How to become a cheerleader for your team | DFS 278

Welcome to destined for success. I'm your

host Jennifer Takagi. And today I want to continue the

conversation that marcha had about being a cheerleader

without cheering or cheering your team on without being a

cheerleader. I don't know. However, she said it was really

great if you didn't catch it, go back and catch last week's

episode. But I want to talk about it from like my

perspective on what I saw while I was in corporate and federal

workforces. So one of the things as leaders, managers, and we're

all leaders, if you're listening, because you lead

somebody, if nobody at all, haha, guess what you lead

yourself. So you have to know your team, you have to know who

they are, what they like, what trips their trigger, what

motivates them. Motivation is one of those kind of elusive

things. And it's kind of like, you have to motivate yourself.

But if you don't give your people tasks and jobs that they

have a skill at and an interest in, they're gonna get bored

really quickly. And the work could possibly not be quite at

the quality that it could or should. So if you know your

team, you know what motivates them, then you can focus on

those areas, focus on the things that they do really well and

have them do more of that. And then if and this is a big F,

capital I f, if there are things they have to do as part of their

job, because that happened in the federal government a lot,

you had to do everything, not just part of it, you had to do

it all, then you can help them identify those gaps of where

they're not performing at their highest, or where you need them

to do something they may not be familiar with. Often we just

assume they know what we know. And I'm going to say once I left

the federal government and started doing trainings for the

the great state of Oklahoma, other federal agencies,

associations and whatnot. The one thing I learned was, when

you're teaching somebody, something, you're typically

giving them way too much at a time. You're expecting them to

know steps A through F. So you just start with G and keep going

and they don't have any background. Some people like me

are gonna raise their hand and say, Wait a minute, I don't get

it. I don't know what you're talking about. Like, when did

you get to there? Like I'm here, we're How did you get there?

Other people are never gonna say it. I had employees that

honestly, I had meetings with. And I was like, so how did you

come to this conclusion? She was like, I don't know. I followed

the form. What do you know what that form is? No, she didn't

have a clue. Whose fault is that? Mine. As the leader is the

manager, that was my fault, and not taking the time to find out

where her gaps were, and what she needed to know and how to

fill them in. So the first thing is, you have to know your team.

You have to know them individually. I know there's a

whole lot of conversation around you can't be friends with your

team that'll get you into trouble, blah, blah, blah. It's

true. I did I got in trouble. Yeah, it happens. But there's a

level that you have to get to know them. So you know their

learning style. You learn how they like to work and operate

and what thrills them. That's what you have to do, you have to

spend some time with that. So I am going to challenge you to

make a commitment. If you don't already know what your

individual team members styles are, what how they like to

interact. Some people just want a short and quick email. Other

people want a detailed list. Some people want hand holding.

