Remind your team of its past successes. During tough times, people become preoccupied with the difficulties they are facing and the setbacks they’ve experienced. The talk in the hallways and the company cafeteria begins to focus on the big contract that was just lost, rumors of impending layoffs, or the problems created by the latest [...]
Set up a performance monitoring project. Select an important performance area that is not currently tracked (e.g., response time to customers, shipping schedules, quality of service calls). Ask members to give you a rough estimate of their performance in this area, then challenge them to track their performance for one month. Teams often significantly overestimate [...]
4. Take the wind out of the other person’s sails. People often enter into conflict discussions pumped up with a high degree of anger, a defense mechanism against anticipated hostility from the other party. To defuse hostility, send messages that will calm the other person and take the wind out of his sails. Offer the [...]
