At some point in your career either you or one of your employees is going to feel depressed at work. The trick here is to deal with the situation before it gets out of control and begins to affect work performance – but how?

The first and most important thing to remember is that depression shouldn’t always be viewed as an illness that must absolutely be treated with medications. In many cases, a person who is depressed is responding physically to something in his environment. So the real key is to find out what is causing your (or your employee’s) depression and find out exactly what those triggers are trying to tell you.

Last week I talked about Matthew Campling and his Age/Work Arc Theory. Campling also spent some time studying the affects of depression in the workplace and concluded that all of us have a space in which our emotions or emotional reactions occur. Those who are overworked may not have time to allow their natural human reactions, such as feeling anger or worry, to occur.

Because they never work through their natural responses they begin to feel as though a dark cloud is filling the space around them. In short, a feeling of depression is usually a cover for some sort of issue or emotion that has not been addressed. Uncovering those emotions and working through them may help to solve the problem.

As a manager, it is your job to make sure that your employee’s tasks aren’t the cause of his dark cloud. If so, try to find out what you can do to make things a bit easier or to help your employee work through whatever issue he is experiencing within the workplace. Just remember that no matter how genuine your desire to help, not all cases of depression are simple to solve. If you can’t help your employee, refer him to someone with more professional psychological experience.

Thanks again,
Sean

Sean McPheat
Managing Director
MTD Management Training Course

Click below for a:
FREE email course “Improve Your Management Skills”

While no one really enjoys the appraisal process, I’m going to take a chance here and suggest something a bit different – why not have monthly or semi-regular appraisal meetings with each of your employees?

Before you start throwing your hands up and calling me crazy, let me explain. There are quite a few benefits that, as a manager, you can achieve by having more frequent appraisals and, in the end, your major annual appraisal will go much smoother. Here are a few reasons to consider.

• The more frequently you sit down with each member of your team the more you’ll understand exactly where is is in the grand scheme of things. You’ll have a better understanding of his goals, strengths, weaknesses, and limitations and will be able to adjust his tasks to focus on this strengths.
• Having frequent meetings will give you the opportunity to identify potential problem areas, giving you the ability to make changes before those problems have a negative impact on the team’s overall work and progress.
• Your team members will be more likely to ask for needed help if you open the door and give them an opportunity during which they feel comfortable.
• You will have the opportunity to work together to set realistic training and development goals.
• Your employees won’t be as nervous or scared about their appraisal meetings because they won’t be as formal and the frequency will make them more comfortable with the entire process.
• Frequent reviews will give your team members a better opportunity to prepare for their large annual appraisal, saving time in preparation.
• The more frequently you work with your team members the more accurate your notes about individual performance will be.

Why not consider a more frequent appraisal process? I think that by implementing regular meetings you’ll find that your employees are not only happier and more receptive to the process but will feel as though you care a bit more about their successes and development paths.

Thanks again,
Sean

Sean McPheat
Managing Director
MTD Leadership Development

Click below for a:
FREE email course “Improve Your Management Skills”

David McClelland was an American professor at Wesleyan University and Harvard in the United States before he died in 1998. While at Harvard, he spent more than 20 years studying the way people are motivated and how they address their achievements and needs.

After years of research he published a book called The Achieving Society in which he discussed the three types of motivational need he discovered: affiliation motivation, authority or power motivation, and achievement motivation. He found that everyone, regardless of their level in the workplace, experiences all three of these needs on some level – whether they need to motivate others or be motivated themselves.

The need for affiliation covers the idea that everyone needs to have positive relationships and, as a result, everyone is motivated towards developing some sort of interaction with others. Those who fall into this category, also labeled n-affil, want to be liked and work well in teams.

A person with a need for authority and power, also referred to as an n-pow person, wants to make a huge impact on the world. They want their ideas to be heard and also focus on making sure others see them as prestigious or with high status.

Those who feel a need to achieve, or the n-ach people, are highly motivated. They set a lot of challenging goals but remain realistic at the same time. Those who need to feel as though they’ve achieved their goals constantly seek to hear feedback from others.

Most people possess all three of these characteristics but spend most of the time leaning more towards one than the others. The one a person leans towards most will determine what type of worker or manager he will become – objective, determined, flexible, etc. Achievement motivated individuals, however, always seem to get the best results in the end!

Thanks again,
Sean

Sean McPheat
Managing Director
MTD Management Development

Click below for a:
FREE email course “Improve Your Management Skills”

As managers we are constantly looking for new and innovative ways to bring our team members together, allowing them to get to know each other in a laid back environment. The next time you have a team meeting, consider breaking your members into groups of 2 or 3 and giving them a series of ditloid puzzles to answer.

Ditloids are small equations made up of letters or numbers that can usually be solved pretty easily. You can use some that are prewritten or have your teams make up ditloits to give the opposing teams. Offer incentives (extra time off) or prizes (lunch, gift certificates, etc) to the team that can answer the highest number of ditloids correctly.

Here are a few examples (and their answers):

• 3  B M (3 blind mice)
• 12 S O T Z (12 signs of the zodiac)
• 50 S I T U S A (50 states in the USA)
• 4 A 20 B B I A P (4 and 20 blackbirds baked in a pie)
• 4 S O A DB (4 strings on a double bass)
• 6 B I A O I C (6 balls in an over in cricket)

Remember, if you make up your own ditloids they shouldn’t be too obscure. They should be based on common phrases used within your organization, for example.

Have fun bringing your team together with a few minutes of entertainment. Who knows – they may just learn a little bit about themselves and about each other!

Thanks again,
Sean

Sean McPheat
Managing Director
MTD Leadership Courses

Click below for a:
FREE email course “Improve Your Management Skills”

I’m always looking for new and creative ways to teach people how to manage their time properly. Today I’ve got just a few new time management tips for you to consider as you go about your workday.

Planning Unplanned Phone Calls

Alright, you can’t really plan things that are unplanned but you can set aside a specific block of time in your day during which you will return unplanned phone calls. Planned phone calls are those you have previously agreed to or scheduled. Unplanned phone calls are the ones that interrupt you while you are working on other things. The key is to not allow people to interrup you as you work, instead making it a point to return calls when you are actually available and ready to focus.

Stop Saying YES

Those of us in management positions often want to say “yes” to others when asked for assistance and then later find that the tasks we initially thought might be simple are actually more time consuming than we had originally anticipated. Before saying “yes” to a request you should be asking as many questions as you see fit, determing exactly what will be expected of you if you decide to participate in a task. Don’t be afraid to say “No” if you don’t have the right amount of time to dedicate to a project.

Be Challenging

Do you regularly attend “mandatory” meetings in which higher-ups hash the same information over and over again? Maybe they call you together regularly to simply delegate work. Are these things that could easily be handled by memo or email instead of through the use of a time-wasting meeting? Challenge those above you and make sure those meetings are actually “immediate and urgent” before they’re labeled “mandatory.”

Are you ready to take control of your time? Incorporate these time management tips along with some of the others you’ve already learned and you’ll soon find you have taken control of your life back!

Thanks again,

Sean

Sean McPheat
Managing Director
MTD Management

Click below for a:
Free email course “Improve your Management Skills”