By Angela Nuñez

Great leaders aren’t just good at solving problems—they’re good at preventing them. Some drama is inevitable when a team of people is working together. Everyone has different ideas, opinions, and backgrounds, and not everyone will always agree. In the work environment, though, it’s important to strive for harmony in order to keep the office from turning toxic. Managers can help keep the peace by encouraging employees to leave the drama outside. It’s far too easy to let outside drama affect the work environment. People carry many burdens, but those must be left outside when they come to work (as long as they’re not work-related).

Some employees may not even be aware that they’re letting unrelated stress affect their behavior at work, so managers must gently point this out to them if they’re bringing in outside drama. If, however, drama is stemming from work-related issues, then they must be worked out in the workplace among those who are involved with guidance from a manager, if necessary. Leaders should encourage their teams to leave drama and personal issues at the door. If teams can do that, they’ll work together much better and be more productive.

 

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By Angela Nuñez

It’s important for managers to make themselves into leaders in order to truly inspire the workforce and lead their agency to long-term success. Leadership is indeed something that can be worked on and improved. Certain traits can be cultivated with time and practice. Here are a few to start working on in order to become a great leader:

• Openness to honest feedback
Any leader worth her salt knows that feedback is essential to success. Leaders need people to tell them the truth without any sugarcoating. Leaders need to hear the hard things in order to be able to change them for the better. Great leaders encourage their teams to give them honest feedback and don’t penalize them when they do.

• Accountability
Great leaders don’t try to place blame on others. They own up to their mistakes and get to work on fixing them. This kind of behavior will gain the respect of any team.

• The wisdom to know who needs to go
Letting people go is never easy, but sometimes it’s the right thing to do. Great leaders recognize when it’s time for someone to move on and have the strength to tell him so.

• Communication skills
Great leaders are great communicators. They keep everyone in the loop and encourage others to communicate often and clearly, as well.

This is not a comprehensive list of leadership traits, but it’s a good start, so if you’re a manager, take a look in the mirror and see if you need to work on any of these more.

 

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By Angela Nuñez

Paid time off is a guarantee in every developed country except the U.S. A new report from the Center for Economic and Policy Research shows that nearly a quarter of Americans work without paid vacation days or holidays. Even worse, the U.S. is the only “rich” country that does not require paid time off even though studies have repeatedly found that a more balanced life actually enables workers to be more productive. John Schmitt, senior economist and coauthor of the report, said, “U.S. law and U.S. employer behavior still lag far behind the rest of the rich countries in the world.” Good leaders will recognize what a problem the disparity is, for they know that teams perform best when they feel appreciated and well-rested.

Relying on organizations to voluntarily provide paid leave is not sufficient; low-wage, part-time workers and small business employees are the ones hit the hardest by a lack of paid time off. Other countries provide between five and thirteen paid holidays each year in addition to paid vacation days. A lack of work-life balance takes a health toll on workers, too, making it more difficult for them to handle stress and rebound from sickness. Tired, overworked employees are unable to be as productive as employees who have the ability to lead a more balanced life. Paid time off shouldn’t be viewed as a burden to any organization, but as a tool and necessary benefit for employees in order for them to maintain their health and wellness and be as productive as possible at work. Those with the power to initiate change in their organizations need to push for guaranteed paid time off so that U.S. workers and their agencies can benefit from the positive changes healthier, happier employees will usher in.

 

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By Angela Nuñez

A new approach to success and leadership has been growing, but its limitations seem to be overlooked. “Fail fast” has become the mantra of entrepreneurs and some leaders. Proponents of the “fail fast” approach believe that momentum and getting a lot done is the best way to succeed. In some cases, this may hold true, but in the area of leadership, it can be a dangerous theory to prescribe to. A mercurial, always changing leader won’t easily win the trust of his or her followers. While sticking with a project or task that will clearly fail isn’t a good approach, neither is ditching a project without giving it a real chance. Employees need leaders who believe in them and their projects enough to give them a real shot at success.

A high, speedy productivity level may sound appealing, but quality is easily lost in this manner. Determined focus and perseverance can lead to great success, especially when it comes to leading others. Long-term success is not found through speed and constant failure, although some failure is inevitable. Long-term success is won through perseverance through good times and bad and sticking with projects and people that deserve a chance even if they’re not successful right away.

 

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By Angela Nuñez

Managing great employees isn’t always easy, but it’s absolutely necessary to enable those employees to flourish. If top employees feel stifled, they’re likely to move on to a different organization, and the loss will be yours, not theirs. Great talent must be encouraged, supported, and given the tools to succeed and thrive. Here are a few traits to keep an eye out for if you want to encourage top talent to blossom in your organization:

• Passion for the work
The best employees have passion for their work and truly care about the organization as a whole being successful. It’s important to make sure this passion is encouraged and never snuffed out.

• Thinking outside the box
Great talent tends to be great because those employees have a knack for seeing better ways of doing things. They don’t want to hear about how it’s always been done or why it can’t be done; once they see a better way of doing things, they want to test it out. Don’t discourage them—put them in charge.

• Problem-solving
Great employees can identify and solve problems. It’s easy to point out what’s not working; it’s not always easy to fix it.

• Honesty
Top employees have the courage to say things you don’t necessarily want to hear but probably need to hear. Finding talent with this kind of strength and courage isn’t easy, so hold onto it when you do.

Supporting and leading top employees isn’t always an easy task, for they tend to be movers and shakers, and change scares a lot of people, but if your organization can put trust in its best talent, it’ll be led to long-term success.

