Issue link: http://psai.uberflip.com/i/1181388
W EEKLY EDITION NOVEMBER 6, 2019 J er ks At Wor k - An d Ho w T o De a l W ith T he m By Karleen Kos, PSAI Executive Director • Twice a year all employees rate their managers. They do this through a questionnaire and each manager ends up with a total score between 0 and 100. This is a fairly standar d practice in many companies, the interesting part is this: • All managers' scores are posted for the whole company to read. And then the kicker: • Employees are free to choose which manager they want to work for. These three practices taken together make bad leadership virtually impossible and create enormous pressure on leaders to constantly improve. Bad managers who refuse to acknowledge the feedback of their employees and improve accordingly quickly find themselves without followers. And jerk managers neve r stand a chance – they are exposed and ousted almost immediately. We realize that most portable sanitation companies are not large enough for an approach in which employees can choose their managers. Still, there may be ideas from Semco's approach you ca n use in your business. Do employees have the opportunity to give feedback in a safe, neutral manner on their supervisor's conduct and effectiveness? Are the supervisors held accountable for the behavior revealed in these surveys, helped to grow or removed if they fail to do so? Nobody is suggesting you immediately fire someone because their employees give them less than stellar marks – but it is important that unacceptable, harsh, unpredictable, or otherwise routinely offensive behavior be addressed and either changed or eliminated. Be sure to own your own part in this. In companies the size of most in the PSAI, you probably know who your jerks are. Are they still in their jobs because they are your personal friend? Are you avoiding the conflict or hassle of dealing with them? If you are the company owner that's your prerogative, but remember: they are costing you money and goodwill. Are you okay with that? P AGE 16 CONTINUED ON PAGE 17