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Many leaders and managers get annoyed with employees’ complaints. Leaders tell me they expect employees to contribute their views and actions to make things better — not complain about what is.

In frustration, some unsuccessfully tell employees to stop whining. Some leaders even hang a no whining sign!

This does not get employees to contribute a positive can-do attitude, their innovative solutions, and full talents and commitment.

What will engage employees to move from complaints to action?

Leaders, 6 Positive Replies to Turn Employees Complaints to Actions

Image by: saschaaa via Creative Commons License.

6 positive replies to transform employee complaints into action:

1. I hear your frustration. I am ready now to hear your ideas/solutions. Validate the feeling. If you don’t, it will continue to crave attention. Once you do, transform the power of the emotion into ideas. You are coaching your employees at this moment so don’t let them slip back into speaking only the frustration. If they can’t break out of it at that point, let them know you will be happy to discuss solutions when they are ready. Then move on with your day!




2. You have talents for solving this. Would you like to brainstorm ideas? This direct approach shows confidence and belief in them and offers them a great opportunity. The reply shows the essence of any organization — a belief in people to contribute to the end result. You as leader/manager guide all on this mission to stay focused on the road to success.




3. Power to move ahead comes from negative and positive poles. You’ve highlighted the negative very well. What’s the positive suggestion to overcoming this problem? Leaders and managers who are either driven for results or hate negativity, often overlook the value of the negative jolt. You can remind yourself and teach your employees this negative/positive balance. It reshapes outlooks and practice.




4. Your feelings and view of the problem are important. Your ideas for solving it — critical. What do you propose?

   If the next couple of statements from them are still complaints: We move forward with solutions. Here are three statements to get you started:

   • We could ________________________________________________.
   • I can contribute ___________________________________________.
   • I am willing to _____________________________________________.

   Take time to think about it and then let’s get started!




5. Let’s take your understandable emotion on this issue and turn it into a power source for solving it. I’d love to hear your ideas. Many employees feel like followers not contributors. Daily reminders that they have power to lead from within their talents help shape the organization and its success.




6. Optimism and skepticism are healthy; endless pessimism is poison to a team. With chronic complainers who offer no solutions or actions, let them know that their endless pessimism can stop success much the same way that blinded optimism can put everyone at risk. As the leader, I will forge ahead on this balanced mission. I want your talent with us. Please bring your balance to this team’s challenges.

These positive replies will work if you are engaging employees on a daily basis for their ideas and solutions. If you are a directive leader and use these replies when employees complain, they will have little effect.

Complaints without suggestions are an indicator that the employees feel powerless. If you lead daily through employee engagement, you connect with them emotionally by tapping their ideas. This in turn validates their worth and helps tremendously when you all must endure things that cannot change.

Employee engagement generates their sense of power and desire to contribute solutions; it doesn’t give away your power. It actually generates a powerful success for the organization you lead. The exact result you seek!

From my professional experience to your success,
Kate Nasser, The People-Skills Coach™


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Leaders, Replace These 5 Behaviors to Attract Top Performance & Talent

©2012 Kate Nasser, CAS, Inc. Somerville, NJ. If you want to re-post or republish the content of this post, please email info@katenasser.com. Thank you for respecting intellectual capital.

Harvard Business Review recently featured The No Whining Rule for Managers by Ron Ashkenas. His main point about accountability and focusing on solutions is rock solid.  The question is how to get people to do that.

One of his client’s, a high level leader, resorted to a no whining sign. Be careful of this approach. It is not just a catchy slogan. It is a demeaning and dangerous approach to leadership people-skills that can infect your organization and spread like antibiotic-resistant bacteria.

Leaders, Replace the No Whining Sign Image by: DBDuo Photography, Creative Commons License

Her outlook is that employees are adults, not children – so she tells them to stop acting like children (i.e. no whining).

But you  show your immaturity as a leader by trying to ban behavior that is not based in laziness but in real barriers to adult communication (silos, titles etc…).

She assumes they know or should know what she wants.  Don’t assume.  As Doug Conant,  former CEO of Campbell’s Soup, advises “Declare yourself. Then walk the talk.

If you want your direct reports to engage in substantive problem solving communication, then, as a leader, show them by doing it yourself.