Other people just want you to give it to him and let him

figure it out. All of those ways are fine, they're all fine, and

they all work really well. But you can't drop something on

somebody's desk and walk away when it's somebody who wants to

talk it out a little bit. I want to know how this fits into my

job. I want to know when it is due. I want to know how this

fits into the bigger picture. I saw that a lot in the federal

government people did not know how their small slice of the pie

impacted hundreds of 1000s if not millions of people depending

on where you worked in what you did. Huge impact, far reach

reach a lot of people. So do all your people know that and

understand it My dad and I used to have conversations around the

fact that they put the newest, lowest person on the totem pole

in the position of receptionist. Well, at one point, every single

phone call that came in unless they already knew you went

directly to your receptionist desk, it might still I don't

really know. But it went to the receptionist. And the

receptionist had no idea what departments we had, where they

were, who did what, or what to do with these calls, they didn't

really understand what our agency did. It makes it really

hard to give one of the most important jobs to the lowest

paid newest person who has the least amount of knowledge. So

make a commitment to figure out what your people do know,

individually, like what do you know, where are your skills,

what are you good at, if there is a way to give them more of

what they're really good at, give them more of what they're

really good at. Sometimes you can't again, in the federal

government, you had a job, you had a job description, you had

to be able to do everything on that job description, well find

out what they can do well, and then help fill in the gaps. Get

it, get them the training they need, you, as the leader or

manager may not be the one to give them the training, that is

fine. Find the people who can, it doesn't have to all be you

find the people who can help. So now that you have agreed, I'm

just gonna assume again, there's that word, it's I mean, I'm

gonna assume that you've made the commitment that you want

2024 to be even better than previous years. You want more

communication with your staff, you want the goals to be met

quickly, easily and with a whole lot less effort. You've made

that commitment. Now what? Now what you've probably heard me

say I have a new book out 12 minutes to win reach your goals

and 12 minute increments. And it's so it's so simplistic, but

it is so powerful and impactful. What if you put on your calendar

actually on your calendar, because it's one of those deals,

if it's not on your calendar, it's not gonna get done. What if

you put on your calendar, that you're gonna spend 12 minutes

with each employee, once a month, 12 minutes each employee

once a month, you can even have a quick coffee break, if you

wanted. I don't drink coffee, but you know what I mean, that

timeframe. So you're gonna have this quick meeting with your

employee, and you're gonna have a few very strategic direct

questions. And initially, they may not talk to you, you may not

have formed that type of relationship with them. But once

it happened several times, and once they learn, you're not

trying to play a gotcha game, they'll start opening up and

they'll let you know what's working, what's not working, and

where they might need some support. So that's the first

step. Can you commit to that? Will you commit to that? Would

that be helpful? We had a new office manager came in one time,

and he made a commitment, he was going to have coffee with every

single employee. And so they drew a name out of a fishbowl

every Monday morning at the principal staff meeting, of who

they're going to meet with. And when my day came up, we walked

across the street to this little restaurant, and he ordered

coffee, I ordered whatever. And he was like, how's it going?

What's going on. And for the first time, and at that point,

I'd be there, I don't know, four or five years. But for the first

time, I felt like somebody in a position of power. With the

ability to affect a change that would be better for me, heard my

concerns. Sometimes employees just want to be heard, they want

to be validated that their concerns are real, you may not

be able to solve the problem. But you can show them empathy

and understanding of what's happening. In the end, that

short meeting with him, it was probably more than 12 minutes

because we had to walk across the street and walk back you

know how that goes. Because of that, a big problem came up with

one of my projects, a project an apartment complex project. And

he said, Get hold of Jennifer she knows about this get the

information from her.

If I hadn't been given the opportunity to have that

conversation with him, since I was so low on that totem pole.

He might not have even known my name or considered having some

But he else in management go to me to get the information. So

number one, it made me feel valued, respected and that

people cared about what I had to say what I thought and you know,

the knowledge that I brought to the table. And also, I was the

one with the information. And they could have gone around in

circles trying to gather this information that I had readily

at my fingertips. So that 12 minute coffee break with him was

very valuable for many people for many reasons. So that can be

your first commitment. I'm going to commit to having coffee with

each employee. And if everybody works remotely, it can be a zoom

call, but it needs to be very casually, very open conversation

about what's going on what's working, what's not working.

Once you do that, then you can decide what would be the next

step. I don't know what that next step is for you. But you

could have a next step. Okay, we're meeting once a week or

once a month for 12 minutes, then you can switch your

questions up. Once you have that first round of meetings, you

might decide there's something else you need to know. The point

I want to make is that you can have a powerful impact in a

short amount of time. If you're completely focused, phone off

notifications off and you're truly having an interaction

whether it's in person or online, focused on them, and

really care about what they have to say. If you can't make a

change in that right then tell them I'm sorry, there's nothing

I can do about this at this time, but I appreciate your

input. And if in the future, I can just know that I will. I'm

Jennifer Takagi and I look forward to connecting with you

soon