Enhance.training

Making decisions reality at work or getting a decision implemented by others to achieve a desired result - is far harder than making the decision itself. Improve decision buy-in from your boss, your team, and others, to make the implementation of decisions quicker, easier, and more successful.

I share the steps and tactics I use in persuading others to buy-in to the decisions made and work to make them a reality. 
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How to Execute and Make Things Happen - Podcast
https://enhance.training/how-to-execute-and-make-things-happen-tm0050/

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Being persuasive with team members is essential to be an effective and good manager. There are so many decisions made by others that you have to work with your team to put into practice. 

Gaining buy-in at work, particularly with those implementing difficult decisions or complex decisions,  is essential to make those decisions effective and get implemented. There are four useful decision making routes I suggest you use when making decisions which help with decision implementation. 

These are:

1.      Unilateral

2.      Consult and decide

3.      Build consensus

4.      Unanimous 

I explain exactly how to use each route when making decisions at work. Matching the route to the decision type is a key skill to get decisions implemented quickly and successfully. 

To persuade others quickly and effectively, I use a 5 step process to plan how I am going to gain decision buy-in commitment. These steps are:

1.      Who are the influencers

2.      Understand their position

3.      Work out the impact

4.      Explain the benefits

5.      Gain the right support level

I go through how I use each step to gain commitment and make decisions a reality at work. 

Finally, I use a ReCODE model for communicating decisions and recommendation to get buy-in and the action I need from bosses, team members and other stakeholders.

When making decisions, always think about the quickest route to getting the result you need rather than the quickest way to make a decision.

If you have any questions on “Improve Decision Buy-In - Making Decisions Reality At Work”, please leave them in the comments section and I will get back to you. 

Jess Coles

Enhance.training

Learn how to give an effective performance review and you have a great tool to motivate and develop team members alongside giving them realistic feedback about their performance.

With the right preparation, you won’t feel nervous conducting a performance review. I share 12 vital tips for how to run a performance review meeting really well so your team member get loads out of it.

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Team Management Course

Managing teams well is hard work, even when you know exactly what to do. When you have been left to figure things out by yourself, getting good at your job is ten times harder and slower. 

Learning great management approaches, knowledge and skills make a huge difference to your effectiveness, your enjoyment and your career progress. Invest in becoming a great manager through our Management Skills Accelerator courses – learn more here: https://enhance.training/msa-usp006

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The employee appraisal process starts when you set goals and objectives for your team members at the start of the year. How can you run an performance evaluation if you or the employee is not clear about what is good, okay and poor. 

The performance appraisal should be a summary of all the feedback conversations that you have already had. There should be no surprises coming out in the employee appraisal.

3 additional preparation steps for the appraisal meeting that I think you should do well in advance are:

1.                Book out plenty of time to think through what you want to bring up in the performance review

2.                Write down all the achievements, wins, successes plus add in the misses and what to improve on, so you have a balanced employee evaluation

3.                Ask peers, bosses, and team stakeholders for their feedback before the employee review

Taking these steps gives you a lot to talk about and share with the team member. Make sure most of what talk about is focus on how they can improve what they are doing, regardless of the current performance level.

How to conduct a performance review meeting starts with working out your agenda for the annual performance review meeting. I suggest using:

1.            Intros and communicating the Agenda

2.            Ask the employee to talk through their performance 

3.            Give your specific feedback on performance and invite discussion

4.            Talk through the employee’s career plans

5.            Discuss the employee development plan and the opportunities

6.            Jointly agreed the goals and actions for manager and employee

 During performance reviews, go through each of these agenda items. In the video I talk through each agenda item in more detail.

A key part of performance review tips for managers is to make sure that you follow up after the performance review has been finished. There is so much you can do to help your team member get better quicker. 

For example, I suggest you book in weekly one-on-one meeting every week or every other week to teach, mentor and coach your direct reports. You have so much knowledge and experience to pass on plus you will learn loads in these meetings. The more you know about what is going on in the team, the better job you will do, and the quicker team performance will improve.

If you have any questions on “How To Give An Effective Performance Review – 12 Vital Tips To Action”, please leave them in the comments below and I will get back to you. 

Jess Coles
Enhance.training

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The more visible to your bosses you are, and the more you make your work visible, the faster you will be promoted and the further your career will progress.

To get promoted you have to be good AND be more visible to your bosses than your competition.

I share six key tactics for you to increase your visibility at work making getting promotion at work easier.

