Are your employees or co-workers shambling around the office like zombies? Take a defensive position and grab this book:
Shine: Using Brain Science to Get the Best from Your People
Your job as a manager is getting harder all the time. But your most critical responsibility–especially in today’s world of intensifying competition and economic stress–is how to help your people shine their brightest. In Shine, Hallowell draws on brain science, performance research, and his own experience helping people maximize their potential to present a proven process for getting the best from your people:
(1) Select: put the right people in the right job, and “light up” their brain
(2) Connect: strengthen interpersonal bonds among team members
(3) Play: help people unleash their imaginations at work
(4) Grapple and Grow: when the pressure’s on, let employees master their work
(5) Shine: use the right rewards to promote loyalty and stoke people’s desire to excel.
I like this approach as it merges nicely with a number of other approaches I think work well, plus it goes one step further.
Certainly there is a history of trying to “get the right people on the bus”, Hallowell gets them in the right seats.
Strengthening interpersonal bonds among teams members might be the hardest part. Not everybody wants to be buddy-buddy with their colleagues at work, but I don’t think that’s exactly what Hallowell is talking about. More reading for me on this point, I guess.
But the rest of this, I am totally on board with! Play at work equals innovation in my book, and “grapple and grow” to me is the same idea that I’ve espoused, which is giving people control – even more when the pressure is on. Throw the rules out the window, let people try anything that moves the “issue” forward.
In the end, it is the “shine” portion that Hallowell has gotten the most attention for. Kevin Sheehan at “Become A Leader” put it best:
Ned Hallowell’s Ten-Step Action Plan
1. Recognize effort, not just results. ”Of course, you want the results, but if you recognize ongoing effort, results will more likely ensue. Cheerleading works.”
2. Notice details. ”Generic acknowledgment pales next to specific recognition.”
3. Try, as much as possible, to provide recognition in person. ”E-mail packs much less of a punch than face-to-face interaction.”
4. In meetings—and everywhere—try to make others look good, not bad. ”Scoring points off the backs of others usually backfires.”
5. As a manager, you need to understand that your most important asset is the self-esteem of each of your employees. ”Recognition is a powerful tool to preserve their self-esteem.”
6. Acknowledge people’s existence! Try always to say hello, give a nod of the head, a high-five, or a smile in passing. “It’s incredibly deflating to feel that someone you work for has just passed by you without noticing your presence.”
7. Tap into the power of positive feedback. ”Granted, it’s important to be able to acknowledge and learn from mistakes. But positive feedback is often a more effective means of consolidating the learning.”
8. Monitor progress. ”Performance improves when a person’s progress toward a goal is monitored regularly.”
9. As a manager, the more you recognize others, the more you “establish the habit of recognition of hard work and progress as part of the organizational culture.”
10. Bring the marginalized people inside the tent. ”In most organizations, about 15 percent of people feel unrecognized, misunderstood, devalued, and generally disconnected. Not only is recognition good for that 15 percent to help them feel valued, it is good for the other 85 percent as well, because it boosts the positive energy across
What do you think about these ideas? What has been your experience as an employee or as a manager?