The phrase, stop whining is a whine! It is a complaint about what you don’t like — poorly disguised as an order.


“Leadership is about being effective in the moment with others.” ~Doug Conant, former CEO Campbell’s Soup.

Leaders, Replace the No Whining Sign!
Model the Positive to Eliminate the Negative

• Model and model and model.
  The best way to teach actionable behavior is to do it!  If someone dumps a problem in your lap without any suggestions, ask them for their ideas.  If they launch into complaints, ask them how to overcome those barriers. Don’t yield. Model.

  Skip the labels.  Labels demean.  Stop whining may shame people into a short term behavior change yet it won’t breed positive can-do attitudes or develop a high performance organization.  It simply breeds compliance to a commandant leader’s orders — when the leader is around.

  It also breeds communication avoidance in those who don’t know how to break through barriers but don’t want to be demeaned.  Avoidance reduces productivity – the exact opposite of accountability and performance.  I have seen it repeatedly in response to leaders whose favorite phrases begin with the word stop or no.

  Even with children, you see quicker success when you show them what you want them to do vs. what you don’t want them to do.




• Create a culture of positive action by showing managers how well it works.
  How leaders treat their managers is how the managers treat the staff.  If you want the whole organization to replace complaining with problem solving and innovating, replace the no whining sign with your non-whining communication.  They will then model it with their direct reports.

  Do you really want an entire organization issuing stop orders? Or would you prefer they engage in behaviors that create success?




• Free yourself from the trap of the should.
  The danger of assuming is common knowledge.  When leaders hear themselves saying, “we assume the employees have good skills“, they stop themselves and finish with, “yet it’s dangerous to assume. Let’s handle it.”

  Leaders are not so commonly aware of the trap of the should.  “These are high level managers. They should already have good skills.“   This thinking is a trap.  It makes leaders replace the reality (lack of skills) with another label for the behavior (e.g. childlike, lazy, whiner).

  Reality: Many managers are promoted by being good staff members.  They were highly responsible for their own work.  They weren’t facilitating solutions across organizational boundaries. Unless you witnessed stellar management skills in them when they were staff members that suddenly disappeared when they became managers, the issue is skill level.

  As managers, they are apprentices who can shine in the new skills with great coaching and mentoring. If you believe or have evidence they are not capable of improving, then courageously find the right people for these management positions.

  So free yourself from the trap of the should.  It takes your eye off the real target — instilling more successful behavior and better performance.

I welcome your questions on how to turn interaction obstacles into (non-whining) successful business behavior.

From my professional experience to your success,
Kate Nasser, The People-Skills Coach™

Related Post: Leaders, Here’s the Pain Free Way to Engage Employee Accountability

©2012 Kate Nasser, CAS, Inc. Somerville, NJ. If you want to re-post or republish the content of this post, please first email info@katenasser.com for terms of use. Thank you for respecting intellectual capital.

People often focus on major career shaping milestones like earning a degree or relocating for a better job. It’s harder to see the psychologically uncomfortable career shaping opportunities yet well worth the effort.

5 Psychologically Uncomfortable Career Shaping Opportunities Image by:kroo2u

When leaders and managers must decide who to place on new projects, in newly vacated job spots, and in managerial and leadership posts, they draw on their everyday observations of staff behavior. How you behave in difficult and uncomfortable situations creates an impression that shapes your career opportunities.


5 Psychologically Uncomfortable Career Shaping Opportunities

• When You’re the New Kid on the Block. Moving onto an existing team can be uncomfortable. How will your expertise be received before you’ve had time to build trust? If you are adept at asserting without pushing, leaders see you as an asset to critical collaborations and sudden teams.




• When Deadlines Loom and You Have Little Information. These situations can challenge your sense of self-confidence and competence. If you perform well without blaming other groups for the void, leaders see you as a resourceful asset worthy of trust for tough high profile assignments.




• When You’re On a Toxic Negative Team. Do you succumb to the negativity — even if just to fit in? Or are you the lonely voice of inspiration that holds strong and re-inspires others? If you inspire in the face of naysayers, leaders see you as the turnaround titan that keeps productivity flowing.




• When Emotions Are Running High. Many people hate conflict. Avoiding it impacts results. Fueling it can be disastrous. If your focus and insight triumphs over emotion, you pop to the top of the next leader list!