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Free Resources
For more tips and advice on how to raise your profile and tips on how to market yourself internally in your organisation, I have a free downloadable booklet available:
https://enhance.training/lm-lp/market-internally-booklet/

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The six tactics and a ton of tips to make you more visible at work start with finding your authentic voice. To increase your workplace visibility, you must share your ideas, views, and solutions. If you don’t have a considered and thought through view, you won’t be noticed at work.

When you are good at your job, you will have ton of views, ideas, and solutions to share. Be more visible at work by communicating intelligently with your boss, peers, colleagues and stakeholders and sharing the value you are adding to the business.

When you have ideas and solutions, there are so many ways to become more visible, to get noticed at work. Start small. Consistently keep your boss and stakeholders up to date with your progress against goals.

The next of my secrets to increase your visibility at work is to diplomatically stop others taking credit for your work. Don’t talk negatively about colleagues that try to take your credit. I talk though exactly what to do.

Another great way for how to increase your visibility at work is to regularly, and publicly, celebrate your team’s success. This has so many benefits in addition to increasing your visibility.

For getting promoted at work, I suggest you work at helping your colleagues be successful. I know this sounds counter intuitive yet being a team player is so important. You must also communicate what you have done to help and the impact of that help regularly to your boss and stakeholders. This is another great way to stand out at work. 

To increase your visibility at work, I suggest you work on becoming your boss’s most valuable supporter. This is much easier than you think and gives you a ton of benefits including raising your profile at work for all the right reasons. 

How to increase your visibility at work is a challenge everyone must tackle in today’s workplace. Make sure you know exactly how to get noticed at work and get promoted faster.

If you have any questions on “How To Be More Visible To Your Bosses – Get Promoted Faster & Progress Further”, please email me at [email protected] and I will get back to you. 

Jess Coles
Enhance.training

It is scary to disagree with someone more powerful than you at work. Learn to disagree respectfully and you are more likely to stand out, create more value and earn faster career progress.

Learn 7 ways to respectfully disagree, 5 thought processes for WHEN disagreeing with your boss is the right thing, and 4 actions to improve how you communicate your disagreement.

How to disagree with your boss is a skill. Voicing your disagreement should only be done after considering the impact of speaking up. If the impact of any change is small, it is probably best to stay quiet. Picking your battles is important. 

When disagree respectfully at work make sure there is a clear business reason why you are disagreeing. Do not disagree for purely personal reasons.

Always take into account of the culture, situation and person when you respectfully disagree. All should factor into the risk versus benefit though process before disagreeing. 

Before disagreeing with the boss consider the risk of saying nothing. What will be the impact on results and how will staying silent impact you in the future. 

The first of the steps to follow when disagreeing with your boss is to agree the guidelines or process for which your boss is okay with your disagreeing.

Next for how to have a respectful disagreement with those more powerful than you, is to ask permission to disagree. This gives them power and puts them into listening mode. 

Next when thinking about how to disagree respectfully, restate the other person’s original position, idea, or solution. This confirms your understanding and that you have considered their perspective. 

I always think it beneficial to explain the purpose of you disagreeing with them. You can confirm the business goals or reasons behind your disagreement. 

Set out your structured argument. When disagree with someone more powerful you want to present yourself as professional and competent. The more compelling your argument, the more likely you will get a change. 

The next of the steps to disagree with your colleagues or boss is to invite their input and feedback. This promotes collaboration and teamwork. 

Finally, to disagree respectfully with someone more powerful than you, state that the final decision is theirs to make. 

There are many ways to disagree politely without upsetting or damaging relationships. How you disagree and how you communicate your disagreement are both very important. 

Don’t avoid disagreeing. Do avoid disagreeing badly.

If you have any questions on “How To Disagree With Someone More Powerful – 7 Steps To Respectfully Disagree” please email me at [email protected] and I will get back to you. 

Jess Coles

Enhance.training

Learn the common mistakes managers make that kill team trust, respect, and appreciation of the manager so you can avoid making them. I share 8 typical mistakes managers make, fundamental mistakes, that your really need to avoid.

Each of these 8 typical manager mistakes makes the transition to manager a lot harder and more painful for you and your team. Make these management mistakes and they will have a big negative impact on your team’s performance.

These are common mistakes of new managers and these are also mistakes of managers with a many years’ experience.

The first of these common manager mistakes is not getting to know your team well enough. When managing teams, the value you personally create is through your team. Not knowing your team is like a carpenter not understanding how to use their tools.

