360 Management?
Want some great advice for dealing with your boss? Don?t let them ?lose face.? When you need to deliver unwanted or bad news, try to be positive and never in public. And smile.
I think this would be a very good strategy to gain respect and trust from your boss. Sure, you have to be doing good work too, but doesn?t a little trust building go a long way toward getting recognized and valued for that performance?
Isn?t this also good advice for working with customers? It seems to me that this level of care would be an effective way to retain customer loyalty. Again, you?ll have to be providing high quality products and service?but taking a moment to be mindful about the way you interact with your customers can distinguish you from your competition.
I didn?t really take this suggestion from a management or leadership training. I adapted it from a culture tip for working with people from Southeast Asian Indochinese cultures.
Why not take it as a good management tip and adapt your behaviour to your employees? When I suggest to managers that they might adapt behaviour to the needs of employees in much the same way they adapt their behaviour within the different groups they belong to, they often think that I mean they should become like the employee. This isn?t what I mean at all.
All the groups we belong to, and the situations we face, determine how we will behave. We are constantly adapting. If you?re a golfer, you hang out with other golfers. Golfers have a code of behaviour that you follow?usually without noticing it?that you do not necessarily use in other groups. If you?re in a theatre group, it?s the same thing?but with different expected behaviours. And you adjust without thinking about it. You reach your own and the group?s objectives by behaving according to a set of unspoken, but agreed behaviours. And each adjustment represents a shift in your frame of reference. You see the world through the eyes of the group interests.
And in the workplace, you adjust your behaviour the same way?to your boss, to customers, to the team. You try to see situations through the eyes of your boss or your customers. And when you do it well, you get good results.
When you do the same for your employees from different cultures, you also get good results. Your employee feels valued. And you get more work done, better, for less. The proverbial win-win.
And since you?re already making the exact same adjustments for your boss and your customers, why not take the time to do it with employees?