Four Common Mistakes Costing You Talent
Leaders: here are four common mistakes I have seen in companies and non-profit organizations for years. They all cost employers great talent.
1 - Being a conflict avoidant leader. When leadership does not deal with “the elephant in the room”, whichever elephant it may be, good people leave. Here’s an example: many years ago I was consulting for a large corporation and there was an employee in the HR Department who essentially didn’t do anything. She was paid a good salary plus benefits to do nothing at all. Why? Because she was in a support role and whenever she was given something to do she did such a poor job that people in the department stopped giving her work. It was faster and simpler for them to do things themselves that they should have been able to delegate to her. So, she sat all day long with a perfectly neat and clean desk and didn’t do much of anything. The senior leader in the department knew exactly what was going on and didn’t face the reality of how this situation was eroding trust in him and building resentment amongst the good talent in the group.
2 - Lack of role clarity. Great employees want to know what their boss wants them to do so they can please their boss. Seems so simple. Yet, I continue to see situations where leaders do not tell their people what is expected of them and then the leaders are unhappy that their people don’t do what the leaders want them to do. Spoiler alert: employees are not mind-readers. This is such an elementary concept yet lack of role clarity runs rampant across organizations today and great talent doesn’t hang around for the frustration that builds with this management style.
3 - Not holding people accountable. Strong performing employees want to know what great work looks like to their boss and they want to be held accountable to do great work. When people are not held accountable for what they are responsible for the slackers don’t care. The five-star people leave. The superstars can’t take and won’t put up with the culture that breeds no one owning what is theirs to own.
4 - Putting someone over a non-performing employee. This is another one I have seen countless times in my 30 plus years in consulting. Go back to rule number 1. When the conflict avoidant leader doesn’t have the guts to deal with the non-performing manager, for instance, they bring in a VP or Director over the manager. This seems like it could save the floundering department lead by the incompetent manager, but if a capable top performer is put over the manager in this scenario, and the manager is protected by senior management, the new VP or Director will leave. The strong performing VP or Director won’t stay to keep doing the dance around the incompetent manager they aren’t allowed to hold accountable. Yet another way to lose a great employee.
If any of these scenarios sound familiar to you and you want to break the cycle of practices which cost you valuable talent, reach out to laura@conoverconsulting.com. We have decades of experience holding the mirror of reality up to leaders and developing their ability to lean into difficult situations.