Using Positive Reinforcement
It's your job to set the right professional behaviors in motion from the start of your relationship with each and every one of your employees. This requires that you not only verbalize what is expected of each one of them in doing their jobs, but that you clearly identify the right behaviors in the practical reality of the fast-paced workplace. In other words, it's your job to instruct members of your staff on the rights and the wrongs of the operating workplace — on the spot and in living color.
Simultaneously, you need to reward your people with positive reinforcement as their job roles unfold and flourish over time. In doing so, you're teaching your employees to behave the “right way” as a rule, and eventually these good behaviors will become second nature to them. Your staff won't have to think twice about whether or not they're doing things right and behaving as business professionals. Aware and assertive coaching can make a huge difference here.
An important coaching technique is positive reinforcement. This entails first identifying the right behaviors in your employees and then rewarding them with positive feedback and other tasty carrots. Positive reinforcement of the right workplace behaviors encourages employees to exhibit these behaviors as a rule and not the exception. Optimally, this is what you want from your people.
We've discussed the many rewards that are used in the business world (bonuses, gifts, and so on), and you can parcel out variations of these to your deserving employees at any time you think it appropriate. However, it is most important that you recognize and note the good behaviors when you see them in action. Positive feedback, or words of thanks and encouragement, is the way to go here in making certain that the positive reinforcement hits its intended target — the particular employee who's performing in a manner that pleases you.
The flip side of the positive reinforcement coin is permitting bad behaviors to go unchallenged. By ignoring any kind of unprofessional behavior in the workplace, you are in essence encouraging it to continue. Maybe that's not your intention, but it's nonetheless the result. And to compound your managerial misery in this area, you are, in practice, rewarding the perpetuators of these bad behaviors. Yes, rewarding them! This is negative reinforcement, which will lead to more and more similar behaviors. Behaviors, by the way, that will guarantee that you won't maximize the performance of your team and achieve the best possible results from them.
Bad behaviors on the job should never be swept under the office rug. Some managers, who take the path of least resistance, reason that, “What's done is done and I can't do anything about it now.” Is that so? When Lenny screws up and you don't say a word about it to him, what do you think is likely to happen next? Lenny's going to screw up again and again. When Sylvia misses her project target date, and you remain mute about it, what do you think is the inevitable consequence? Sylvia will miss her next deadline, and the one after that, and will probably fall way short of her performance targets and goals.
Positive reinforcement can't be overstated, because it's the ball that your employees will run with. True, it is up to your employees to motivate themselves to work hard and reach their full potential. But they've got to be shown the right and proper paths to forward movement, too. And this is where your coaching skills come into play. If you fail to show your employees the right paths to navigate (for growing job skills, job satisfaction, and career advancement), then you've been remiss in your role as coach and leader.
As a coach, you must be particularly attuned to the coachable moments that come your way. These are the times in your coaching when the circumstances are ripe for extracting valuable lessons to impart to your employees. Coachable moments are situational learning opportunities for coaches to pass on to staff members.
When men and women attend Alcoholics Anonymous (AA), they hear the recurring adage, “Only you can help you.” They see it displayed on placards hanging on the walls of meeting rooms, too. But AA is about showing people the ways to quitting drinking, while freely and honestly talking about the right and wrong behaviors that define recovery. Ditto for the workplace and your role as a coach.
You can never retreat from your job responsibilities by claiming that your employees have to help themselves and show initiative and a willingness to learn and grow. They do indeed have to do all those things. But you are empowered to help your employees help themselves. That's what you were hired to do. And that's why you're called a coach.
