Men and Women in Leadership – Helping Their Employees Succeed

As a manager, motivating and helping your employees succeed ought to be among your top priorities. You need to build a succession plan with a leadership bench that is broad, wide, and deep. The people in your work group need the leadership, direction and support that only you can provide. In this article, you’ll find seven proven strategies managers can use to help employees reach their full potential and be ready for the next move up the organizational ladder.

Employees who have gaps in their knowledge and skills aren’t able to do the job as well as managers need them to. American schools are training workers who are woefully unprepared for the jobs of America’s future. Not every worker needs to be a college graduate. Indeed, perhaps 30-40% of new jobs will require college degrees. However at least 89 percent will need some post-high school vocational training. Currently the US has far fewer students than other countries invested in these vocational tracks.

Here are some key ways men and women in leadership can help their employees succeed.

1. Provide Mentoring.

   You want your employee to have mentorship from the manager or other men or women in leadership inside the firm. These mentors can provide specific information and guidance to help employees do their jobs better and improve their overall performance and productivity.

2. Find Training Opportunities.

   Training is important to employee development because it helps them improve skills and gain deeper knowledge in the areas that might be lacking. When selecting a training program, consider the areas that need the most development and choose what will best help achieve the desired end result. Does your employee need to cultivate the qualities of executive presence, or does she need the skills to enter her first leadership position? For instance, leadership coaching would be beneficial for those aspiring to an advanced position.

3. Create On-the-job development.

   Sit down with your manager and discuss what can be done to learn and grow. Find projects, activities, group involvement and responsibilities that can be added to the current position to help with growth and development.

4. Identifying the skills that need development.

   Once the skills have been identified, you’ll want to get the employee’s buy-in and commitment to improve. An obvious place for this to happen is during the employee’s quarterly or annual performance review. This is also an opportunity to set specific goals. Also, this sets the stage for monitoring and documenting their improvement (at their next review).

5. Provide honest feedback.

   A high degree of feedback will directly improve the effectiveness of an employee. The constant feedback will help make incremental changes in behavior and skill level.

6. Provide clear expectations and steps for success.

   An employee needs to know the expectations of their manager and what is important for them to be working on to improve their overall skill level and abilities.

7. Celebrate their successes.

   This will not only encourage further development, but will help to inspire others in the work group to develop their skills. Be sure to recognize your women business leaders too, not just the men.