The position you hold automatically comes with a certain amount of respect. You don’t. You may have been respected in your last position. That’s in the past now.

The fact is that you will now have to earn that respect all over again with a new team, whether they are subordinates, peers or superiors. They may have heard of you, but that does not mean they will respect you the minute you take over.

Some may fear you because of the power (real or imagined) that you have. You will have to pay your dues all over again.

As I said, you have not earned their respect…yet. Respect comes with time. The level of respect you reach will be determined by how well you use that time. Just occupying the position won’t do it. Making rash decisions your first days on the job won’t do it either. There are ways to earn that respect. There are also ways to lose it along with the respect that automatically came with your title. Let’s look at how some have lost that respect and how others have earned it.

Remember the image we talked about earlier? You see one image in the mirror in the morning. Others see a different image. The fact is that you likely look at that image with a more forgiving eye than others do. Hey, after all, you have been looking at that great face a lot longer than they have, right?

Think about the Academy Awards. What is it that everyone talks about the next day? Not who won what, but who wore what and how they looked. They all thought they looked great. But did they?

Be critical of yourself because you can bet others will be.

One young man I know started on an assembly line in a manufacturing plant. He didn’t know that it was only a job. He didn’t know that he was supposed to just come to work, complete a set number of units and then go home at the end of the shift. He didn’t know that it did not matter whether his work area was clean or not. He didn’t know that wearing clean clothes everyday wasn’t important. He didn’t know it was “just a job”. So he did all his work, helped others with their work and kept himself, his work and his work area spotless.

A strange thing happened. Less than two months later the plant superintendent called him into his office and offered him a spot in the supervisor training program. From there he went into HR and was promoted three more times in the nine years he was there.

You don’t need a large wardrobe. But, whatever you wear, make sure you are neat and clean. Think of it this way. Who would want to go to a doctor that has stains all over her white coat?

The bottom line is this. Some respect comes with the position. More respect comes through the image the leader presents to his team.

Your office doesn’t have to be the cleanest place in the world, but it should not look like the last time it was cleaned was when movies were a dime. Your boss is not likely to say much if your office is a pigpen. Your peers and subordinates may kid you about the mess, but they will also be reluctant to pass on any important paperwork to you that could get “lost” in a pile somewhere. They may bypass you completely, leaving you clueless.

So what’s an office supposed to look like? Make it easy for people to come in to see you, regardless of what their position is in your company. You don’t need to have all the symbols of authority on your walls. They already know who you are.

In other words, if you think it doesn’t matter what your office looks like, you are dead wrong.

Thanks for stopping in. More later.

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I question the wisdom of insisting on a process with so little apparent value!

Anyone who has been in HR for some time also knows that most supervisors in their organizations hate doing them. It’s a chore that the company says needs to be done. But they either put it off until the last minute or they set easy targets for their people to meet, or they give most of their team an average score.

The easiest ones for them to do are the superstars and the ones standing in the doorway on a banana peel waiting for someone to give them a shove.

The ones that they hate doing are the ones who they need to have on their team to get the work done. The soldiers who show up every day and never create a problem. The supervisor’s dilemma is how to keep this group motivated. They can’t always give them more money. They can’t always promise them a promotion for the good work they do.

I know, someone “upstairs” says the performance reviews need to be done, so the supervisors do them. In my experience, this process is a waste of time and accomplishes little.

I have read more than a thousand of them over the past 40 years. Most are generic junk. A bunch of words copied from the last review or feel good words so they don’t have to deal with a confrontation with the employee.
In more than a few situations those feel good reviews have given a plaintiff’s attorney a lot of reasons to smile.

Supervisor – “The guy was a poor performer. I had to let him go.”

Attorney in the discovery process – “The record shows you gave him several average or above average reviews!”

See where that conversation is going? Oh, ya. Get the check book out, employer.

More on this next time. Some ideas for you to think about.

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It seems the typical thought among them is “If we don’t have a policy to cover it, we can’t do it.” That’s puzzling to me. Maybe it’s the thought of union organizing potential, possible violation of some state or federal law, or a lawsuit by an employee.

All too often I find human resource people counseling their CEO’s that in order to do something, they must first create a policy to cover it, then have the policy vetted by legal and only then post it.
So why does this thinking seem so prevalent? Lack of experienced human resource people? Paranoia of being sued? Afraid of offending their employees?

“Management rights” means that unless you have given the right away by policy or there is a law covering the situation, you as the management of your company, have the right to run your business as you see fit.
Here is a typical management rights clause included in a company/union contract. This one is from a union contract dated 1971.

“It is understood and agreed that all the customary and usual rights, powers, functions and authority of management including the management of the plant and the direction of the workforce, the right to hire, discharge, discipline, promote, demote, transfer, relieve employees from their duties for lack of work or other legitimate reasons, to maintain order and efficiency, to decide plant locations, number and locations of departments, type and quantity of tools and equipment to be used, products to be manufactured, schedule of production, and control of materials shall be vested exclusively in the Company.”
The above rights, powers, and authority of management are not all inclusive, but indicate the type of matters or rights which belong to and are inherent to management. Any of the rights, powers or authority the Company had prior to the signing of this Agreement, including those in respect to rates of pay, hours of employment or conditions of work are retained by the Company, except those specifically abridged or modified by this Agreement or any supplementary agreement arrived at through the process of collective bargaining.”

What this says is “Unless we have given it away in the bargaining process or a law covers a particular situation, the management of this company retains the right to run the company as we see fit.”

What does this mean for non-union organizations? Note the sentence which says in part …… the type of matters or rights which belong to and are inherent to management.
That’s the part that needs to be understood by CEO’s and human resource people. In effect, unless you have given something away by policy, or the law has taken it away, you decide how you want to run your business.
If you see a problem in your organization, you do not have to check to see if you have a policy to cover it or create one before you can act. You just handle the situation. Some employees may say that you can’t do something because there isn’t a policy in place. They are wrong.

In one company I came into, they had one employee who was a disruptive influence. I took care of the situation. When I asked why the supervisors had let this guy get away with that behavior for over two years, their answer was surprising. They said the guy never broke any rules so they couldn’t discipline him!

Do you think that way? If so, you need to change your mind set. If you see something that needs to be corrected, fixed or otherwise taken care of, take care of it!

Another example. One employee used the company email system to promote his personal agendas, including his religious preferences. When we told him to stop, he claimed he had a right to do so. That he was just stating his personal opinion. And other employees used emails to say personal things.

We told him we didn’t care what his personal beliefs were. Was there a specific policy in place that covered this situation? No, but that did not matter. We have an inherent right to run the business and his use of the company communications system to broadcast his private beliefs was not acceptable.

The bottom line ………. Unless you have given away the right to manage parts of your business, take the action necessary to correct a problem.

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