Wouldn’t it be great if our bodies could diagnose and fix themselves so we wouldn’t have to worry about going to the dentist, or visiting the doctor and you’d never fall foul of the usual round of cold and flu viruses that magically appear at this time of year? 

Unfortunately, there isn’t yet a Matrix style programme that we can download into heads to sort out our health. And yet most of us, if we stopped to listen to our bodies and took some simple measures, could actually prevent a lot of the illnesses we have. 

Ok so you’re rushing around trying to meet with clients, grabbing a quick lunch and preparing an important presentation, but a small amount of time spent on yourself and the welfare of your staff could pay dividends in the future. It’s one of those investments that we should make but often don’t to our cost. 

Healthy Environment
Providing a healthy environment for you and your staff is vital to help reduce accidents and keeping people safe. It everyone’s responsibility to ensure not only that their working area is tidy but that their equipment is up to scratch. It’s also good to check they are sitting in the correct positions and are following the correct guidelines when using equipment. However, as their boss, it’s up to you to make sure they are aware of their responsibilities and that all new staff are given adequate guidelines and the appropriate training.  

Reduce Stress
A tense environment can quickly escalate causing staff to burn out and is one of the main factors why people fall ill. They may even end up leaving if this pattern keeps repeating itself, and in extreme cases this can result in staff taking their employer to court. Using humour in the workplace can foster wellness, improve stress management and increase productivity and morale.

Read More

The Employee Job Life Cycle describes the evolving quality, productivity and job retention of typical employees throughout the process of hiring, employment and then termination. An employee life cycle is the steps the employees go through from the time they enter a company until they leave. Often Human Resources professionals focus their attention on the steps in this process in hopes of making an impact on the company’s bottom line. That is a good thing for them to do. Their goal is to reduce the company’s cost per employee hired.

Unfortunately, they aren’t the ones who really make a difference – managers are. People don’t really work for companies; they work for their boss. To the extent that you can be a good boss, you can keep employees, keep them happy, and reduce the costs associated with employee turnover. In the process, you will make your own job easier and increase your value to the company.

An employee joins a new Organisation; therefore he is always into the torment to set up him on the job. A brief introduction of the company and its entire rules & regulations book is given to the employee during the induction process. Thereafter, employee is placed on the job for live exposure of the job, where he interacts with the existing employees and tries to be friendly with them. Upon his work he faces various obstacles such as rude behavior of seniors & juniors, negative comments from dissatisfied colleagues, weak support from management and many other problems. Sometimes employees’ leave in frustration in such situations, but those who pass through the tough times, they might have a better future in the Organisation.

Upon the job, the job responsibilities are changed so that employee learns about the various skills required to work. Also, so that employee does not feel monotones on the job.

Read More

This may not be the first time that your CEO has sliced your training budget and I am sure it will not be the last. If you already run a lean and mean training function, then congratulations on your efforts. You may find, though, that your previous good management will not slow the CEO from asking you to shed some more expenses. Whether you have already optimized your training function in the past or you realize that you have a long way to go, here are ten practical steps that you can take to weather any financial storm.

1. Provide more self-help workbooks and on-the-job aids.
Replace some of the high cost training sessions with materials and aids placed where people do the work. Laminated procedures, checklists, tips’n’tricks, lists of shortcut keys, ready reckoners, and so on, may be effective replacements for full-blown training sessions. If somebody is having difficulty handling angry customers or using Microsoft Excel, check out your local training publishers for self-paced workbooks.

2. Conscript local experts or coaches to take the place of some training sessions.
If people have some knowledge and skills about the subject, identify one or two local experts in each area to act as a central point for all questions. Make sure that the experts and coaches you nominate have the required communication and interpersonal skills.

3. Cut training sessions that do not add value to the organization.
Does your organization really need that assertiveness skills training course? What tangible benefit did your organization achieve from it? Drop courses that do not show a demonstrable advantage to your organization. I’m not saying that these kinds of courses are never worthwhile. During difficult periods is the time to review whether they are of real benefit to your organization now.

4.

Read More

Many organizations muddle through change. How is your organization progressing at implementing that new accounting system or moving to a new employee performance management process? Are your managers nodding approval in public but sabotaging the initiative in private? Are your employees shell-shocked and just giving up? Do you have no money left over for post-implementation support?

Whatever change your organization is trying to implement, knowing about and working through the necessary steps will go a long way to making your change initiative a success. I have distilled these crucial steps into a process model for change. The model is called the CHANGE Approach, with each letter signifying a step in the process. I have summarized below the key features of each step leading to a successful change transition.

Create tension
With this first step, articulate why change needs to happen and why it needs to happen within the planned timeframe. Many change programs start with a big bang, but then peter out ending in a whimper. Other programs struggle to develop the initial momentum. Think about the immediate force that will get your people moving in the right direction. This could be impending legislative changes, new entrants to the market, high levels of customer dissatisfaction, etcetera. Think also about the impacts of not changing, such as loss of market share or fines from regulators. To prepare your company for the impending objections, collect as much data as you can to back your assertions.

Harness support
Next, get on board the key decision makers, resource holders and those with the potential to subvert your change process. Start by identifying the key stakeholder groups; the people with something to lose or gain from your change proposal. Include in your analysis the end receivers of the new products or services, such as suppliers, customers and end users of software.

