As a manager I always try and follow a certain way for managing my team. And the keyword for me is maintaining the correct balance between various aspects of regular work. Like, giving time to innovate AND delivering on tight deadlines; taking time-offs AND putting in extra hours; etc.
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The author of Burned Out and Handling Burn Out blog, points on 5 ways to keeping your team from burning out:
- Keep communications open from top to bottom.
- Keep the political crap off of your employees.
- Keep the job varied.
- Keep the employee learning.
- Reward the employee.
Unlike my previous blog earlier: Guidance on Avoiding Redundancy, the author accepts the need to take good care of your team regardless of the economic situation.
In fact I’d say one must take extra care during these tough times. If you don’t and once the economy starts improving those will be the first ones to change jobs who were not treated well by their employers. :~(
Denise Dubei in his article – Sharpen up at work to avoid losing your job points out 5 key ways for IT professionals to avoid redundancy in today’s recession rid times. They are:
- Get Noticed
- Keep upgrading your skills
- Do not take advantage of the access to the systems that you may have
- Do not make demands
- Do not spew negativity
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Agreed no one in the IT world is immune from the current market situation and is (sometimes easily) replaceable. My question here is:
-Are these pointers only applicable during tough times?
-Is it okay to sitback on your bum, not upgrade yourself
-and access sensitive data on your intranet okay during good times?
No I don’t think so!
Except for being resonably demanding, I think rest of the points should be adhered to at any workplace; whether you are in IT, Finance, Customer Service, Teacher or even a bus driver!
Leadership expert John Baldoni in his latest post – Why Leaders Should Lighten Up recommends managers to try following three (3) things to lighten up the working environment during challenging times:
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- Relax Your Mood
- Create Laughs
- Keep Your Door Open
I think examples of challenging times could be: current economic crisis, a project deadline or a challenge to win a customer account. Whatever the situation, challenging or may be even those peaks when everything is going fine; I think the manager or leaders should always keep the situation light and comfy for his team. As per the above three pointers I have mostly noticed that following the first option (Relax your mood) is a bit tougher than the other two. In a crunch situation one might still have his door open but he also needs to respond with a relax mind to his staff or colleague. This will make him sound confident and in control of the situation and not panicky. Quite often we’ve noticed managers or leaders go into their shell or real-self during pressure situations.
But as someone once told me – “Leadership can be learnt. One needs to unlearn his old behaviour and learn to behave differently like a true leader in life.” And I think one should also learn to retain his composure and relax the environment during such challenging times.
There is some (good?) news from ProvencoCadmus. SmartPay buys ProvencoCadmus’ payments division.
Provenco merged with Cadmus and became ProvencoCadmus around a year ago. But with recession and a debt of almost $45 million ProvencoCadmus went into receivership recently.
As per the above article SmartPay will be moving into ProvencoCadmus office – does that mean there will be no lay-offs and ProvencoCadmus staff continue work with SmartPay? Its not mentioned clearly. I hope they do as I have got some ex-colleagues who used to work for ProvencoCadmus.
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