How to be a good employer (3 of 3)

The all-important sense of direction

Have you ever been woken at first light by your cat mewing triumphantly and presenting you with a mouse, dead or alive. Isn’t the cat crushed when you yell “Get that thing out of here”?

Imagine you are a mafia boss. Crime is your game, but you are very religious and would never commit or sanction a crime on Sunday, the day you go to church. One of your henchmen robs a bank on a Sunday and brings you the loot, anticipating the old-fashioned hug and the standard twenty percent commission.

Be fair. You can hardly give him the traditional concrete dunking if you have never told him that you do not approve of Sunday bank robberies.

These two real-life examples demonstrate why your employees crave a sense of direction. They want to do the right thing but the right thing for one employer might not be the same as the right thing for another. You have to tell them. You can (and should) do this by communicating your vision, your business plan and your policies. However, these alone are not sufficient, especially if they sit on a shelf unrefreshed for periods of time. You need to communicate your values and your preferred methods on a daily or weekly basis either face to face in the huddle or by training or work-shopping actual issues. The best way of all is by example. Never be a “do what I say, not what I do” employer.

Employees who use their initiatives generally have greater job satisfaction. You also stand to benefit by delegating but, in doing so, do not throw your employees to the wolves. It is common decency to make sure they feel safe by giving them all the training and information they need to make the decisions you would want them to make.

Communication is the key.

Remember, no blame. If they occasionally get it wrong (as you do) follow the correct procedure, as follows -

How do we fix it?

How do we reduce the risk of it happening again?

Admittedly, it is difficult to train a cat.