 

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By Angela Nuñez

Telework is on the rise, and learning how to manage remote employees is a skill managers need to master if they want to be good leaders. The most important thing a manager and his or her remote team need is trust. If off-site employees feel like they’re being micromanaged, they’ll feel underappreciated. Unless you have good reason not to trust a teleworking employee, give him or her the benefit of the doubt. You shouldn’t have an untrustworthy employee working remotely in the first place. Even with a good amount of trust, quarterly reviews are still a good idea and should be standard. All that should matter is that the work is getting done and getting done properly. When you give your employees that power, most won’t abuse it, and the ones who do you don’t want on your team, anyway. Let go of those people who don't measure up to your standards.

Another important aspect to managing remote employees in addition to trust is communication. Be sure not to over-communicate, as this could make employees feel micromanaged, but do check in when necessary via email, phone, or Skype. Make sure communication is clear and let your team know that support is always there when they need it. Having a dispersed team adds diversity to the organization—offices can sometimes stifle innovation. Teleworking also enables employees to have a better work-life balance. As long as managers can learn how to effectively manage their remote teams, teleworking can be a great thing.

 

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By Angela Nuñez

Productive, drama-free conversations are important to the long-term success and wellbeing of any organization. Most people begin conversations from a place of advocacy—persuasion in favor of their own needs, desires, and/or beliefs and from their own point of view. Entering a conversation in this way leaves very little room for growth, change, or collaboration. A better attitude with which to approach conversations is one of open-mindedness. You should still value your view, but be open to the fact that you may be missing something. If everyone in a group has this attitude, there is much more room for innovation and growth. In this way, employees can express their view as a possibility but not the only answer while listening with an open mind to alternative views.

This approach is much more likely to lead to problem-solving than if everyone simply argues his or her point of view. You can start having better conversations by adopting this attitude and inviting responses after you’ve expressed your point of view. If you don’t understand where someone else is coming from, ask him for further explanation and be willing to hear his reasoning. A balance between assertiveness and open-mindedness leads to better conversations and more productive, healthier relationships both at the workplace and outside of it.

 

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By Angela Nuñez

With budgets shrinking and demands increasing, agencies—especially those in the public sector—need to have competent, productive teams. This may mean letting go of some employees in order to enable teams to be more productive and in order to make room for new employees. There are several traits that managers need to look out for in their employees, one of which is the tendency to cause drama. Work can be stressful enough without petty drama added to the mix, so if you have a drama queen or king in the office, you may want to consider letting him or her go. Another troubling trait is the tendency to overpromise and underdeliver. The best employees are aware of their abilities and limitations; you don’t want someone with a glaring lack of self-awareness on the team.

A red flag that it’s time to let go of an employee is if he or she acts out with customers and/or clients. Doing so is unprofessional and very bad for an agency’s brand and reputation. Another red flag is if an employee is unreliable and doesn’t do his or her job. Managers need teams they can depend on and that are able, even under pressure. Many employees will learn and grow, of course, but it’s important not to waste time on those who can’t or won’t improve. In some situations, out with the old and in with the new is the way to go.

 

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By Angela Nuñez

Compared to the rest of the world, U.S. benefits are a joke. New mothers in other countries, from Pakistan to Canada, receive anywhere from 12 to 50 weeks of paid maternity leave. New mothers in the United States receive zero. Smart organizations provide some paid maternity leave even though it isn’t required because they know that benefits such as paid maternity leave instill loyalty in employees and that any investments made in benefits will be well worth it in the long run. But not all new mothers are lucky enough to work for these on-the-ball organizations. Many other developed nations also provide paid paternity leave; unsurprisingly, the U.S. doesn’t provide that either.

Why is the U.S. so behind the times when it comes to employee benefits? This country’s values have been shaped around working hard in order to achieve “success,” and somewhere along the line, “working hard” was equated with having no work/life balance. Other developed countries also provide more vacation time for their workers than the U.S. does because they value health, wellness, and family time. U.S. workers tend to be overworked, stressed out, and lacking in the social life department. But how successful are we if we are giving up time with family and friends and butchering our mental, emotional, and physical wellbeing?

A cultural shift must occur if we are to change our lifestyles in order to be healthier and to spend more time with those whom we care about. Younger generations of workers will demand this shift and usher it in themselves if necessary, because we’ve witnessed that sometimes, no matter how hard you work, you still lose it all and for nothing but irretrievable time that could’ve been spent with family and friends. The Internet has connected us to the rest of the world, and we see that there are better ways to live, that the “American way” is not the only nor the best way in every circumstance. Working hard is certainly important, but so is having a life outside of work and putting time and energy into that life. The best leaders will recognize that their agencies must value work/life balance if they are to be successful in the long run.

 

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By Angela Nuñez

Ensuring long term success isn’t easy, but there are things you can do to make sure your organization is doing all it should to attract the right candidates and set itself up for long term success. During the recruiting and hiring process, it’s important to keep in mind the skills your agency needs now and those that will likely be necessary in the future.

One of the most important traits for an organization to have if it is to be successful in the long run is flexibility, and managers play a large role in determining how flexible an agency is willing to be. Forward-thinking organizations offer benefits such as unlimited paid vacation and the option for women on maternity leave to return to work when they want to on a schedule of their own devising. Strategies like these inspire terrific loyalty and rarely, if ever, backfire. Not to mention that by 2025, Generation Y and its successors will comprise more than half the global population and 75% of the workforce, according to consulting firm A.T. Kearney. Eighty percent of them want to be able to work flexibly, so recruiting candidates from that generation will require agencies to embrace flexibility.

Cooping employees up in offices everyday stifles creativity and innovation. While there is undoubtedly value in bringing people together in the office, it is not the only way to inspire great work and collaboration from employees. If you want loyalty, creativity, and innovation to thrive, make sure your organization is flexible.

 

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