• Do you have high turnover?
• Do you have people who struggle to learn their job?
• Do you have people that are not engaged?
• Do you have people that their attitude is a disruption to the team?

If any of these “People Problems” describe your situation then read on these 4 strategies will change things for you…

Strategy Number 1…

Hire the right people   The best predictor of future performance is a person’s past performance.  Create an interviewing process that looks for evidence of these five “S” words:

Stability (the average tenure is 3.8 years because of buy-outs and acquisitions.  So look for a pattern of leaving a job that is not related to a lay off. )

Skills (find people that already have the skills instead of you teaching them; let their previous employer teach them.)

Success (Look for a pattern of success.  Successful people know their accomplishments, they are competitive, they move up in the career.)

 Salary (Find people whose income is in your salary range.  People taking a step back in salary will only last until they solve this problem.)

Social/Culture Find people with like Values, Attitude and Character (You can’t teach Values, Attitude and Character you have to hire it.)

Strategy Number 2…

Create Systems so ordinary people can do their job.  (Only 20% of people perform at the top.  You can’t hire all 20%ers.  Your most profitable group is the good steady producers in the middle.  This group compared to the top will produce more sales or products and profit…there is so many more of them. Create your systems for them.) 

Strategy Number 3…

Train people to do their job.  (You have one window in time to get people to form the right habits.  It all starts at the beginning.  Some companies call this On-Boarding)

How to train:

• Explain Tell them how to do the job. Let them get their mind around it and understand the reason you do it this way.)
• Example Show them how to do the job.  Let them watch you mistakes and all.
• Examine Practice…you watch them do the job mistakes and all.
• Expect MBO (Management By Objectives) Now that you know they can do the job you have earned the right to expect them to do their job. “What gets measured gets done.” Give them an objective so they will know when they are successful.
• Empower Catch People Doing things right and praise them for it.   Everybody on your team has a need to be appreciated.  Unappreciated people are emotionally disengaged in their work and are unhappy in their job.

Strategy Number 4…

Don’t try people out, develop them … If you have Hired the right people that have evidence in their past performance of the 5S’s, If you have created systems so ordinary people can succeed, If you have trained by Explaining, been the Example, Examined their progress, Expected to achieve their goals, and have Empowered them by letting them know you appreciate them.  Then you can commit to do more than just try them out you can develop them and help them succeed.

In this environment there is only 3 reasons to fire someone.

1. They Lie, Cheat or Steal
2. They are a disruption to the team (Even if they are the top performer…if they are harming other people’s careers they

                   can’t stay.)

3. They won’t do their job … Here are the most common reasons why people won’t do their job:

• They don’t know what their job is. (You think they know but do they?)
• They don’t know how to do their job. (Unless you have properly trained they have all the wrong habits.)
• There is an Inside disruption (People don’t quit their company they quit their manager.)
• There is an outside disruption (divorce, bankruptcy, illness, death in the family).

Mike Duke: President, Recruiting Practice Leader

Mike is a Certified Personnel Consultant and President of Professional Search for Career Development Partners.  Mike is a successful entrepreneur and people developer.

For over twenty years Mike has been bringing positive change to corporate leaders in the area of hiring, training, and developing people. He says, “You can boil any business down to three basic strategies: Products, Profits and People. Out of these, the people strategy is the most important. If you don’t hire the right people, none of the other strategies will work.”

Email: mike@cdpartnersinc.com