Enhance Training & Coaching

If you don’t have collaboration, you don’t have a team. A team beats a group of individuals hands down (when you have interdependent roles).

To smash team targets working on building high levels of collaboration and communication in a team makes a lot of sense.

There have been countless times when I have asked team members for help and we solve a problem in 10 minutes that I had been struggling with for an hour. I would have go to a solution, eventually (2+ hours later). My solution probably would not have been as good (two minds are usually better than one).

Imagine this happens across the team. Everyone is asking the best person in the team to help whenever they get stuck or slow down.

Everyone gets through their work that much quicker. They have more time to help each other. They have more time to spend getting the solutions to tricky problems that little bit better. The team output goes up. Beating team targets starts looking like a forgone conclusion…

I have transformed the performance of a worst team in the business to one of the best, multiple times in multiple companies.

Building high levels of collaboration and teamwork was one of the most important factors getting such a huge increase in team performance.

Invest 10 minutes and learn 5 of the most important ways to build collaboration in your team
https://enhance.training/5-ways-to-build-collaboration-in-your-team-to-step-change-performance-tm0315

Difficult employees make a manager’s life and job a lot more difficult. When you have a difficult employee (or several) you know you have conflict ahead. That alone is stressful. I used to dread the conversations: psyching myself up, giving feedback and asking for improvement.

Until I was taught exactly what to do by a brilliant boss. Then it back just another task to do – no big deal.

Unhappy, underperforming, negative, disruptive, lazy, … in fact any problematic employee has the potential to cause major problems in the team and badly damage team performance.

Dropping team performance is a key reason managers lose their jobs. Difficult employees are dangerous to manager authority, happiness and career prospects.

This is why managers must take action. Either they take action OR they risk job insecurity, frustration dropping credibility or worse.

I know from experience, that 9 out of 10 employees want to do a good job. If they are underperforming or being disruptive, they usually have one or more barriers in their way.

As a manager you are in a brilliant to help remove those barriers with 4 out of 5 employees.

You can learn what to do to get IMPROVEMENT or you can carry on getting frustrated, annoyed, angry … until you decide to remove them. The remove route is a lot more hassle, more costly, more risky (for you and company) and not very pleasant.

Give yourself a lot more options before removal becomes necessary. Learn how to turn difficult employees into great employees (up to 85% of the time!) Invest 15 minutes and watch https://youtu.be/QMOhGtXQZxk

Communicating clear direction and getting every team member to consistently move in the same direction is harder than most managers think.

When you get all team members moving in the same direction, sharing and owning common goals, then:
1. Everyone works faster (less friction, delays, persuasion etc needed)
2. All team members feel safer (clear goals provide them permission)
3. There is a lot less waste (unclear direction or changing direction adds to work
4. Decision making in the team is a lot easier and quicker
5. Prioritisation is a lot easier.
6. Team members are happier
7. You the manager don’t have as much work to do (less course correcting and motivational work)

Clear direction for the team comes with a huge number of benefits for the manager, team and business

And then the harder part – actually creating really clear direction and expectations for the team.

When around 20% of direction and expectations is created by what a manager says and writes, it is no wonder many managers struggle.

It takes courage to choose a clear direction and stick with it.

It takes skill to persuade bosses to let you stick with a clear team direction, when the latest bright idea or initiative is gathering momentum internally.

When you create and stick to a clear direction for the team AND keep disciplined … you are in a MUCH BETTER place to meet and beat targets with your team.

Invest 10 minutes to learn exactly how to create and communicate clear team direction to all your stakeholders https://enhance.training/how-top managers-create-clear-direction-to-consistently-beat-targets-tm0314

Really STAND OUT at work. The MOST VISIBLE managers aren’t just “competent” – they display visible, repeatable behaviours that signal leadership potential and business impact.

When you think “visible” a manager in your business probably comes to mind. They seem to be everywhere. Bosses and peers really listen to them in meetings. Their teams love working for them. They are in all the most important projects. People are constantly coming over to speak to them at their desk…

They display, much more strongly than other managers, at least 6 behaviours that really make them stand out.

The first is courage.

