occurred to you that he doesn’t do anything because he makes a lot of mistakes?

4. Practice makes perfect

This is totally wrong. It should say, “Perfect practice makes perfect.” It is said that the difference between an amateur and a professional is this: an amateur practices until he gets it right: a professional practices until he can’t get it wrong. Structure job training so employees “don’t mess up.”

5. Start at the beginning; work to the end

Wrong! Start at the end. Go back to the beginning. Did the Mavs and Packers, or any other basketball or football team, start out saying, “We’re going to win every week?” No. His eye was on the prize from day one. They then sat down and worked out what they had to do to win it. Start with the goals and how you will conclusively measure that you have achieved them. Your people can’t build success unless they have a very clear notion of what it is and how they’ll know they’ve achieved it.

6. Good interpersonal relationships are desirable

Is it so. But they are a consequence, not a goal. Make outstanding job performance and business success your first priority. Tell the staff exactly what you want. Provide the resources to achieve it. Work is not a “crush”. But it is quite remarkable how tolerant individuals are of others’ personal weaknesses when they are part of a successful team. Ask any athlete…or employee of a really successful team.

7. Get “Inside Their Heads”

Please do whatever you do to improve the performance of your staff, no, please don’t play the amateur psychologist. Stop trying to manage your people. Focus on managing your performance. Get the systems right. Get the performance standards right. Get the team rules and goals right. Focus on getting results and getting staff motivated. It’s amazing how well employees perform when they understand exactly what is expected of them and are trusted to fully meet those expectations.

conclusion

Gurus get a lot right. But usually they write and teach for big companies. The small and medium business is different. Few gurus specialize in that field. And blindly following the gurus can easily backfire.