The best way to achieve your moonshot goals is with your internal customers – i.e. the employees who work with you. They have to be focused on the same goals be a part of the journey and the rewards.
They must enjoy what they do and are happy most of the time. Their attitude speaks louder than words to your external customers, i.e. those who write your paychecks. No one wants to talk with a grouch. They will talk with a person who seems pleasant.
One of the most overlooked actions is to ensure that you hire the right attitude. One of my clients had a series of employees who didn’t belong at his company. In my opinion they were dysfunctional on a personal level. They weren’t happy. They weren’t doing their jobs and their personal problems followed them to work every day and consumed much of their time. They left…at the beginning of a long, busy summer. However, it was much better that they were gone since they weren’t taking care of the external customers well either. This caused problems initially. However, in the long term, the company was much better off with the “bad apples” gone.
The key is to hire the right internal customers. You can train from a technical standpoint. However, you can’t train attitudes and work ethic. Where do you find these people? Find people who take good care of you in places you go. I’ve watched more than one waitress become a great employee of a contractor. Another hired a bank teller who became a great field employee.
Let’s assume that you’ve hired the right attitude. How do you ensure that they stay happy and motivated? Many contractors mistakenly look for “motivation tricks” or “sales tricks” that will make the people do what we want them to do.
Most “tricks” don’t last for long. All lasting motivation is self motivation. That is why you must hire the right attitude and work ethic. Employees must want to do a good job and follow the rules. Otherwise, they won’t stay. As a manager once told me, the good employees will leave and you’ll have to kick out the bad ones.
Each person you come in contact with is different. We have different ways of communicating, different personal needs, different ways that we look at the world. I’m sure you’ve experienced the situation when your best employee went to a customer, fixed her problem and the customer hated the employee and called complaining.
In other cases, your worst employee went to the customer and didn’t fix the problem. The customer calls back and doesn’t complain about the employee even though he didn’t fix the problem. In the first case, the employee didn’t communicate well. In the second case he did.
Once an employee feels that the communication channels are open, he is more likely to offer suggestions which can help improve his job and the company operations. You’ll have contented employees and a better bottom line.
The First Time Manager – Sales, gives great ideas for a person who has been in sales and promoted to sales manager.
However, this advice is great for any field or office person who is promoted to manager!
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