Many people want to move into a management role because of higher pay, prestige and the ability to finally do things their way. But managing people also means having difficult conversations with the people that report to you. Whether you need to discuss performance, explain how a role is evolving or enforce the dress code, you should be prepared for tough talks.
Employment attorney and HR consultant Kate Bischoff has put together a 7 point checklist for having these tough conversations. But how can you implement this checklist in a real-life scenario? Let’s say you have an employee whose outfit is inappropriate for the office. Here’s how Bischoff’s guidelines would play out in the case of a dress code violation.
Step 1: Plan
You can’t go into a conversation about a sensitive topic without planning it first—after all, how do you expect employees to take the conversation seriously, if you aren’t adequately prepared for it. Consider what are you going to say and how will you say it. In this case, make sure you review the official company dress code so that you can refer to it. Having a printed copy on hand would be great.
To keep reading, click here: Your Seven-Step Guide to Having Tough Conversations with Employees
Great article!
And, yes, it is very true that most manager’s are not “trained” to be managers.
Too often, the training for managers involve things such as “here’s a copy of our time-off policy” and “here’s a copy of instructions on how to fill out a time sheet” and “here’s a form for ordering equipment.”
But, rarely, do managers get taught how to “manage”!