Relationships make or break a team’s effectiveness. The leader/manager sets the tone and models the behavior that the rest of the team follows. Over seven posts, we will be looking at “respect” as an action acronym to guide creating and maintaining team dynamics that lead to productivity.
r-e-s-p-e-C-t
“C” stands for choice. Each of your team members has a choice about whether on not they work on your team. They may not have a choice about working – our society depends on money to exchange for goods so we exchange our time for money. But we all have some latitude about where we work and for whom, including you as the leader/manager.
The action part of the choice is to acknowledge that people can and will choose to stay on the team you lead – or not. It is interesting to note the difference in the way volunteers are treated compared to paid employees. Volunteers are welcomed, treated as rare and wonderful contributors, and thanked for their time and effort. I have had the opportunity to work with several not-for-profit organizations that have a mix of volunteer and paid staff. On two occasions, volunteers accepted offers to become full-time paid staff. They immediately noticed a difference in how they were treated. Instead of being welcomed, they were all but ignored because now they “had to” be at work by virtue of being paid. I have spoken with many managers who do not think they have to thank their employees for completed work because “it’s their job”. Unfortunately both of these volunteers-turned-employees quit after less than one month because they could not reconcile the change in their treatment. Not only did the organization have to rehire and retrain, they lost these folks as volunteers – and anyone else who heard about their experience with the organization.
Treat everyone on your team as the volunteer that they are. Be civil. Be polite. Be clear about task responsibilities. Be firm and maintain the standards of performance. Acknowledging your team members as volunteers should not undercut your role as the leader/manager or eliminate their responsibility to perform.
If anything remembering you are all volunteers may inspire a sense of freedom to commit more fully to the work – because you and they are making the choice to be there. Help them choose your team.