Read More

Hiring the wrong person for the job can be detrimental to the productivity of the company, and may cause avoidable expenses.

The cost of hiring the wrong person is higher than taking the time to find someone with the right personality fit for your business. Think about the time and monetary costs of having to go through the recruitment and training process again. It is better to find the right person in the first place.

The key to finding that candidate - is to concentrate on their personality & culture fit within an organization. Here are some tips to help make your recruitment job easier.

Effective interview techniques
It is not just the jobseeker who needs to be prepared for the interview – you need to do some homework too. A recruiter will need a good understanding of what type of individual will fit into the business which including their personality, skills base, attitude and manner. Use these techniques to ensure you always have effective interviews:

•    Be clear on the competencies required for the job, including your required output and key performance indicators.
•    Determine characteristics and traits of the person you think will succeed in the role. Look at employees who are doing well in the same job and list what they bring to the position.
•    Prepare a job description for candidates.
•    Read each person’s resume and cover letter before meeting them so you know their experience. It will also give you a springboard for questions.
•    Prepare interview questions beforehand covering the skills base you need, but also questions that will help you assess the candidate’s behaviour.

Read More

Legend has it that Theodore Roosevelt and one of his cowhands found an unbranded steer on land controlled by Gregor Lang, a neighboring rancher.

In accord with the usual custom, they prepared to brand it, but as the cowboy applied the brand, Roosevelt said, “Wait, it should be Lang’s brand.”

“That’s all right, boss,” said the cowboy.

“But you’re putting on my brand,” Roosevelt said.

“That’s right,” the cowboy said, “I always put on the boss’s brand.”

“Drop that iron,” Roosevelt commanded, “and get back to the ranch and get out. I don’t need you anymore. A man who will steal for me will steal from me.”

Roosevelt understood that a person’s moral conviction must rest on something firmer than the presence or absence of particular people. Do what is right, no matter who might benefit or who might be watching.

— H. Hagedorn, Roosevelt in the Badlands, Theodore Roosevelt Nature & History Association (August, 2000), cited on CharacterFirst.

Why do we hire for skills, but fire for character1? Why do some people succeed and others fail?

The difference that makes a lasting difference is character. It is not heredity, not circumstances, not ability or disability, not favoritism or discrimination, not environment, not luck or chance. It’s none of these. Rather, those who overcome obstacles are the people who succeed.

Are people born with the drive to overcome? Or can it be taught? Yes. And yes. Anyone who has children knows that babies are born with certain tendencies or character traits. Yet, it is also true that people learn to be who they become. Most of this learning takes place in the family.

Read More

When you became a manager, there’s a good chance that you didn’t realize that providing employee training would become a major portion of your job. However, it’s a fact that teaching is an essential function of every managerial job. When you’re in charge of managing and motivating other workers – no matter how small or large your team may be – training is something that you’re going to have to do on a regular basis.

Providing training to employees is a very specific skill, and it’s one that many managers don’t realize they need to have. Sharing information and teaching people how to perform tasks are two very different things. When you are providing training to team members, you have to focus on conveying information to them in a manner that is motivating and that will enable them to truly understand what you are saying so they will be able to transfer that knowledge to on-the-job performance.

3 Keys to Effective Employee Training

1. Recognize Your Training Responsibilities
Too many mangers think that employee training is “someone else’s job”. Even if your company has someone in charge of training, those who hold supervisory roles bear responsibility when it comes to employee training and development. If you want to lead a peak performing team, you must be prepared to coach and train your team members to excel.

Managers at every organizational level are responsible for making sure that the employees on their teams have the skills needed to perform the work required. Accomplishing this managerial duty involves providing effective training to team members about company polices and procedures and industry standards, as well as recognizing the need for skill-based training and making sure that it is available to employees who need it.

2.

Read More

Many managers and supervisors struggle to get the best out of their employees. Do you have difficulty understanding why your workers behave the way they do? Sometimes this is because managers mistakenly assume that everyone is like them: “I like a lot of detail, so everyone else must as well”. And when an employee turns in a report that looks like an executive summary, this type of manager stresses to find out what went “wrong” with the employee.

In other cases, the manager works on the assumption that their employees’ preferences are the opposite of their own. This type of manager, for example, believes that employees are motivated primarily by their paycheck whilst they themselves are motivated by a stiff challenge.

What both these types of managers share is that they are both one-dimensional; seeking to explain all or most of their employees’ behaviors by a single cause. People are much more complex than this. Being able to appreciate some of this complexity will help make otherwise unintelligible behaviors understandable. Using this knowledge to then shape employee behavior will not only take some of the stress out of managing people, it will lead to greater rewards as employees begin to work with you and not against you.

Without wading through a lot of theory, let me illustrate the power of psychology with a real-life example. In one computer production facility, the production manager wanted to lift production levels. To do this, she implemented a new incentive scheme in which production workers would receive a 5% increase in their take home wage if they increased the number of units produced by 30%. This did require some effort on the part of the employees as the productivity gains could only eventuate if each of them learned how to use the new microprocessor-controlled cutting machine.

Read More