“We’re having a hard time recruiting employees into our roles, and having a tough time retaining them. My managers are burnt out and feel like they are in between a rock and a hard place. If they try to hold people accountable, employees will leave….yet if they don’t hold employees accountable, we are stuck with a group of employees who just barely show up.”
Sound familiar?
A few months ago, I was on the phone with a business owner. He was stressed out, and his managers even more so. He knew they were in a tough spot AND he wanted to show how much he trusted them and believed in them as leaders. He described the situation above (which we hear from so many of our clients).
“I know you’ve done in-person training in the past. Have you ever considered doing some training programs using tools like Zoom?”
This was one of the questions he asked me that day, and I was thrilled to give him a very confident “YES” answer to this question.
The truth is, we developed a module-based training curriculum almost two years ago as a way to better reach businesses where sending a manager (or 10!) to a live training session somewhere in the U.S. (not to mention, all the travel, logistics, and coverage back in your business) just wasn’t feasible. Who knew it would be pandemic-friendly, too?
The goal? Give managers, supervisors, and leaders straightforward, practical tools to use to make the uncomfortable more comfortable (like how to have difficult conversations with employees, addressing performance issues, interviewing, and also topics like giving recognition more effectively and ways to retain employees).
We worked with the business owner to enroll his managers in our online program. At first, as with any new training, managers questioned how this would really change their situation. We kept hearing things like “we can’t find anyone”, “if I give feedback to employees they will leave and then I will be in a worse situation than I am now”, and “it’s this younger generation, they just don’t want to work”.
Now that we are a few weeks in, we are hearing the excitement from the managers as they’ve begun to implement the new skills and tools. The managers’ confidence in recognizing employees and addressing performance issues has increased. The managers have changed how they approach employees and started holding employees accountable. And guess what?!? Employees didn’t leave. In fact, their performance and productivity has increased. True story.
In a final coaching call, one manager shared with me that as a result of the training he has seen a change in his approach and a change in how employees respond to feedback. They welcome his feedback and coaching, AND they have changed their behavior after receiving feedback. Previously this manager noticed employees would try to hide from him or would cringe and roll their eyes at his feedback. Now, employees are open to hearing his thoughts and are talking with him about what went well and what they could be doing better.
Through the program the business owner was able to increase the confidence in his managers and the performance and productivity of employees. AND he was able to achieve his goal of supporting his managers, and showing how much he trusted and believed in them.
Yes, it is possible.
Send us an email with the subject “TRAINING” and we’ll reach out to set up time with you.
