|
|
|
Treat Your Employees like Pokémon
In the world of Pokémon, young trainers travel the land catching and
training creatures called Pokémon. There are 150 different kinds of
Pokémon, and each trainer tries to catch and train as many as possible.
After a Pokémon is caught, the trainer starts preparing their new Pokémon
to battle other Pokémon. In order to properly train a Pokémon, the trainer
must invest a great deal of time and energy, perseverance, and love.
Since each Pokémon has separate and unique powers, the trainer also needs
to develop each Pokémon differently. When the training is complete, the
once wild Pokémon will have become loyal, will have developed a set of
battle skills, and may have even evolved into an advanced form of Pokémon.
If you are an owner of a company or a supervisor of workers, the above
Pokémon description should sound familiar. In today's job market, many
employers are literally out hunting and capturing new employees to hire.
But as most employers have learned, the job of being a supervisor does not
stop upon hiring a new employee. After an employee is hired, the
supervisor's job is to start training the employee with the goal of
evolving the employee into an advanced form.
Evolving an employee is similar to evolving a Pokémon. It takes time and
energy, positive regard, and mentoring in order to evolve
an ordinary employee into an advanced employee. I have outlined a few key
steps to help guide supervisors in their training and evolving of ordinary
employees into advanced employees.
How to Train and Evolve an Employee
Every new employee needs a company orientation, but most supervisors
forget that employees also need to be orientated to the company's
VISION in addition to learning their
coworkers' names, company policies, and what not to eat in the cafeteria.
The company's vision statement tells the employee where the company is
going, what their role will be, and how success and achievement will be
measured.
Set a DIRECTION for each employee that is in
alignment with the company's vision statement. Each new employee should
be launched into the company with a set of personalized goals that will
help the company obtain its goals.
Now it's your employee's turn to do some work. Ask your new employee to
tell you how he or she can change in order to help the company meet its
goals. Your job is to LISTEN to your new
employee's ideas as to how he or she can change in order to help the
company meet its goals. This step should occur sometime between the
sixth and ninth month of employment.
GUIDE the employee's feedback. Not all your
employee's suggestions for how he or she can change in order to meet your
company's goals will be good ideas. But it is your job as a supervisor
to guide the employee into understanding which
of their ideas for change will be helpful in meeting the company's goals.
A good supervisor will also guide each of their employees differently
because similar to Pokémon, each employee will offer your company unique
talents and will evolve into different forms of advanced employees.
MEASURE and give FEEDBACK
are the last steps before employee evolution can occur. These steps need to take
place no later than 12 months after the employee's hire date. It is the
supervisor's job to measure the employee's overall success and ability to
change in order to help the company achieve its goals. The best way to
measure employee performance is by keeping progress notes. These notes
should be composed of both objective and subjective measures of the employee's
yearly progress. By giving the employee accurate feedback you will motivate
the new employee to stay in a continued process of evolving.
Each of your employees is capable of evolving again and again over the course
of their career. We are all familiar with the story of how a mailroom clerk
worked his or her way up the company ladder to become the CEO of the company.
In today's work world too many talented employees are leaving companies long
before he or she can become the CEO. Employees who "job hop" attempt to
evolve by changing companies instead of evolving within one company.
Employers who tap into their employees' need to evolve will retain their
talented employees, and may one day have a CEO who started in the mailroom.
Happy Working,
Gary Vikesland, MA LP CEAP
Employer-Employee.com
Main Page
|
|
|
Copyright © 2001-2007
Employer-Employee.com
All rights reserved
Disclaimer
Privacy Statement
|