• During Rapid Start-ups. Start-ups present a huge revenue and public relations challenge to companies. The learning curve is an expense. Delay is risky. The stress of these start-ups crushes many people. If you are a fast fearless learner undaunted by a lack of structured training programs, leaders see you as pure profit and risk reduction.

What does it take to develop these traits and seize these opportunities?

1. Desire
2. Persistence
3. Continuous improvement

You can strengthen your ability to blend into new teams, handle ambiguity, stay inspired, improve focus, and embrace fast change. In fact, you can achieve most anything you desire.

Leaders will notice; confidence and commitment burns bright.

From my professional experience to your success,
Kate Nasser, The People-Skills Coach™

Related Post: Be & Perform Like a Ferrari

©2012 Kate Nasser, CAS, Inc. Somerville, NJ. If you want to re-post or republish the content of this post, please first email info@katenasser.com for terms of use. Thank you for respecting intellectual capital.

Leaders and managers ask the same persistent question: How do you engage employee accountability?

Many are excited to engage employees to be more creative and innovative.
They picture building accountability as hard fought battles of weight, responsibility, and blame.

Leaders, Take This Pain Free Journey To Engage Employee Accountability

1. Define accountability as a celebration of honor, ownership, and learning. Far too many see accountability as carrying the blame for mistakes. Why would employees jump up and engage that negative idea?

   Honor employees contributions and they will honor their responsibilities.




2. Support this definition of accountability with your behavior and communication in positive and negative situations. Finding fault stops progress; finding solutions ignites success.




3. Abandon the no news is good news approach to leadership. Applaud incremental growth and smaller accomplishments. It builds interest and the confidence to be accountable. Practical Examples: Leaders, 12 Worthy Kudos to Spark Employee Engagement

   When leaders speak only with criticism, employees will forever define accountability as blame.




4. Illustrate accountability in pain free moments. Use the phrase “I take responsibility for not being clear or “I own that delay”.

   What leaders say and live becomes the culture of the organization.




5. Employees engage when they can see what’s in it for them. So, what does accountability do for the employees? Discuss it. Listen to their views on it. Open up to what holds them back from it and their ideas to fix it. A pain free step to accountability!




6. Honestly address mismatches in job fits. If people are truly wrong for the positions they hold, their continued misses frustrate the team to the brink of finger pointing.

   Prevent this pain with honest reassessment of the best job fit.




7. End each day or week with: “What did we learn that improved our ability going forward?” With this practice, employees skip the fear of blame and the disease of perfectionism and become accountable for excellence.

Accountability doesn’t have to leave scars. It doesn’t have to come from a demanding leader constantly nagging employees to do what’s needed.

Create the opportunity and culture for excellence and watch employees engage and embrace accountability. It’s welcome and pain free!

I look forward to launching this journey with you. I will take you from inspiration to action!

From my professional experience to your success,
Kate Nasser, The People-Skills Coach™

Related Post:
Leaders, Replace These 5 Behaviors to Attract Top Talent

10 Ways to Ignite Greatness Without Leaving Scars

©2012 Kate Nasser, CAS, Inc. Somerville, NJ. If you want to re-post or republish the content of this post, please first email info@katenasser.com for terms of use. Thank you for respecting intellectual capital.

Kate Nasser, The People-Skills Coach™, delivers coaching, consulting, training, and keynotes on customer service & experience, teamwork, and leading change. Kate turns interaction obstacles into business success. See this site for workshop outlines, keynote footage, and customer results.

As we work tirelessly to deliver super customer experience, I find and fix common everyday mistakes that drive customers away.

Recent experiences focus me today on ways we imprison customers which do everything but build loyalty. You might think imprisonment is too strong a word. Yet that is what customers report.

Super Customer Experience: Loyalty not Imprisonment

Give customers a get out of jail free card — fix these mistakes!

Ways We Imprison Customers!

1. Endless Loops. This is definitely #1 on the customers list. Beyond the endless unclear phone menus (voice response units – VRUs, IVRs), customers also feel imprisoned by agents, reps, and CSRs with poor skills.

   The Story: A business owner needed to become a credit card merchant. The sales rep was clear, focused, and offered a great deal. The business owner signed up. The sales rep reported that the support team would send an email with account # and temporary password. Support would then call to finalize everything.
   

