How to Empower Your Employees
Having empowered employees is the dream of every company. An empowered employee is one who can take decisions, in keeping with company’s rules and objectives, on his or her own feet and requires little to no guidance. That however is very difficult to achieve and usually managers are the biggest hurdle to that. Most managers have a tendency to micromanage, which discourages employees to make their own decisions and creates a routine in which employees just come, complete their normal tasks and leave without providing any sort of feedback or suggestion for improvement. Off course, this is something totally unacceptable in today’s corporate culture.
That said, not all manager have poor skills, it is just that they don’t have the requisite training and guidance. In this article we will focus on those areas where managers should concentrate so as to create a more open work environment in which employees have an opportunity to step up.
Instructions
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1
Open the Lines of Communication
Most employees don’t feel the need to give feedback or make decision; because they know whatever they will suggest will eventually become their manager’s suggestion, which means that he or she will take all the credit. The first therefore in empowering your employees is to ensure them that their suggestions, innovations and feedback are exclusive and will be heard at the highest level. -
2
Initiate Incentives
People work for money and as a manager you need to understand that if you deprive them of bonuses and raises for an extended duration, they will stop coming up with ideas. -
3
Encourage Safe Failure In Your Employees
Employees have an in built hesitance and they will be more than comfortable if as a manger, you are constantly getting involves in each decision process, for it makes their job risk free. However, that is not how the managers should operate. Instead, they should inculcate a culture in which employees should take calculated risks and in case there is a failure, they should not be discouraged. -
4
Define Roles
Create a comfort zone for each employee and assign tasks to him or her according to that. That does not mean that you put roadblocks in the path of their job enrichment, but only ensures that employees don’t complain that were assigned something which was not related to their speciality.
