Leading and Managing Staff: Key Strategies for Success

In today’s business world, effective leadership and management are crucial for achieving financial results, company culture, staff motivation, and retention. However, many companies face challenges in this area, particularly when a manager is appointed without formal training in staff management, especially when transitioning from a colleague to a managerial role. Your work colleagues are sometimes family and friends, and suddenly they become direct reports, and you are expected to manage them.  One of the greatest challenges is knowing how to manage staff effectively, but more importantly, having consistency where everyone is on the same page on how to handle it.

Effective leadership is about following the strategic direction of the business, and ensuring the goals and objectives are aligned across departments. When departments operate in silos or staff not getting along due to personality clashes and complaints among employees, it impacts productivity and damages company morale. At KBA, we see many companies that have all the right intentions to progress to the next level, but they fail through their lack of strategic planning, which includes people strategy. This is about how the company is going to lead and manage their people more effectively, with consistency and standards across the management team. When it comes to standards, we often see a vast difference between one manager to another and even the business owner.

To turn a company from good to great, you must establish a strong level of understanding of how your company is going to manage staff effectively across the business. Your leaders need to learn the difference between leading by setting the right direction and managing by doing things right. Mission, Vision, Purpose, and Values are key factors, linked with company, team and individual goals, is a great ingredient for success. However, if your leaders or managers are not aligned, following the same process, then this could be holding your company back from getting to the next level.  Don’t throw someone in the deep end to manage staff and fail them.

At KBA, we’ve facilitated many Effective Management Workshops across Australia. This is one of our flagship training workshops because it brings business owners, their managers, and future leaders together on the same page. Learning the importance of understanding leadership through HR processes will give you and your leaders a competitive advantage. Given that wages are a significant expense for a company, investing in effective management training is essential, especially with regulations set by the Fair Work Ombudsman and OHS/WHS Laws consistently changing, you cannot afford to wing it anymore.  You need to train your managers to lead, and they need to also know how to manage risk.

Over the past 16 years, many companies have come to us seeking assistance after facing issues with staff, rather than proactively addressing staff management practices. However, it’s your choice. You can run a proactive company, or you can take the risk and work it out when something goes wrong.  At KBA we like the proactive approach, as it has been proven many times how quickly we can help grow a client’s business through having a solid people management process.  We refer it back to Jim Collins’ book “Good to Great”.  Today’s leaders and managers are expected to know everything about managing staff, and if not, this could become a very costly outcome for your company.

Imagine how more effective your leadership team would be if they were confident with the following:

• Learning the difference between a great leader and a manager
• Defining the manager’s role within the business
• Understanding the purpose of an organisational chart
• Understanding the key drivers for company results
• How to recruit the right staff through an effective recruitment process
• Understanding the interview process
• The purpose of position descriptions (KPIs and KRAs)
• How to successfully start a new employee through an onboarding and orientation process
• Understanding the purpose of company policies and procedures
• Being organised and planning for company meetings and training sessions
• How to manage and motivate your team to get the best out of them
• Understand the value of one-on-one conversations and staff performance reviews
• How to address under-performing staff in the most effective way
• What to do if there was misconduct from a staff member
• Understand the termination process through staff dismissals!
• The value of an exit checklist and exit interview
• The power of record keeping

For more information about the above model check out: www.keyba.com.au/events/event/effective-people-management-workshop-4/

Staff engagement is everything and having some form of HR Best Practice that is linked to your strategic plan is key, as it sets the foundation of staff behaviours and expectations. Your leaders must learn and understand the process to get the best out of staff and also how to address the non-performers. HR Best Practice is all about empowering staff to perform where individuals take ownership to drive personal and company outcomes.  It is also about looking at staff capability and resources to deliver company outcomes that will take a company to the next level.

Key Business Advisors has a proven model that spans over 16 years.  We have a dedicated team that delivers results, which are aligned with our mission, vision, values, and purpose.  We take our clients from good to great because we become embedded in our client’s business through the services we provide, covering all aspects of employee engagement and performance.  We have a proven model that results in building strong client relationships all over Australia.

To learn more about our company and access FREE resources to help your business grow and get to the next level:

• Key Business Advisors – keyba.com.au
• KBA Business Strategy & Growth – https://keyba.com.au/business-advice-strategy-and-growth/
• KBA People & Culture – https://keyba.com.au/people-culture-business/
• KBA HR Advice and Support – https://keyba.com.au/hr-advice-support/
• KBA Professional Sales Training – https://keyba.com.au/professional-sales-training/

At KBA, we are very passionate about taking businesses from good to great. If you need assistance in enhancing performance through a strong organisational culture, please don’t hesitate to contact us today!

If you would like to explore our services further or require assistance, please reach out to Key Business Advisors on 1300 4 ADVICE