They are willing to take personal risks.

They speak up in meetings, even when everyone else has a different opinion. They respectfully challenge their bosses on solutions they spot problems with or they ask probing questions to force deeper thinking.

They put themselves in situation where they might look silly, they might have their ideas shot down, they might be shouted at … (even those these things rarely happen)

Courage takes action and time to build. Courage doesn’t happen just because you want to be brave. Start with taking small risks and build towards the bigger ones. Keep pushing the boundaries of your comfort zone. Get used to acting even when fearful.

Courage is the FIRST behaviour.

To learn about 5 MORE behaviours to REALLY STAND OUT at work, click here https://youtu.be/5REKwrUBHP4

Getting what you want at work – whether a leader, boss or worker – depends a lot on your negotiation skills.

Have great negotiation skills and you get: the help you need quickly; you get sensible targets and objectives you can actually beat; you work on interesting activities, initiative and projects; you get more of your boss’s time; you cause less upset around the business; you build a stronger reputation faster …

Your ability to negotiate and get what you want for your team and for the business DIRECTLY impacts how SUCCESSFUL you are AND how others PERCEIVE you at work.

I have worked in top companies, turned around failing companies, transformed the worst team in a business, been promoted a lot of times … negotiation played a massive part in all of these.

There are six approaches I use religiously when negotiating. Each plays a very important role in getting what I want at work.

The first approach is knowing exactly what you want BEFORE you start negotiating. This should be SPECIFIC, quantifiable, and CLEAR.

Vague, rough, ballpark is not enough. When you get specific, you can then work through the different routes to getting to your specific goal. Then you can think through the resources you need for each, the pinch points, the constraints.

This gives you a list of “must haves” and “nice to haves”. You cannot succeed unless you get all the “must haves” that overlap for each route.

I know this sounds like a lot. Get into the habit of mentally going through this process before starting any negotiation and you will know exactly what you need and what you can give away to get what you need. The more you practice, the quicker you will get.

A few minutes of planning can save you hours of discussion / negotiation.

To learn about the other 5 vital approaches to becoming a great negotiator, I invite you to click on https://youtu.be/Oc_8CSmI0rU

Getting employee push back on your ideas, solutions, decisions or requests as a manager, can be pretty tough in the moment.

You can feel like you authority is being challenged or even question whether they are trying to undermine.

90% of the time, you are getting push back or questions for very good reasons.
1. They don’t understand.
2. They don’t want to change
3. The have different ideas and solutions in mind and what to discuss these
4. They have spotted a problem and want to bring it to your attention
5. They are scared, upset, frustrated etc

And sometimes they don’t like you or have a problem with you being their manager and are trying to make your life difficult.

Or they really are purposely challenging your authority as a manager.

I used to hate employee push back and challenge, especially when I was new to managing teams and was still building my own self-confidence.

Then a realisation hit me.

Most of that push back helped me be a better manager, make better decisions, end up with better solutions. I can’t tell you how many better outcomes came about because I listened to team member push back. Far too many to count over a 25+ year career.

I love constructive push back.

There is always a danger that push back will damage your authority as a manager. And of course there are those that intentionally WANT to damage your credibility, standing and authority.

I have 7 straight forward steps I nearly use when I get any type of push back. These maximise the benefits I can get from the push back WHILE ensuring there is no damage to my credibility and authority. In fact these steps generally INCREASE your credibility and authority as a manager.

Invest 10 minutes to learn exactly what to do https://enhance.training/7-great-ways-to-handle-employee-push-back-on-ideas-solutions-requests-tm0313

Your weakest or most difficult team member is probably costing you £’000s personally. And most managers DON’T realise.

Managers are assessed and financially rewarded based on their team’s performance. Increase performance and you increase your rewards. It is that simple.

Your weakest or most difficult team member anchors the performance of the team. They might even be damaging the performance of the team. They do this UNINTENTIONALLY and the effects are SUBTLE.

Your weakest or most difficult team member sets the standards and behaviours, that are ACCEPTABLE to YOU, for the rest of the team. As long as they are above these, they don’t need to put extra work in to improve.