The second these 8 mistakes managers make is not communicating expectations clearly. Common new manager mistakes in this area are thinking that telling the team is enough. It is not. There is a lot more to creating very clear expectations.

The third common management mistake is thinking the team rules don’t apply to you. Petty displays of power or giving yourself an ego boost are sure to anger the team and kill your credibility. Team performance will dive.  Live the rules you set.

The fourth people management mistake is managing with a one size fits all. Everyone is different and every situation is difference. Flexibility of approach is an incredibly important skill and one of my best new manager tips.

The fifth manager mistake is not truly listening to the team. Each team member is an expert in their area because they are seeing and experiencing the problems and challenges. If you don’t listen, how will you really find out what is happening. Listening also speeds up the employee to manager transition.

The sixth of these leadership mistakes is using an “I know best” approach. Don’t get hung up on being the best or demonstrating that you know everything needed. Good manager skills are identifying which ideas and options are the best rather than needing to come up with all the ideas or solutions. 

The seventh typical mistakes managers make is avoiding conflict. Destructive conflict will kill team performance and morale. You must tackle it quickly and in doing so, it is so much easier to resolve. 

The eighth common mistakes managers make is not investing in yourself. Learning by trial and error is slow, painful and rarely get you past an okay skill level. Read books, take course, get a mentor or coach. Management is a set of skills. If you are serious about your management career, invest in yourself.

If you have any questions on “8 Common Mistakes Managers Make That Kill Team Performance and Morale”, please email me at [email protected] and I will get back to you.

Jess Coles

Enhance.training

Feeling safe at work or enjoying psychological safety in a team is a very big deal for all of us. I cover what is psychological safety, 4 stages of psychological safety and 7 ways of creating psychological safety in teams.

Feeling safe within a team or having psychological safety at work provides a huge range of benefits including:

1.      Much more positive working atmosphere

2.      Better teamwork

3.      Lower staff attrition rates

4.      Greater levels of innovation

5.      Higher team performance and output

Create psychological safety in a team and you, as a manager, get to enjoy all the benefits that come with increasing team performance.

There are loads of ways to make employees feel safe and create psychological safety in the workplace. The first step in my view is creating really clear expectations. When we know exactly what is expected of us we gain psychological safety and certainty. 

Next, for getting staff feeling safe and secure be open and honest with what is happening around the team and with what you think, feel and worry about. Being honest and being empathetic increases transparency and reduces fears and insecurities. 

Third, to create safety at work proactively ask questions and seek team members views. This is great for how to make employees feel valued.

Fourth, critical for creating safety at workplace for team members is how you manage and control your reactions and responses.

Fifth, for creating psychological safety in teams prove that making some mistakes is okay by treating this as a learning opportunity. By accepting some mistakes, you encourage your team to take calculated risks, to learn and to innovate.

Sixth, to get staff feeling safe at work encourage constructive conflict where ideas, solutions and views shared are open to careful and diplomatic challenge. Celebrate the differences within the team and use these to improve the solutions created and implemented. 

Seventh, to encourage feeling safe at work, make it desirable to ask for help within your team. Asking for help quickly and appropriately aids learning, creates psychological safety and improve team performance.

I view creating psychological safety in teams as essential in the journey to increasing team performance and making the team an enjoyable and rewarding place to work for everyone.

Please put to use as many of these ways to make employees feel safe in your team - today and onwards.  

If you have any questions on “Feeling Safe at Work – 7 Ways of Creating Psychological Safety in Teams”, please email me at [email protected]  and I will get back to you. 

Jess Coles

Enhance.training, 

Knowing your team as a manager gives you huge advantages to improve team performance. Get the most out of your team by getting to know your team on more than a superficial level.

I share 12 actions to step change team performance through knowing your team a lot better.

When you know your team's strengths and weaknesses, you can play to strengths and avoid weaknesses. Do this consistently and you will increase team performance. 

Great managers know their team on a more detailed level that average managers. Everyone on any team is different. 

Part of good team management is understanding those differences and combining them to create a team that works well together, relies on each other, and utilises all the strengths and talents in the team to produce great team performance.   

When you know your teams strengths and weaknesses, and each individual in the team, you can adapt your approach, your management style and how you communicate so that you improve how you work with the team.

By making the time and effort to get to know your team, you demonstrate you care, your interest and both massively help increase trust and appreciation. This in turn helps you build stronger relationships with the team members. All essential ingredients to step change team performance. 

