Managing Challenging People
Posted by Dr. Earl R. Smith II in Executive Coaching, tags: adviser, advisor, advisory board, board of directors, CEO, chairman, coaching, consulting, director, Executive Coaching, Governance, Leadership, leadership assessment, leadership development, leadership styles, Life Coaching, management assessment, Personal Growth, spirituality, turnaround, Turnaround ManagementDr. Earl R. Smith II
DrSmith@Dr-Smith.com
www.Dr-Smith.com
Unfortunately, difficult people are everywhere in today’s workplace. All you have to do is to enter into any company or business and you will notice who they are right away. No matter what your company’s success is or even if they are well known for their friendly employee policies, these seemingly unmanageable and difficult people pose challenges for their executives and team leaders every day.
Whereas some of these employees are just negative or obstinate, a few of these employees are actually angry and some of them may appear apprehensive. Some will even deliberately start up frequent arguments with their fellow co-workers. Still others quietly stonewall and fail to follow through on commitments.
The more severe forms of problematic behaviors are, unfortunately, easier to deal with because they are usually blatant and prohibited as stated in the company’s policy handbook. In these situations, the best course of action for the company is to simply follow company policy procedures and implement the appropriate consequences.
However, before such behaviors are allowed to escalate to such devastating results, the company’s Chairman or CEO should consider retaining the services of an executive corporate coach. Such an executive coach will conduct leadership assessments as well as management assessments and be able to implement a plan of action that would entail both management and employees involvement in producing a less hostile workplace.
In general there are four guidelines that business coaches try to implement when directing executive leaders to manage challenging people effectively.
1. Personal Executive Coaching requires that a coaching client attempts to discover what it is that is causing the employee to be so frustrated and unhappy. This can be easily done by starting a formal conversation with the employee. A good coach will investigate why this employee has shown such inappropriate behavior. Is it because they are feeling overwhelmed with the amount of responsibilities that they have been given? Alternatively, is that they just simply feel that they lack the proper training to perform certain tasks? When a coach meets with the employee, they will try to be as objective and professional as possible – and try to get to the bottom of the issue as quickly as possible.
2. Business coaches will suggest, that if your employee’s problems are definitely work related, management should attempt to address their needs within reason. By doing this not only are you proving your company’s commitment to all the employees by accommodating the needs of this one employee, but you are setting goals for this employee to meet. A good coach will provide the employee with obvious examples of their problematic behavior and suggest alternative ways of acting so the employee can learn exactly what is expected of him in the future.
3. The guidelines of executive business coaching states that the employee should meet regularly with the executive in charge and revisit the issues. Often just observing the situation is sufficient for the employee to improve his actions and words. Business coaches explain that this is not only a great way to manage challenging employees but of managing all the people that are in both your company and in your life. By utilizing this technique, executives are able to open communications with their employees and they then, in turn, will understand what both the Executive and the business expect from them.
4. Business coaches advise executives that if a difficult employee refuses to cooperate and attempt to improve themselves, then, sadly, management should initiate corrective action. Ultimately, this may lead to the dismissal of this problem employee. For that reason, executive business coaching mandates that all executives and managers follow their company’s business policies, document the corrective actions that are taken and conduct proper termination procedures.
Too often some CEOs, Chairmen and other business owners fire an employee under the belief that they have an ‘at-will’ defense, only to discover later on that they are involved in a wrongful termination lawsuit. A person who is challenging in the boardroom is probably going to create challenges in court as they seek retribution after a firing. This might be avoided by hiring an executive coach and following his advice.
© Dr. Earl R. Smith II
~~~~~~~~~~
Related Articles:
-
Reflections of a Coach
-
Benefits of Executive Coaching
-
Team Coaching – Building Value by Unlocking Potential
-
Coaching Benefits – Thinking Strategically About Evolution
-
Succession as a Growth Strategy
-
Corporate Strategic Planning for Coaching Programs
~~~~~~~~~~
Dr. Smith is a proven senior executive, successful entrepreneur, published author and public speaker. He serves on boards of directors and advisory boards or as a strategic adviser to CEOs. Dr. Smith specializes in turnaround management, strategic planning, leadership development and executive coaching. He also works as an executive and/or life coach in the areas of personal growth and spirituality. He is the author of Amazing Pace: Turbo-charged Business Development – a book that shows how Advisory Boards can dramatically increase revenue. Dr. Smith is also the author of Dream Walk: Parables for the Living – a book of Raven Tales and exploration.
Entries (RSS)
This is a good article. But at times, the problematic employee could be re-acting to a situation where poor communication is at fault. If poor communication is at fault and information is not getting through people tend to get stressed and frustrated. . . .which eventually leads to disruption thus impacting business progress.
I was exposed to situation where business progress was thought to be slow because of multiple disruptive employees during meetings. Coaching/Training was provided and rolled out to all members of leadership team by the way of adapting an improved means of communicating. The improved approach to communicating with each other enabled all to identify the emerging “disruptive behaviour” and it provided them with a means to counter act / or respond in a way that would down play or eliminate the negative aspects of the communication style thus enabling all to proceed with the business at hand.
This is an excellent article and can be readily seen in almost any organization. In the Medical Profession, it is now being defined as “disruptive behaviour’.