{Note: My startup, Lighthouse, just launched its blog. If you’ve been enjoying my posts on leadership and management, follow me over to http://GetLighthouse.com/Blog and subscribe on the right sidebar to get every post.
Below is an excerpt from the first post there, “Why don’t we reward good managers?“}
We all know management is important, and yet, it has not changed the largely dismal outlook of management: 70% of American workers are disengaged. Poor management is largely to blame.
People don’t leave companies, they leave bad managers.
As I’ve spoken to managers and employees, it’s amazing how often I hear about managers that ignore their people, stifle their team’s efforts, and are totally unaware of the unhappiness of their employees. Unfortunately, this candor on their frustration is with me, not their employer.
Some of these issues can come up in 1 on 1s, if you have them often enough and you ask (many are afraid to volunteer such issues, especially introverts). If you miss those opportunities and they’re now leaving, you can do exit interviews to learn what went wrong, but that’s too late to help them. You are also unlikely to get straight answers in an exit interview; if an employee desires to leave on good terms, they have incentive to sugar coat things and find the most diplomatic reason to say they’re leaving.
Bad managers affect everyone.
Good employees work hard to produce, but they resent their manager if they’re not appreciated and treated well. When it happens to mediocre and bad employees, they will just shut down and under produce, creating dead weight on teams. Your good team members will eventually decide they’ve had enough and look elsewhere. In a competitive market, this will happen sooner than later.