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The skill of being able to council staff is an essential skill of a manager, and one that it learnt on all good management courses. As a manager you are primarily responsible for people, the people under you. Know them well. Attempt to understand them and keep an eye open for existing or potential problems.
If a negative change occurs in the behaviour pattern of an employee, particularly one who has recently had a change in their area of responsibility or personal circumstances, there is a need to diagnose the problem and to cure it.
Changes in behaviour may show themselves as perhaps shortage of patience in a normally placid person, the quiet moodiness of a normally gregarious person, or the sudden occurrence of unpunctuality in a normally punctual person.
Before these symptoms evolve into a disruptive influence, it is necessary to have a serious talk with the employee in an attempt to deal with the problem that is troubling them.
Where a situation is obviously wrong, and likely to get progressively worse, you must realise that the positive action to take is to decide to hold a counsel interview and face up to the problem. The problem will not disappear if you ignore it.
Prepare for the interview by trying to find out as much as you can about your employee's background. Arrange a time and place for the interview and give your employee a general idea of what the meeting is about. For the period of the interview ensure that there are no distracting interruptions.
During the interview ask questions and get talking to your employee. Delegates attending management courses find questioning one of the most challenging areas. Some of the answers will already be known to you, but that does not matter. You are looking for the key to unlock and release the real causes of a worsening problem, to get your employee to open up to you.
Once your employee has admitted and revealed that there is a problem, you can start to constructively change the situation. Only after frank discussion can the root causes of the problem be agreed, and agreement is essential to bring about a cure. Without it there is a strong likelihood that it is effects, and not the causes, that are being dealt with.
Any counsel interview must end with mutual agreement, a positive commitment from both sides on the nature of the problem and the fact that a course of action has been established to solve the problem. However, in this type of interview it is much better for your employee to be encouraged to talk, make suggestions and attempt to solve their own problem. This way they will have a far higher degree of commitment to the course of action. You must listen to your employees suggestions for putting the situation right.
Having thoroughly aired the problem and agreed what has to be done, your employee will feel much better. This is partially due to having been allowed to get the problem off their chest, and partially due to being able to see an end to the problem.
Attending professional management courses will further develop your ability to council staff.
Richard Stone (richard.stone@spearhead-training.co.uk) is a Director for Spearhead Training Limited ( http://www.spearhead-training.co.uk/ ) that specialises in running management and sales training courses. Richard provides consultancy advice for numerous world leading companies.
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