I share 7 specific areas that I look to get to know about each team member such as their energy levels and ambitions as well as the more obvious skills and experiences they have. 

Good team performance management is knowing how to utilise the strengths of the team and cover any weaknesses. I share 5 actions that focus on achieving both of these day in day out. 

I personally think it is next to impossible to improve team performance in a meaningful way without getting to know your team in depth. 

Not taking the step of getting to know your team would be like a carpenter having little clue about the tools they are working with. The outcome is unlikely to be good. 

Make the time to get to each of your team members and flex how you approach and work with each person to get the best from them. This creates a great foundation to significantly increase team performance.

If you have any questions on “12 Actions to Step-Change Team Performance Through Knowing Your Team”, please email me at [email protected] and I will get back to you. 

Jess Coles

Enhance.training,

Preventing workplace stress is in everyone’s interests. I cover four fundamental major causes of stress in the workplace and share tips on how to deal with stress at work.

Stress at work costs the UK economy £28bn per year with 23.3m sick days taken. 

As a manager, you should be thing how to deal with stress at work for yourself personally and just as importantly, for your team. If team members are not at work because of workplace stress, they can’t do great work to hit team targets.

I am covering the 4 big causes of stress at work based on my experience - rather than giving you lots of tips on personal stress management - to help you when dealing with stress at work.

In my view, the first place to start with how to manage stress at work is to manage your workload. The more overworked you are, you more stressed you will be. It is that simple. One of the best ways to handle stress at work is to practice saying no. 

Learning when to say no and how to say no are vital to handle stress at work. As a manager, to reduce employee stress in the workplace, learn to say no effectively on behalf of your team. Overwork is one of the biggest causes of stress at workplace I know. 

The next biggest cause of stress at work is having poor relationships with your boss or teammates. When thinking about how to deal with stress at work, think about your relationships and what you can do to improve them.

Focus on your relationship with your boss first. There are lots of actions you can proactively take to improve this relationship professionally and personally. Better relationships are great for handling stress in the workplace.

Another of causes of stress at workplace, is not getting the right help and support. Trying to deliver and learn at the same time is very stressful. Learning takes time, which you are not likely to have enough of. Get the best help you can from inside or outside of work – this is a workplace stress solution you must use!

Organisational conflicts cause a lot of workplace stress, particularly because they are outside many people control to fix. You can contribute to a solution and take steps to resolve these conflicts, even if you are the most junior person in the office. Proactively manage this stress at workplace.

If you have any questions on “Preventing Workplace Stress – 4 Major Causes of Stress & What To Do”, please email me at [email protected] and I will get back to you.

 Jess

Enhance.training

Everyone comes under pressure to perform at work. How we handle the pressure to perform at work is a big part of our personal success as well as how much we enjoy being at work. I share 6 actions to handle the pressure to perform at work.

Pressure in the workplace increases as you enter the management ranks and progress though them.

Dealing with pressure at work at times can get overwhelming. Dealing with pressure is a mental state of mind with physical implications. Staying calm under pressure reduces the physical responses and helps us handle pressure at work.

When we are under pressure at work our hearts beat faster, we have shallower breaths and our bodies release adrenaline and hormones which impact our ability to manger our emotions and memory. To manage pressure at work we need to manage our physical responses. 

How to overcome pressure at work starts with our mental game, which influences our physical responses. 

Performing under pressure is a lot easier when you employ four mental actions. Reframing problems into opportunities is a great way to deal with pressure at work. The pressure of work seems a lot higher when you think in terms of problems. 

Next, for how to deal with pressure at work, replace the feeling of I feel nervous with I feel excited. This is a great mental approach to cultivate to manage pressure at work and explain why in the video. 

How to deal with pressure at work should absolutely include breaking down big problems into lots of smaller problems. Physiologically, small is easier to manager and overcome than big. 

How to handle pressure at work is also about cultivating a positive state of mind. I share tips on how to stay positive even when everything seems against you. 

Pressure in work also arises when we tackle all the urgent tasks first rather than focusing on the important tasks first. In practice this is much harder to do as it involves saying no and potentially disappointing people.

How to manage pressure in workplace is much easier when we make sure we finish each task without allowing ourselves to get distracted. Easy to say, hard to do in practice, yet it is essential to learn how to minimise distractions.  

There is a lot of actions you can take to proactively handle the pressure to perform at work. Start taking action today!

If you have any questions on “6 Actions to Handle the Pressure to Perform at Work”, please email me at [email protected] and I will get back to you. 

 Jess

Enhance.training