   

   Super Customer Experience: Loyalty Not Imprisonment! Image: iStock for Editorial Use.

   
   The business owner received a phone message from support saying “By now you have received your email with account # and password. Please call me, Mindy, at this phone number and extension.” The business owner left Mindy a message saying “We never received the email. Please let us know what to do now.”

   Mindy left a second, third, and fourth message saying the exact same thing as her first message! When the business owner finally spoke on the phone with Mindy, she continued to say “you should have received the email by now.”

   Imprisonment: The business owner finally said, “Time is money. Move me forward or I will cancel my account.”

   Customer service is forward not stagnant. To customers, stagnant feels like imprisonment.

   Release customers from status quo prison! For a super customer experience, move them forward to the solution.

   Question: Where in your organization do customers get stuck in the status quo?




2. Lack of teamwork. Multiple teams engaged in service with little or no teamwork leave customers trapped in a maze. Customers must jump between teams to get a solution or jump out of the maze and choose freedom. That’s not conducive to customer loyalty.

   For super customer experience, deliver a single point of solution not multiple points of failure. Build teamwork with shared technology, mutual service level targets, and one service culture.

   Question: How many teams in your organization must work together to deliver a super customer experience? Do they all give it the same priority? If not, customers end up imprisoned in the maze.




3. Tunnel vision. A less evident yet still common mistake, thinking only from the company or agent perspective. Super customer experience requires seeing things from the customer’s view. Else the customers feel ignored and overlooked — imprisoned in solitary confinement.
   Cultural tunnel vision in global service leaves customers in the dark.
   Rigid script reading and poor listening slam the door shut.
   Websites with poor e-commerce design drive customers away — to well-designed easy-to-use sites.

   Shine the light of customer awareness throughout your organization to free customers from solitary confinement and to value them in your organization.

   Question: Where in your organization is tunnel vision blocking super customer experience? Expand the vision. Replace the tunnel with bridges to the customers and to your success.

Customers want information and solutions that meet their needs. Online, in person, or on the phone, they seek positive easy experiences to get what they want. Imprisonment is not positive nor easy. It makes them want to break out, run away from the stress and find success elsewhere.

Think customer care not customer control. Think bonding not bondage. Think customer!

I look forward to working with you, leaders, and your teams to create super customer experience.

From my professional experience to your success,
Kate Nasser, The People-Skills Coach™

Related Posts:
Super Opportunity to Improve Every Customer Experience
Simply Great Choices Create Super Customer Experience

©2012 Kate Nasser, CAS, Inc. Somerville, NJ. If you want to re-post or republish the content of this post, please first email info@katenasser.com for terms of use. Thank you for respecting intellectual capital.

Leaders, recognize employees for their individual strengths and talents and spark employee engagement. Plenty of studies support this claim. Plenty of leaders think this means company recognition programs, awards, and celebratory events.

That’s nice yet nothing sparks other human souls like sincere appreciation of their worthy unique strengths.

Let your people-skills shine and applaud the employees’ natural talents with worthy kudos. No matter the age, the gender, the occupation, or the title, the employees connect with the future when you spotlight their present strengths.

Leaders, 12 Incredibly Evident Kudos to Spark Employee Engagement Image by:LexnGer

12 Worthy Kudos to Spark Employee Engagement

1. Organized without being rigid. In this day of do more with less, information overload, and enterprise integration of everything, organized people who can flex and adapt are a treasure to any business. Tell them. Applaud it!




2. Thirsty for knowledge and application. Business is moving fast and furious to fulfill the present and create the future. Employees who are constantly learning and applying it are both the fuel and the ballast for success. There’s a worthy kudo!




3. Sensing potential and spotting futility. Employees who can accurately sense when to advance an initiative and when to recommend scrubbing it propel the organization forward and prevent it from falling. Laud this worthy talent.




4. Tough, thorough, and reliable. How often do you overlook those that you can totally depend on? Change it. Tell them how much you truly appreciate their constancy and commitment.




5. Intuitively strong. Today’s focus on data sometimes minimizes those who use their intuition for everyone’s benefit. They move highly data driven people from stagnation to appropriate risk taking. Applaud their worthy insight.




