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

Learning how to play office politics to your advantage is a crucial part of any management job. Workplace politics happen because of conflicts, differences and scarcity. Navigating office politics is a key part of building personal influence within the organisation in which you work. 

Learn 6 Crucial Ways to Successfully Navigate Workplace Politics.

How to manage office politics starts with ensuring you are aware of the politics at work. Ask questions to those in your network to find out what is happening around the business and who is pushing what.

Company politics, in my opinion, covers the skills and actions you take to build influence within the business. 

When thinking about how to handle office politics don’t chose to ignore it. You will be handicapping your career progress and ability to do your job as a manager effectively.

Influence is power. How to handle office politics is also about using the influence or power you gain to do the best you can for the company and group as a whole. Influence is given to you by others. If you are self-serving, unpleasant, unhelpful etc, you will lose influence and be shut out of meetings and decisions. 

Working in the best interests of others significantly increases your influence and is a great approach for how to win at office politics. This doesn’t mean you are a charity. Do favours for others and they will feel obliged to return those favours. 

A key tool in dealing with office politics is mapping out who you need to get to know and build relationships with. The larger more complex the organisation, the more important this step is. 

Another important part of how to handle politics at work is to build bridges and allies. Both happen when you build trust and relationships with others. 

Finally, when planning how to handle workplace politics, work on building a positive reputation. A good reputation will mean navigating the politics, building trust and relationships will be a lot easier. Proactively work on building your reputation.

Throughout all sections I share how to deal with office politics tips,

If you have any questions on “Office politics – 6 Crucial Ways to Successfully Navigate Workplace Politics” please email me at [email protected] and I will get back to you. 

Jess

Enhance.training

Learn 7 ways to use 1:1 meetings to develop employees and improve performance of the team. One-on-one meetings with employees are the most value able of my week and it is incredible what you can achieve through them. 

One on one meetings are super useful in setting goals and expectations and more importantly revising progresses towards goals and maintaining expectations. One-to-one should be held in private.

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One-on-One Meeting Booklet (13 pages)
Learn exactly how to run brilliant one-on-one meetings for better relationships, increased development and improved indiviudal performance - all of which helps you improve team performance. Learn more here: https://enhance.training/lm-lp/one-on-one-meeting-agenda-ulp030/

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Setting really clear goals in one on one meetings should be a priority for every manager. Too many don’t put enough time into creating clear goals, leading to confusion and lack of direction. Improve performance by being clear.

Next, use 1-2-1 meetings to prioritise what your team members work on. Explain how they can create more value for the team and focus more of their work on these higher value activities and say no to the lower value ones. This makes a big difference to team performance. 

In one-on-one meetings, I love asking questions of my direct reports and listening to find out key blockers and problems team members are facing. You can develop employees by getting them thinking and providing solutions. The more your team are thinking, the more you build a higher performing team.

When developing employees, provide praise to positively reinforce the good stuff and corrective feedback so they know what to improve and how to do this. Whenever you are giving feedback, always give feedback in service of developing staff.

Really effective one on one meetings should include time to coaching and developing employees.  When thinking about how to develop employees, think about all the skill you have because you are a manager and share these. 

How to coach and develop employees should include problem solving. In 1:1 meetings, this is fun to do and really helps build their problem solving skills, which in turn helps reduce the pressure and burden on you. 

Finally, when developing your employees focus on improving their decision making during your one on one meetings. These are vital skills to build to progress their career into the management ranks. 

One-to-one meetings are a great tool to build high performing teams. 

If you have any questions on “7 Ways to Use 1:1 Meetings to Develop Employees & Improve Performance”, please lemail me at [email protected] and I will get back to you. 

Jess

Enhance.training

Self-awareness for managers is an essential skill to lead and manage others better. Most people think they are self-aware, yet research has shown only 10-15% of people are truly self-aware.

Take 5 actions to improve your self-awareness and make it easier to manage teams.
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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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Developing self-awareness as a manager is essential to success. If you can’t manage yourself, how can you manage others successfully?

Firstly, lets cover “What is self-awareness?” It is your ability to perceive and understand what makes you an individual.

Increasing self-awareness at work will give you a huge range of benefits. Research has show those with good self awareness build better relationships, communicate more effectively, are more confident and creative and make better decisions. 

Growing self-awareness takes a little bit of work, yet the rewards personally and professionally are brilliant. Learn 5 steps to increase your self-awareness.

From my experience, increasing self-awareness to manage others better is an invaluable process and it makes you more comfortable with who you are and helps you manage more authentically, honestly, and effectively.

Increase your self-awareness and you will become better at managing how you display your emotions which is essential to build trust, confidence and credibility as a manager.

