"People Issues" come in all shapes, sizes and seriousness. Here is a rough handy guide about some of the typical ones. There will be 3 instalments. This first one focuses on the individual level not team or organisational.
INDIVIDUAL LEVEL
1. Challenge: A breach of the law.
Solution: Stand the person aside, let the police investigate, if they are convicted terminate the employment, if no action by police internally investigate and take action based on your policy settings and contracts (which need to be tight by then). Make sure the person on the other side of the claim is protected but fire them if the allegation turns out to be vexatious. Protect whistle-blowers. Don't treat senior people differently.
2. Challenge: A high potential is discovered and they are flourishing or floundering:
Solution: Coach them (I do this stuff a lot), ensure they have management and 2-up manager support. Focus on self awareness. Give them straight feedback, disclosure, and tough assignments. Don't feel the need to tell them they are a hipo. Spend 50% of your development money on the 5-10% of people like this. Focus on strengths. Move them every 18 months until they are 35. Watch their pay carefully. Make sure they know their career will flourish here. Ensure they have a clear and specific development plan. They are an asset of the organisation FIRST, then of the department they are in now. Make sure your talent review process is actually throwing up talent. Remember 80% of the value in the Company comes from 10-15% of the people.
3. Challenge: One of the managers is technically good and important but is leaving a trail of human destruction.
Solution: Start with feedback, an attitude of helping/caring, be clear, specific, normative, and delivered by their boss if they can do it, the Head of HR, the CEO or a good consultant. Focus on behaviour and take care for their self-esteem. Do a 360 to get a baseline (use one with a good norm base). Coach them and be frank. Give them a time-frame. Move them to a sole contributor role if no progress because the culture is being damaged.
4. Challenge: Interpersonal conflict. Usually this will be one person complaining about another.
Solution: Firstly make sure your policies are robust - grievance policy, whistle-blower policy, performance management policy. Follow your policy. Focus on caring, helping, treat them like adults, use firmness and personal accountability for the conduct. Find out why the Manager didn't know or act prior to this - make them lead this (or they are part of the problem). Seek witness observations. Usually there will be individual sessions and then conciliation . Seek rectifying agreements by each of the people. Look for solutions that they can "live with" not that they are happy with. Follow-up in 4 weeks to see if everyone is doing what was committed. Discipline people if they are unreasonable or unprepared to own it and fix it. Be very hard on vexatious claims so that policy is not manipulated by your people with personality problems - so don't assume the one complaining is the victim. Be very aware this is damaging all the relationships in that department. Losing people over stuff like this should be rare not common or else you have a cultural issue that is just manifesting as interpersonal conflict.
5. Challenge: Something is happening at home and someone is not OK.
Solution: Put it on the radar. Notice things. Have a clear set of guidelines for dealing with domestic abuse, depression, substance abuse and hardship. Make sure their Manager is keeping an eye on things and noting behaviour such as withdrawal, absence, lateness, emotional stability. Lead with confidentiality, caring, help and support. Be very careful not to worry or humiliate the person and let them drive at their pace and when/if ready. Encourage them to lean on their best friends at work. Don't avoid but don't confront - subtlety and signalling is important. Eventually someone may need to say "Mary, I've noticed XXX, are you OK". Run generic programs like "white-ribbon" and "R.U.O.K" to signal that this is a caring, safe place if people want to seek help, and that problems like these are common. Be very careful to point them to external professional specialist support - counsellors, police, etc. Don't report it in your HR or WC systems as a "case" unless absolutely confidential. Don't let policy rigidness get in the way either: EG: cash advances, time off, or whatever. Recognise how important their workplace is to their life right now.
6. Challenge: A Manager needs help to hire, manage performance, set goals, deal with interpersonal issues, or support Company policy such as diversity.
Solution: The good news is that every Manager has a Manager and its Managers who should be managing not HR people. Hopefully the HR person has a decent professional relationship with both people and is knowledgeable and credible and influential. Managers manage, HR people advise.
Very often there is a mindset problem at the root of the issue such as :-
If I give corrective feedback they will be upset (All feedback is help and should be delivered as such)
If I don't give everyone the same pay rise there will be disharmony ( They know not everyone is pulling the same weight and EXPECT the manager to see this too)
If I give corrective feedback they won't like me (And if you don't they won't respect you)
If I acknowledge my star performer it will rock the boat (You should be continuously praising in public whenever you see great behaviour)
I don't agree with that policy (It's not your Company, and as a Manager its not your place to be shop steward but to privately raise your concerns and publicly support)
It's my department I will hire who I want (Yes you have an important place in this but all employees are an asset of the Company first, will be here when you are not, so its a team call)
I don't need to formalise goals, I know how people are doing (But the person may not be as clear as you or as tolerant of ambiguity, and systems like bonus payments need some structure from the get-go, sorry its the policy to set clear written goals and to let people know where they stand as objectively as possible).
7. A good person has resigned.
Solution: Find out how they came to this decision to leave and why they were open to leave if in fact they were approached - it will be about their career.
I'll bet some of these things are true:-
a. There is no career and development plan in place and nothing has actually happened in the last year because we are all so busy
b. There is a fair chance the Manager could have nipped this in the bud 6 months ago
c. The others in that team are now talking about their careers
d. The person leaving will be saying they are in large part doing it for money (which is sometimes true but not as often as people say it is)
e. The Manager will not be happy about this and even be a bit embarassed
Don't try to counter-offer as it fails 94% of the time within a year, and everyone else then finds out that you would pay people higher only if you had to. Don't just push the work onto others. Make sure the "leaver" is not treated like they are gone until they are. Hire an even better replacement. Find out what the Manager has decided to do differently.
Comments