Saturday, August 6, 2005

Employee Expectations

Anne Fisher of Fortune.com (9/8/04) asks the question, are you managing enough? According to Bruce Tulgan of Rainmaker Thinking the past couple of decades, micromanagement  defined as managing with great or excessive control or attention to detail, has fallen out of favour.

When we ask employees what they want from the people above them, the first thing they never mention is a pay rise. It's always more coaching, more guidance, clearer goals, more constructive criticism and more recognition for achievements.

It's a similar result for Australia. A survey conducted by AAP according to CCH (24/8/04) of 1,280 Australian managers found that 41% received no training or development at work. It's not the pay packet that matters so much  the amount of on the job training matters most to 1 in 3 workers according to the survey. 32% of employees would rather receive ongoing development at work over a pay rise.

According to CCH training could also foster loyalty to employers, with 84% of workers feeling more committed to a boss who invests in their training and development.  The survey also found that 70% of employees start looking for a new job because of a lack of training and development opportunities.


study finds - employees prefer more training
over a pay rise!


Providing constructive feedback to employees is not difficult. Informal feedback, recognising successful outcomes when passing employees at their work site is as easy as good job on the review. Such, lets an employee know that they have achieved that magic mark, achieved the standard. If you don't tell them how do they know what the standards are?

Formal appraisal systems, require a commitment and in many cases a change to the organisations culture or the way mangers manage. Tulgan founder of Rainmaker Training and his team have conducted an in-depth study of hundreds of managers in America.

Fisher says rainmaker defines as the five management basics



  • clear statements of what's expected of each employee,

  • explicit and measurable goals and deadlines,

  • detailed evaluation of each person's work,

  • clear feedback and

  • rewards fairly meted out



Its seems hardly anyone is consistently stepping  up to the plate. Only 10% of managers provide their direct reports with all five of the basics at least once a week. Only 25% do so at least once a month. About a third of managers, it seems, fail to get around to the basics even once a year.

Tulgan contents that neglecting the five management musts means you're not in a position to anticipate problems, so you spend all your time putting out fires. You can't delegate, so you end up needlessly tangle in the details. This is why, when people tell me they don't have time to cover all five basic consistently, I tell them they don't have time not to.

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