How to improve your self-awareness is an important question. The 5 actions for becoming more self-aware including:
1.How to get and use honest useful feedback
2.Ask What instead of Why
3.Understand and use your values
4.Be confident using strengths and managing weaknesses
5.Learn what drives strong emotions in you

Developing self-awareness as quickly and as easily as possible is super useful for all managers and all stages of their career. After 25 years of managing teams, I am still working on improving both the two types of self awareness.

If you have any questions on “Self Awareness for Managers – 5 Actions to Improve Your Self-Awareness”, please email me at [email protected] and I will get back to you.

Jess
Enhance.training

Articulate yourself better! I share 8 powerful ways to be more articulate. When you can articulate your thoughts clearly and confidently to others, you gain a lot of confidence, feel more valued and be more effective at work.

What does it mean to be more articulate? Being articulate means being clearer in what you say – the words, sentences etc used and also being better at how you communicate – using your voice, body language, emphasis etc.

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There are so many benefits from being able to articulate yourself well. Firstly you can save yourself and others a lot of time when you can articulate your thoughts well. 

When you clearly articulate your thoughts, you are likely to enjoy more success professionally as you increase teamwork, your impact and influence within the business.

The benefits of being more articulate also include stronger relationships with colleagues and friends as you present yourself more authentically. 

Being able to speak more clearly, helps you build a better and bigger network to support you personally and your career growth.

Finally, when you can better articulate your thoughts, you will be better at public speaking which many see as a pre-requisite for promotion into management and leadership positions.

How to become more articulate is the next logical question. I share 8 powerful ways for how to be more articulate. This includes how to become more articulate when speaking to small groups as well as giving presentations to large audiences.

Each of the ways to become more articulate includes practical suggestions and tips of what to put into practice and how to build your articulation skills through practicing. 

If you have any questions on “Articulate Yourself Better – 8 Powerful Ways To Be More Articulate”, please email me at [email protected] and I will get back to you.

 Jess

Enhance.training

Why consistency is key to success in improving team performance is because consistency creates confidence, trust, belief, safety and ensures team members understand exactly what is expected.

I share 5 steps to master consistency in people management.

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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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Success is all about consistency. The same is true when managing teams. The majority of team members need structure, clears goals and consistent expectations to enable them to consistently perform well and to enjoy their job. 

Why consistency is key at work – consistent actions create clear expectations, certainty, and trust. The power of consistency helps team members get better at their roles and delivers higher team performance as everyone know what to expect and how to deliver against those expectations. 

When the manager’s actions behaviours and decisions are aligned with the key goals of the team, the manager reinforces expectations and the importance of the team direction. This is how consistency builds confidence in a team.

Master the art of consistency in people management with 5 steps I try to use when increasing team performance and building higher performing teams.

The first step is using your values as reference points to harness the power of consistency in leadership. Doing so keeps your decisions, actions and behaviours in line with the goals you have agreed with the team. 

Second, communicate a clear vision and repeatedly communicate it. The messaging consistency is key. 

Third, for how to be consistent, always check alignment between your actions and decisions and the direction of the team and its goals. 

Fourth, the power of being consistent with your behaviour as a manager is huge and helps team performance significantly. 

Finally, to improve your people management skills, keep practicing, adjusting what you do and repeating. Practice will consistently improve your skills. That is why consistency is key in building strong management skills just like any skill.

If you have any questions on “People Management - Why Consistency is Key to Success & 5 Steps to Achieve Consistency”, please leave them in the comments section below and I will get back to you. 

 Jess

Enhance.training

Gaining employee trust - working out how to build trust with a team – is a key step to building and  improving team performance. Without trust, delivering on all the other responsibilities of a manager become so much harder. I share 7 actions for how to build trust with your team.

Winning team trust is most easily done while being genuine, while doing your best to help and support team members reach team goals. Start by understanding there are two types of trust most people look for. The steps to gain the trust of your team should keep both in mind.

Winning employee trust should start with listening. Ask for the team’s input, ideas and solutions. When you get them, choose the appropriate ones and act – put them into practice. Taking action is a great start to gaining staff trust.

Encourage trust with your team by empowering them. Let them do their jobs. Extent trust to earn trust back.

Winning the teams trust at work by being open and transparent. This holds you accountable in the same way as they are being held accountable. Plus it gives the employees more opportunity to be autonomous and contribute to solutions.

Gain the trust of a team by demonstrating consistency of action. This create psychological safety with employees – they know what to expect from you in a range of situations. 

Lead by example when building trust in a team. Live the same rules that you are asking your team to live by. Show the team how to behave and what you expect of them.

There is no better way to winning the teams trust – that I know – than working hard in service of the team. Help, support, coach, remove problems  - anything that will fairly help the team reach its goals and support team members.

Build trust with employees is easy when you have a trustworthy mindset and management approach. Look after your team, protect your team and develop your team. Work to make it as easy as possible for them to do a great job.

If you have any questions on “Gaining Employee Trust – how to build trust with a team”, please email me at [email protected]  and I will get back to you. 

Jess

Enhance.training