To increase team performance, increasing the minimum
acceptable standards is a pretty sensible step. By pushing up the level of the minimum standards, you put psychological pressure on EVERYONE in the team to improve their own standards, not just your worst team member.

Team performance improves by MUCH MORE than one person’s contribution.

There is a catch.

To increase team performance, you have to improve your worst team member WITHOUT damaging the trust and psychological safety within the team. If you do, team performance will probably DROP.

There are a number of straight forward strategies you can employ that do just this.

I invite you to download our Worst Team Member Strategy detailing out at tried and tested approach to getting significant team performance improvement in months. Click here to get your copy: https://enhance.training/lm-lp/worst-team-member-improvement-strategy-ulp048

People work hard when working hard MAKES SENSE TO THEM. Look at a team that is coasting or even a lazy team, and chances are high that working harder doesn’t benefit them.

As a manager, you are in a brilliant position to incentivise your team to work harder … to make it in their best interests to work harder WITHOUT pressurising them or threatening them.

Individuals always work harder (and better) when they WANT TO rather than when they are forced to (to say keep their job).

If you have a big salary budget to play with, then paying more in salaries or even better bonuses is an easy go to. It does require much work from the leadership/management.

When you don’t have extra budget to spend on salaries etc, there is still a LOT you can do to motivate a team to work hard.

Some practical examples:
1. Reciprocity – work to help your team members and they will feel obliged to help you
2. Personally work hard – sets an example and expectations – which will get some people working harder. The real secret is what you work on. Chose the right areas and people will be falling over themselves to help you in return.
3. Offer lots of benefits for working harder – praise, recognition, more interesting work, more of your time … there are a lot of options.

To learn 4 tried and test approaches to increasing the work rate of a team (without changing the people) I invite you to click on the link and use 4 approaches that I have used consistently to transform ordinary teams into high performing ones – again and again, in different companies and in different situations.

Click here https://youtu.be/dDW7rgKiiyw

How clear are your comms really at work? How do you make your communication – what you say and write – even clearer.

Look at any staff survey on the worst problems in their business and lack of communication or lack of CLEAR communication is always near the top of the list.

I know plenty of people and organisations that say a lot but don’t really say anything at all. There are a lot of words, but it is hard to pick out the important points they are trying to get across.

How good are you at getting to the heart of the matter and communicating that?

Do you organise your thoughts before you speak or write? [Or is your organising brain always trying to catch up?]

How direct is your communication?
[Or do you including hedging, deference, emotional, permission, jargon or complex language mixed in with your message?]

What emotions do your audience expect from you or is every communication an emotional lottery?

When you speak do others listen attentively or do they look like they are politely waiting for their turn to speak?

If you work on building 5 habits into your communication, you will write and speak a lot more clearly. You audience will spend a lot less brain power listening, taking in and understanding your message. The clearer your communication, the more action you will get from your communication. Actions create results and results build careers.

Invest 10 minutes to improve how clearly you communicate https://enhance.training/5-habits-for-clearer-communication-actions-to-speak-clearly-like-top-leaders-tm0312

Get Promoted EVERY Year. Hard work does not get you promoted. I know so many talented people that work very hard and yet don’t get promoted. Or they get promoted much slower than others who don’t appear to work as hard.

Getting promoted is NOT really about EFFORT.

If fact, sometimes the more effort you put in, the harder it is for you boss to promote you (they don’t want to lose your contribution to their success)

Getting promoted IS about achieving specific OUTCOMES and results (and achieving them in an acceptable way).

Normally, you need to put effort into achieving good outcomes BUT they are NOT the SAME things.

It doesn’t matter what level you are at – trainee or senior manager – the outcome rule matters to you. The more senior you get, the more OPPORTUNITY you have to work to produce specific outcomes (and the more opportunity you have to choose the wrong outcomes).

I invite you to invest 10 minutes to learn about 5 important strategies for CONSISTENTLY getting promoted. I employed these and got promoted 13 times in as many years all the way up to board level. They work. In any company and in any sector.

Click here to learn about 5 strategies and a ton of tactics and actions to take within each. https://youtu.be/0-x8ONbfUPk