Leadership When the Heat's On: 24 lessons in high-performance management

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 Lesson Six

Practice Humanagement

Humanagement is simply the ability to use the job to develop the person while having fun in the process.  My entire emphasis changed as I stopped managing my people like a bunch of livestock and began leading them as people.  It occurred to me I could help each individual unlock the talent he or she had inside, as well as to:

• Set more meaningful goals (personal and professional)
• Better understand and plan their time
• Use more of their creativity
• Better handle their stress
• Feel safe pushing their envelope

If I had an office full of happy, growing people, I thought, there’s no telling what we could accomplish.  Sure enough, when they began taking a new and enriched mind home at night, instead of a sore, tired, and aggravated one, our entire universe expanded beyond anything we would have previously thought possible.

Don’t forget the “...while having fun in the process” part.  I don’t mean you open the office with a joke every morning.  My experience has proven time and again that people who grow and develop to the point they can handle problems they would not have been big enough to handle in the past are happier people.  They are happier because they are more fulfilled and actualized.  When an office full of people becomes more fulfilled and actualized, morale goes up.  With higher morale comes higher productivity.  I’ve never seen it fail.

           

Staff turnover also drops.  With low staff turnover comes more bonding and team spirit.  High turnover results in suspicion and a lack of personal investment in the job.  It’s difficult to feel a part of an organization if the probability of losing your job is high.  There are the managers who swear their organization has a terrific atmosphere, but people leave because the money is not competitive.  There are also bureaucracies where people stay forever, even though they are miserable.  A good logo for them would be: Repeating Yesterday, Inc; Home of the Living Dead.

Nobody is having fun in either case.  People leave the first organization because they’re not happy, not because there's more money elsewhere.  The value of having fun on the job ranks above money.  The ability to enjoy the work and the working environment is a stronger hold on people than higher wages in an unpleasant job and environment.  Ask yourself the following three questions to help get positioned and mentally prepared to practice Humanagement: 

• What can I do to set a better example for my team of the five bulleted points above?
• If my team members were asked to rate how much fun they have working for me what would my grade be?
• What's the gist of the conversations that are being carried on about me at night in the homes of the people that work for me?

“Help a team member grow, and you will receive respect in return.”

THE LEADER'S DOZEN

Each time there has been a downturn in economic conditions the requests for my “Leadership When the Heat’s On” program have gone up. Such is the case now. My presentations are tailored for each client’s needs. The structure is build around the maxims in my “Leader's Dozen” which are listed below.

Please keep in mind my track record where 145 salespeople increased production 800% in a five and one-half year period and that included two recession years.

The best IS yet to be!

Danny

THE LEADER'S DOZEN

1. The ultimate reward for the leader of people is to be able to say at the end of the day, “I saw someone grow today and I helped.”

2. Charisma = Intensity (goal, focus and direction) and Enthusiasm (expectancy of better things to come).

3. High performance is often the result of a sudden change of direction.

4. To achieve great things, know more than the average manager considers necessary.

5. An organization quits improving right after the manager does.

6. Help a team member grow and you receive respect in return.

7. On a scale of 1 – 10, team morale and customer service receive the same score.

8. Take a mentor to lunch before somebody else eats yours. (It’s not necessary the mentor be in your industry since great leadership principles are non-industry specific.)

9. Be aware of a team member’s weaknesses but talk to his or her strengths.

10. An organization will never rise above the quality of its leadership.

11. Fear has no strength of its own, only that which you choose to give it. Ironically, that’s the very strength you need to overcome it.

12. Your team members are just as good as you are at planning their time.

13. If you don’t have enthusiasm that’s contagious what ever you do have is also contagious.