My team and I have almost grown up together... and I have come a long way in honing my people skills. Never a believer of hard-core management fundas (plus the lack of a formal management degree!), I have always figured out my own approach in managing my team and helping them remain motivated. Having had my fair share of struggles in managing team members early on, I quickly realized that there is no rule book. The only rule I have diligently followed all these years is to truly understand the person.
When I conduct interviews, the most important answer that I look for is- why are you here? Is it the money, the social inclination, ambition or simply a parking space? And I do a deep dive on it. This helps me not only build their KPIs effectively but also truly help them flourish and grow- something that I am deeply passionate about.
Every person is unique and so is their skill set and it is important to remember and honor that. Don’t try to push a numbers person to a people’s role and push a creative soul into the excel world. Another wonderful thing is to constantly discover new skill sets in team members. I once had a HR team member turn out to be one of the best salespersons and a
Facility Manager- technically a nurse to be a great negotiator! One strategy doesn’t apply to all. I have to understand how a team member prefers to interact- some are motivated when I get to understand them personally, whilst some want the relationship to be at a professional level only. I adapt my ways of functioning and individualize my interactions with every person. I constantly fine tune my relationship with each of my team members.
A critical piece is also to ensure that my team members have a clear understanding of my value systems and principles. So, on one hand, I am transparent with them, and on the other, they clearly know the ‘no-go’ areas. I believe that a ‘person relationship’ based approach works better than a ‘repartee-manager relationship’- any day.
