There’s often one in most teams or organisations, the person who you just can’t seem to reach, the person who can have a negative impact on not only you, but the rest of the team.
Performance management makes up a significant part of a manager’s role, but can also be one of the most stressful parts of managing a team. Being able to recognise, understand and deal with poor performance is a critical skill for all managers. When issues concerning under performance are not addressed appropriately and sensitively, it can lead to unhealthy and unproductive outcomes that can impact negatively on the whole team.
I once worked with someone who was labelled as having a ‘difficult personality’ by most of the managers in the department. As I was not in a management position at the time, I did not have to tackle this, but it did get me thinking:
How on earth do you manage someone who fits this description? How do you reach them and how do you summon the courage to have difficult conversations with them?
When I moved into a management position, I ended up having this individual in my team. The challenges I knew I faced, managing a disruptive member of staff, were daunting to begin with but once I began to confront the issue, things improved.
We ended up having a great working relationship, and I began to understand some of their frustrations. They came to appreciate my honest approach to managing them. They could still be challenging but at least I understood why and was able to adopt an appropriate approach.
Help is at hand:
Whist we are painting a very negative picture, people often have a good reason to think or feel this way. It can be challenging to understand these reasons, and in fact, they may not even understand them themselves. But through effective communication, we can start to get a grasp on things.
The first time you have a conversation around work performance or attitude can be really challenging. You may have concerns or worries, like:
How will they react?
Will it make it worse?
What if they get angry or upset?
I don’t like confrontation, how do I deal with it?
Help is at hand though! BHT’s Training’s course ‘Managing Poor Performance, Negativity & Resistance’ aims to answer these questions and provide proven techniques to give feedback on poor performance, attitudes, and even the sensitive issue of personal hygiene.
We will also dig deeper to help us recognise some of the causes of people’s attitudes and poor performance so that we can tackle the issue rather than just labeling people as ‘difficult’.
It also enables us to reflect to the tough question:
Could it be us?
Find out more:
Graeme will be running the popular ‘Managing Poor Performance, Negativity and Resistance’ course on 4 September 2017. The course will be repeated on 13 march 2018.
BHT Training also provide a number of training courses for managers and those moving into management. Click here to see what is currently available to you.
About the author:
Graeme is a training and development specialist with 20 years’ experience of delivering leadership, management and soft skills programmes to a range of private, public and voluntary sector organisations.
His trainees have included, managers from the Independent Police Complaints Commission, the Line Management Group and Cambridgeshire Fire & Rescue Service.
In 2013, Graeme attained a ILM Level 7 Certificate in Executive Coaching & Leadership Mentoring and now coaches senior managers on a one to one basis in addition to delivering courses.
Graeme firmly believes that learning should be an activity that is thought provoking, experiential and enjoyable and delivers his training in a way that allows participants to reflect on their daily routines and take practical steps to develop their skills.