Good leaders are those who set their people up to succeed. For you to be an effective leader, you have to keep away from management practices that destroy employee productivity. While there is no such thing as a “perfect leader”, you have to consistently try to be a good one. Below are some practices that you should avoid at all costs to make sure you are not the reason for your workers’ decreasing efficiency.
1. Using fear to motivate people.
Although fear is an effective motivator at times, repeatedly threatening your employees’ job security will not give you the results you want. Employees who are too afraid to lose their job are likely to gossip with coworkers, or secretly look for another job in case they really lose their current one. These are activities that do nothing but decrease productivity and kill morale. Instead of fear-mongering, you should create a workplace culture built on respect, trust and engagement.
2. Calling out employees in public.
Praising employees publicly is good, but criticizing them publicly is a big NO. Criticizing an employee in front of other workers isn’t only embarrassing for the one being called out, but it also has a negative effect on the morale of the whole team. If you feel that there is a need to counsel a team member, do it privately and not in a way that may distract others.
3. Not being emotionally vested in a project.
Good leaders lead their team members, and don’t just give orders the latter should follow. If you are noticeably disengaged in a project, there is a huge possibility that your team will feel the same about it. As a leader, you have to be accountable and responsible for whatever happens to your project.
4. Ignoring good performance from team members.
Ineffective leaders are very good at ignoring the special abilities of their team and its members. If you continue failing to reward or praise great performances by your people, there is no way you can expect them to perform at a high level. You have to determine what each of your employees is capable of, and give them tasks and responsibilities that can leverage those skills.
5. Conducting ineffective meetings.
Meetings play a very important role in managing a project. It is where managers get updates on the status of certain projects, and it is also where they give out instructions to the group or individually. However, meetings that are poorly managed are not likely to be productive, and can instead lead employees to eventually lose interest. Thus, managers have to make sure their employees get something of value and relevance out of their meetings.
Conclusion
For a team, department or an organization to be productive, the manager has to find a way to inspire their people to be engaged. By avoiding the bad management practices mentioned above, you will be able to get closer to creating a highly productive environment.