Rules Of Management

RULE 25 - Listen to ideas from others

“When people talk, listen completely. Most people never listen.”

Ernest Hemingway

If you think you know it all, chances are you will be too busy listening to yourself and how great you are to have time to listen to anyone else. But I know that’s not you. Everyone, no matter how lowly their position or task, has something to offer you. Try talking to the lift operator, the car park attendant, the canteen staff, the cleaning staff, whoever and whatever. And, most important, listen to people in your team. They are the ones in the know who have to work with the resources and the products. They are the ones at the cutting edge and they may well have ideas, good ideas. You don’t need to consult them over every little thing but the big things…well, yes. Talk to them. Get their feedback, their ideas, their creativity.

“Talk to them. Get their feedback, their ideas, their creativity.”

You obviously have to be careful to make sure that although you are listening to them it is you who still carries the can. You might listen but that doesn’t mean you are going to a ct on every one of their ideas. Nip in the bud the feeling that if they suggest, you have to carry out. Therein lies terrible trouble. Listen, assimilate and then decide based on what you heard, you own experience and ideas and what is practical. It’s no good you listening and then not using their information and them becoming terribly despondent – ‘What’s the use of telling the boss my ideas, they’re never used’.

You have to listen without giving the ideas that you will necessarily use their ideas, so then they won’t be disappointed when you do something completely different. But you can make them think their ideas were incorporated into your overall strategy.

Virtually every team member I have ever known could tell their manager something useful about what they as a team or a company are getting wrong, or how something could be done better. If you’re open to this, ask good questions and listen without prejudice (or talking over them), you’re immediately in a different class to most managers.

posted by Right Ranger @ 6:33 PM