Are you empowering others to make better decisions?

I’ve been reading several reports about employee disengagement. The numbers are staggering. Between 60-70% of employees feel unempowered in their current roles. If your business was a car, you would be driving down the road on one tire.  It may as well be a unicycle.

 I thought we might do a check in to see if you still feel empowered as a serving leader. I find many serving leaders are still engaged in their passions and missions, but for an organization to grow and thrive you must be able to connect to the people you manage.

Many of my clients are so busy doing, they miss the writing on the wall. High purpose and growth organizations are not immune to this as they become more mature organizations. Take to look at the following questions and see if any match some of your team members’ behavior. It’s critically important to recognize the signs. Some are easy to see, but others are more subtle in how they appear to managers. This test will you know if your empowering your team?

• Are your people keeping their heads down so they don’t call attention to themselves?
• Do they participate in team meetings?
• Are they still making suggestions for improvement in the organization?
• Are you still getting honest feedback from your team members?
• When was the last time someone made a suggestion that could improve the way you manage and lead?
• Innovation has been replaced by people doing their jobs the same way they’ve been doing them for years?
• People do exactly what they are told to do and no more?
• Are you letting people use their own strengths and life experiences to help build a stronger business?
• Are people living more for the weekends and spend little time discussing and working on work problems?
• When they talk at work they talk about hobbies and other extracurricular activities?

So how did you do? Add up all your yeses to see how empowering your culture is. If your organization has more than three yeses, you may have an organization that is beginning to be less empowering to your fellow team members. If you have a score of five or more yeses, you must begin reengaging your team members.

Never fear, over the next several weeks we begin to share ideas that can help empower your team members to higher levels of connectivity. See you Thursday, when we start helping you help your team become more productive.  Don’t worry, many managers I work with tell me they would like to improve their skills. I will be sharing proven ideas that will help you feel more confident in your ability to manage and lead your team. See you Thursday!