Micromanagement - When we micromanage the people we lead, we tell ourselves that we’re helping them stay on track and manage challenging tasks. In reality, we’re creating a recipe for frustrated high achievers who feel a lack of trust and who will switch teams as soon as possible. The people left are those who wait to be told to do every little thing, afraid of acting because they feel you expect perfection.
Reacting with anger and judgment - We tell ourselves, “I’m passionate about this work, and anger or judgment is the appropriate response to this situation. We have to hold people accountable.” But what we get is employees who fear setting you off, so they withhold telling you about their mistakes or offering you the critical feedback you need for making good decisions.
Caring only about the deliverables and not about the team as people - When we do this, we tell ourselves, “I am driven to do great work, and I get great results. I hope my team will be inspired by my hard work.” But instead, your staff feel you don’t care about them, so they don’t care about you or your goals. They believe it’s more important to appear productive than focus on doing the right things.
Not reinforcing positive performance - When we fail to reinforce positive performance, we tell ourselves, “They know what their strengths are. I don’t need to reinforce that for them. Plus, we should be intrinsically motivated.” What do we get? Frustrated employees who feel like their efforts and strengths go unrecognized and lose the motivation to try harder or help their teammates. They may also resent others whose strengths are recognized.
Withholding negative feedback - When we withhold negative feedback from our teammates, we tell ourselves, “I don’t have time for a feedback conversation, so I’ll just fix it for them and wait until their performance review to bring this up.” Your attitude and body language tell them you’re not totally pleased, but they can’t know for sure what they did wrong. They wish you believed in them enough to invest in their learning and growth, and think you’re too passive-aggressive to say what you actually think and have the necessary hard conversations.
Ignoring their suggestions - Your rationale might be, “I don’t have time to consider their suggestion and figure out whether or how it will work. It’s on me to keep folks focused on priorities.” But the danger is, employees who feel ignored will either seek out other ways of pushing their idea forward (e.g., having someone else suggest it, going over your head) or become disengaged from the work.
Not dealing with an underperforming or toxic teammate - We tell ourselves, “That team member is a little hard to deal with, but they have strengths we need. Plus, I’ve talked to them, and they are making small improvements. It’s not that bad. I wish the team wouldn’t take it so personally.” But employees think less of you as a leader for not dealing with the employee who is bringing down the whole team, and they feel hurt that you don’t believe them when they tell you how bad the situation is. They may overreact or take seemingly small transgressions personally because, to them, that small transgression is part of a much larger systemic issue.
As leaders, we can either destroy our teams’ confidence and courage, or we can supercharge it.
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