6. Analytic and creative. These two talents are often thought of as mutually exclusive. They aren’t. There are employees who can create ideas and analyze to implement it. These dual talents also serve well to bring teams together for project success. How about another round of applause here!




7. Passionate and restrained. Passion is inspiration that renews itself and energizes others. It takes passion to ignite success and restraint to stay on course. Employees who contribute both make your job as leader easier. Worthy of applause and gratitude!




8. Positive and realistic. A positive attitude sustains everyone and realism sharpens the vision and prevents being blind sided. Successful entrepreneurs have and value it. If your employees have this, it’s worthy of a compliment!




9. Grateful. Employees who live their lives with gratitude often minimize workplace drama. Their inner sense of happiness and control filters noise instead of reacting to it. They aren’t doormats yet they easily see what truly matters and let the rest of the baloney fall away. They bring balance to new teams. Offer gratitude for their gratefulness!




10. Remarkable in people-skills. Great people-skills are the daily life blood of an organization. Interacting skillfully with each other, with customers, suppliers, regulators, auditors, and the media in a multitude of settings delivers success to the business. Don’t drain the lifeblood by ignoring it. Replenish it with an occasional remark of worthy appreciation.




11. Resourceful. Employees that shine in creative problem solving convert obstacles into pathways of success. Who in your organization is highly resourceful? Tell them how it makes a difference!




12. Confident. Distinctly different from arrogance, confidence delivers great presentations, strength in new challenges, accountability for results, and willing ownership of mistakes. Show your appreciation for this maturity. It’s worthy of it.

Sales teams get to see it in money. Show it to non-sales teams in your reflection, remarks of appreciation and worthy kudos. It’s a no cost and high return investment!


I welcome your additions to this list. What other employee talents and strengths have you applauded?

From my professional experience to your success,
Kate Nasser, The People-Skills Coach™

Related Post: Leaders, 10 Ways to Ignite Greatness Without Leaving Scars

©2012 Kate Nasser, CAS, Inc. Somerville, NJ. If you want to re-post or republish the content of this post, please first email info@katenasser.com for terms of use. Thank you for respecting intellectual capital.

Working on the front lines of customer service can be wonderful or terrible. It depends on your mindset – on what you picture — not on the customer. Surprised?

It’s actually good news. What happens when you interact with others is not completely random. Success is within your grasp because what you picture, you create!

It’s not voodoo. It simply that what you picture or think about, you focus on, say, and do.

Customer Service: If you picture it, you create it.

Customer service starts with picturing that you can make a positive difference.

If instead you picture difficulty or conflict, you will focus on being right, being heard, and being in control. All of this creates the difficulty you pictured at the start.


The Story

When I reached the service rep, he handled my problem with empathy, accuracy, and calm confidence. Before I left the room, I said to him: “I teach customer service to large corporations and reps tell me how stressed out they are. How do you stay so positive with so many people in here complaining?”

He replied: “Kate, if they’re smiling when they come in here … they’re in the wrong room!”

He understood what people would naturally feel and he became the picture of a man making a difference.

Picture the positive and you reduce your fear. Result: Increased listening that guides the interaction to success.

Picture the positive and you feel influential with no need to control others. Result: A collaborative success instead of a target shoot.

Picture the positive and you project empathy and connect sincerely. Result: You make a difference and that is great customer service.

One informed rep with a positive attitude and one customer-friendly policy of delivering luggage created a positive customer experience instead of a social media rant.

What will you and your teams picture before you all start work tomorrow? I hope that it’s caring for customers and making a difference.

Yours in service,
Kate Nasser, The People-Skills Coach


Related post: Customer Service, Key Link in the Chain not Life in Chains

©2011 Kate Nasser, CAS, Inc. Somerville, NJ. If you want to re-post or republish, please email info@katenasser.com. Thank you for respecting intellectual capital.

A positive attitude and enthusiasm are essential tools for sales and customer service. A recent study at the Wharton School of Business showed how mood affects customer service performance.

Customer service representatives (also known as a CSRs) who start the day with enthusiasm and a positive mood deliver better service throughout the day. Most would agree that the same applies to sales teams’ success.

So the more enthusiasm in sales and service the better, right? As a mindset or mood, yes.

As a communication style, über enthusiasm can overwhelm and turn off the customer. In other words, there are ups & downs to enthusiasm.

