You’re a manager of a team. One person keeps missing deadlines and the quality of their work is poor. You don’t think you can trust them to perform the role.
Unfortunately, sometimes as managers, we come across this situation. The trick is to understand why the person is not performing as required and identify the relevant actions to be taken. What is important is not to judge a person instead to understanding the whole situation.
Throughout my working life in the corporate world, I performed a range of tasks, some of which I did well, and some not so well. This did not mean I failed at my job; it meant I was struggling with that particular task.
All too often we think that, because we did not do a task well, we are not good at our jobs. There are a range of reasons to consider as to why the task did not deliver as expected.
I had a client who said to me she had no idea that she could do what she could do. And yet I heard her say she was doing it when we were chatting about her job and what she did. So often we are too close to what we are doing and saying that we miss the little things that can really take us forward. Or we are so focused and determined about what we know that we miss the bigger, picture. Likewise, we can be thinking so broadly that we forget to look a little deeper and see what it is we are really capable of doing.
A coach is someone who dedicates time to listen to you and will hear what you are saying but do not realise you are saying. You could be having a conversation about your last job. What you did, what you liked or hated about it. What problems you identified and sorted. How you helped other people or maybe kept to yourself. Your coach will hear what you liked and did not like, what you found annoying, what you don’t want to do again, what skills and experience you have, your achievements.
When looking for a promotion or a career change, or to be better at what we do, we tend to focus and what we have just done. We look at the last role we performed or the last job we did.
Most people have had more than one job and completed more than one role. Working with your coach to look at all your roles and jobs and what you liked about them, what you did not like about them, what you have achieved and how you achieved it, you will get a really long list of skills and experience. Your coach will ask probing questions to help you remember more, understand more. Life time achievements are also taken into consideration, like running 5k (determination), getting a qualification (focus), participating in a team sport (team player).
With all these facts you are then able to look at what role you want, what skills you need and what you already have. You don’t lose a skill. It might become a little rusty. With a bit of effort, refresh it will come back.
Reach out, let’s build that picture of you as a skilled experienced person ready to go forward towards your desired outcome.
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