Enthusiasm's Ups & Downs Image by: tk_yeoh

Enthusiasm’s Ups & Downs

1. Enthusiasm for customer service shows the customer you care. When it drives you to do all the talking, it tells them you don’t care enough to listen.
2. Enthusiasm in technical support drives you to solve even the toughest problems for customers. When you show the customer enthusiasm for broken technology, they think you care more about technology than you do about them.
3. Enthusiasm for the products and services you sell, captures the customer’s attention. When you spew it like a geyser, you stop the development of great customer relationships.
4. Enthusiasm sustains your objectivity and commitment when facing an irate customer.  When you ooze enthusiasm on an irate customer, you come across as insensitive. Your actions lack empathy.

Sales and service tip: Before you take off on an exciting ride, make sure that you and the customer are together!

Business success — be it corporate, mid-size enterprises, innovative start-ups, or small businesses - depends on the positive can do attitude. It is also weakened and destabilized by a bad attitude.

For business success, leaders, inspire people to choose a positive attitude but don’t coach a bad attitude. The latter is a waste of time and money. The team members who bring a positive can do attitude use your inspiration to deliver success. An employee with a bad attitude just uses you.

Are you surprised to hear me, The People-Skills Coach, say don’t coach a bad attitude?  Well, I am not speaking about an employee who offers a different view, contributes alternate solutions, or is having a bad day.  I am referring to an employee who under performs, is under-motivated, constantly negative, analyzes but doesn’t deliver, or refuses to work with necessary constraints.

One leader recently asked me, how long do you work on the bad morale of a negative employee? I replied, never!  You cannot work on someone’s morale.  People choose and own their individual attitudes.

Coaching a bad attitude means you are spending time on their mission instead of the mission of the organization.

Inspire Positive Attitudes; Don't Coach a Bad Attitude!

Positive can do team members …

• Offer realistic solutions to fix frustrating/difficult situations they don’t like.
• Own their occasional bad day.  When they ask for assistance, they try the suggestions you offer vs. negating your ideas and continuing to complain.
• Learn from many situations – the good and the bad – instead of complaining about them.
• Initiate actions to deliver success.

If you are thinking or saying the following about a constantly negative team member, you are enabling a bad attitude:

“But this employee …”

• “Just needs more time to develop a positive attitude.”
• “Will come around eventually.”
• “Is still recovering from the previous bad boss.”
• “Is having a rough year.”
• “Is young/immature.”
• “Is good in a crisis.”

Would upper management be swayed by these reasons when trying to assess the value of your organization? Or would they ask you to calculate the cost of having employees who don’t use positive attitudes to fuel outstanding results?

What can you expect instead? A positive attitude to create business success now; someone who is capable of choosing a positive attitude doesn’t need more time.  An employee who had a dictatorial boss before could be thrilled by a chance to work with a better leader now.  Young employees can be positive about the possibilities that lie ahead. Team members who are good in a crisis have the mental strength to choose a can do attitude daily.

Leaders, if you struggle with the idea of expecting a positive attitude, ask yourself why?

Do you:

• Want to be liked more than you want to achieve success
• Fear the necessary conversation about a bad attitude
• Believe you have the power to change people
• Believe that expecting and requiring a positive attitude means you are a tyrant/ogre
• Feel bad about yourself if an employee has a bad attitude toward the job
• Believe that positive employees won’t want to work in your organization

I see this trend among: certain personality types, managers who are leading their former peers, and leaders who replaced a rough demoralizing micro-manager.  Yet coaching a bad attitude doesn’t change the bad attitude.

It can also demoralize the committed team members who endure the bad attitude while you try — in vain — to coach. It takes you all off course.

Get back on track. Expect a positive attitude and inspire the possibilities that come from it!

Feature team successes and lessons learned.  Recognize innovative thought, outstanding effort, commitment, and action.  Express your appreciation at the end of the week for tough situations handled well.  Let no complainer disillusion or distract you and the team from the true mission.

Positive attitudes are not denial of the difficulties the team faces.  They are the very fuel for overcoming obstacles to reach business success.

Create an environment for a positive can do attitude and then expect it from everyone.

What other actions do you recommend to create an environment for a can do attitude? I welcome your comments below.

The internet is abuzz about Central Bucks PA teacher Natalie Munroe and her blog post where she called her students whiny and lazy. As I heard the story, I immediately knew that Natalie Munroe had made a classic people skills mistake.

Labels –> they never inspire and always leave scars.

There is much for leaders to learn from this people skills mistake. I offer the following lessons and welcome your additions to this post.

People Skills That Lead and Inspire

1. “I” not “You”. When you have something negative to say, use an I statement instead of a you statement. Hear the difference between “I would like you to work harder” instead of “you are whiny and lazy.”




2. Highlight behaviors vs. traits. Whether you are a teacher, a leader, a team member, or a parent, you are more likely to see positive change when you discuss specific behaviors you want to see rather than traits. You will see results sooner with “Ask for help or offer an idea” instead of “you are whiny.” For years, many mangers have used the desktop sign: “no complaints — only solutions” to inspire employees to engage and solve problems.




3. Refocus powerless feelings.
   When labels emerge, it is a sure sign of frustration and a sense of powerlessness. Always a danger zone ripe for a people skills disaster unless you refocus on what you can do vs. what you can’t do.
   In this case, teachers have the tougher situation. Corporate leaders and managers have options to move low performers to less demanding projects, to lower profile teams, or out the door. Teachers don’t have these alternatives and sometimes little support. Hence it is even more important to refocus on what you can achieve with the students instead of the continued obstacles. When you lower your own frustration you find the power to inspire.




4. Move forward however slow the pace. Forward steps toward the mission, purpose, and goals will keep your people skills and your people on a positive track to success. Side trips and rest stops in the gullies of change resistance will derail you all.




5. When you slip, admit and recommit. Frustration can get the better of anyone. A teacher, leader, or a team member can slip into frustration driven labels and unproductive remarks. The sooner you admit, apologize, and recommit to productive interaction, the less the damage. You also become a model for learning, leadership, and integrity.

What other people skills lessons learned would you add to this list?

Flickr: HugoVK

Is your positive attitude helping yourself and others?  Or are you so extremely positive that you drive others crazy?  Science Daily (July 3, 2009) published an article on the research of Dr. Joanne Wood and Dr. John Lee with interesting results about positive self-affirmations.   The results showed that some people do better when they are allowed to verbalize both the negative and the positive.    (See link below.)

I have a positive view of life and see life’s challenges straight ahead of me.  I take action to create a good life and learn from my experiences — both good and bad   However, I meet others who see the negatives more than the positives.  They live differently and I respect their choices.  Some have told me they were inspired by my positive outlook and actions.  Others go their own way.  I have also met people who try to convert me to their positivism before seeing how positive I already am!  This turns me off to what they have to offer.

So here are three steps to prevent positivism from being patronizing, controlling, and insensitive in everyday life.  [NOTE: In organizations and teams, positive can-do attitudes and positive disagreements are essential to meeting goals.  Too much negativity can slow momentum and derail end results.]

1.Coach only when asked.  In everyday life, don’t elect yourself someone else’s life coach.  Even positive words like “I would like to encourage you to …” are somewhat arrogant if the person didn’t ask for your help.   Live and enjoy your own positivism but don’t declare yourself Prince of PositiveLand and issue decrees.  You may become known as a royal pain in the a_ _.

2. Listen in the moment and understand others’ perspectives.  Listening builds trust through respect.  Extremely positive people are sometimes so busy encouraging others to be positive they don’t stop and listen to the moment others are in.  Everyone in this life is on a journey and they travel at different speeds.   Some get to positivism faster than others.  Some don’t even want to go there.  Exception: If you are a leading an organization through change and a true resistor is slowing the pace with mega-negativity, you will need to address that very clearly to ensure the momentum of change.

3.Disagree honestly and with respect. Become comfortable with honest respectful disagreement.  People disagree in life.  Working through disagreements often delivers great results.  Yet sometimes extremely positive people patronize during a disagreement because they seek immediate harmony.  Disagreement can be a positive if it is respectful.

Live positively and let others see your positive outlook and actions.  Be careful of pushing them to be positive — you could create the opposite effect.

I welcome your additions to this list and your other relevant comments below.  Here is the link to the Science Daily article mentioned above: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/07/090702110503.htm

Kate Nasser, The People-Skills Coach

MA Organizational Psychology