3) “Increase manager wellbeing by 32% through ongoing manager development
[…] and someone at work actively encourages their development, manager
thriving increases even further to 50%”

This has been the cornerstone of our work for decades. We work with people who are keen to develop professionally and generally they have the support of their bosses.

A key part is recognition of a job well done.

A middle manager been on a course to improve their budget prioritising skills? Give them the recognition they deserve.

Our suggestions:
 
Saying “well done!” is fine. For many of us it can be enough. But let’s take it a step further. Give that team member a chance to apply the new skills in a way that will motivate others to want to do the same.
 
An effective way of doing this is delegation.
 
By delegating new budget responsibilities to your colleague, you will be openly recognising their new skills, motivating them to carry on with their development and encouraging others to look for opportunities to improve their skillset.
 
But be careful, delegation is a tricky area! You need to get it right.
 
 
 
One of the suggestions is teaching managers effective coaching techniques. This can boost manager performance from 20 to 28%.
 
This reflects the views of Bhandarker and Singh in Global Leadership Perspectives. They report that millennials in India prefer their bosses to be coaches and mentors rather than having a hierarchical mindset.

This is something we see increasingly across all generations.
 
If we put this together with HRDrive’s piece ‘3 in 5 employers say soft skills are more important than ever’ and Gallup’s assertion that 44% of managers have had no leadership training, then surely it is easy to see a route into solving falling engagement.

Train leaders how to be effective coaches.

As HR professionals you know you have a critical role in equipping leaders within your organisation with right skills: coaching skills in this case.

​But never assume that the leaders and managers you work alongside know how to coach.
If you’ve never been shown how to coach, then it’s difficult to know what questions to ask.

Imagine what it must be like for a colleague to be told to ‘Be a Coach’ and they have no idea where to start.

With AI, the ‘what’ to ask is easy to find. Yes, there are many books and websites, but now the right prompt can immediately give you a list of questions to suggest. We’ve tried it.

As expected, the list is generic, but refining the prompts will get it to fit your organisation’s profile.

But, as noted above, it will be the soft ‘how’ to ask skills that need more guidance from the experienced professional like yourself.

Let’s be clear. The type of coaching that we expect the line managers in our organisations to do is different to having an external coach.

As a manager-coach, you will have skin in the same game as your coachee. You will be looking to achieve the same organisational goals and it is highly likely that any successes and failures of your team can be attributed to your actions somewhere along the line.

This is a completely different scenario and one we all want to get right.

The cost of recognised coaching courses with certification can be expensive. This is often cited as a reason for not sending people on them. Also, there is a lot of work (rightly!) for colleagues aiming for accreditation.

This is a workload issue that can be off-putting.

However, you can get your colleagues trained to an effective level by

1. using AI for coming up with list of questions
2. looking for books on coaching that take you into the psychology of ‘how’ to be effective
3. setting up your own in-house accreditation

I have found Bob Thomson’s First steps in Coaching a valuable source.

He talks about how to ask questions and notes how important your tone of voice is.

The Complete Handbook of Coaching by Elaine Cox, Tatiana Bachrikova and Daniel Clutterbuck is pretty much what the title says.

They get deep into the details.

Investigate GROW and OSCAR models, Solution-Focused and Person-Centred Approach to coaching amongst others. If you have a coaching background and have found a particular method effective, show your colleagues how to do this.

By exploring these resources, you can help colleagues become good manager-coaches. Without having to go on expensive, time-consuming accredited courses they will see advice such as:

**Build a genuine rapport: This helps the coachee to trust that you will bring your expertise to the situation so that they will benefit.

**Reframing responses: “I’m absolutely rubbish at that!” can be met with “Your high standards and focus on improvement is outstanding”.
 
If you want to get the best from this method, you might like to talk to us about effective in-house training strategies.
​
But the main thing is to react to the report and its suggestions. Get your managers trained to be effective manager-coaches and see your engagement blossom.
 
 
 
Bhandarker and Singh (2018) Global Leadership Perspectives. Sage. P103

​Things like performance review data, new targets, KPIs... your team is expecting important data. They are waiting for you to send it but you have not been given it or maybe you haven't had the permission to release it yet.

Your team nag you and start getting uneasy - understandably.

How much can you nag your boss?
Do you tell  your team what the delay is?
Do you stay loyal to your boss and cover their slowness?

Connecting people and tasks is a regular issue we hear about and help to solve. Communication flow is probably the Number One gripe we get from middle leaders. In particular: when they are waiting to pass on some information to their team, but this hasn’t been released by those higher up.

This raises questions:

Are senior managers holding back for a legitimate reason or are they just being slow?

Are they being slow because they don’t appreciate the urgency, or that they don’t care?

How does the middle leader approach them? Or can they?

What does the middle leader say to their team? Do they criticise the senior leaders? Do they stand up for them? Do they openly empathise with one side or both?

 
A lot depends on the culture of where you work and its different expectations. So have this in mind when we suggest this as a starting point when keeping your team notified:

"I totally understand how frustrating it is for you. I am in the same position. I am in regular contact with the senior team and have let them know that a quick resolution will be appreciated by all of us. They are not being awkward but only want to ensure that the information is accurate."
The important thing here is letting your team know that their criticism has been noted. They are not being ignored.
But what if you believe that your requests are being ignored by your manager?
That's something for next time. Any ideas?
If you want to contribute but prefer to keep it out of your manager's sight, send a PM.

​Middle leaders: not just a conduit but people who can shape the culture of an organisation. From strategic drawing board to frontline application.
Middle managers are often seen as a conduit between C-suite and frontline. But this isn't utilising them enough. The brightest people in the middle can bring a whole new perspective to things.

Understandably, those at the top are required to have a broad, strategic view. It's in the job description. Middle leaders can tease out the intricate details and make them clear to those at the top. This will help senior managers make decisions that will work.
Done properly, it is a perfect jigsaw.
But it can only work if:
senior managers allow and encourage these conversations
middle managers have the trust of the frontline
middle managers have the communication skills to put their case


Sylvia Rohlfer, Abderrahman Hassi and Simon Jebsen point to research that suggesting empowered followers take a more proactive approach to what is happening at work. Bosses who encourage this benefit from team members coming up with things that senior staff might not think of.

A danger I can see is when leaders at any level feel threatened by what might seem to be a loss of control. It goes further.
In Global Leadership Perspectives, Asha Bhandarker and Pritam Singh highlight the evidence that millennials - and, I now suggest Gen-Z employees are looking for their managers to be more like coaches and mentors rather than order-givers.
All this suggests that we are heading for a time when the traditional top-down autocratic approach does not work.
Is this a new role for middle leaders: being the coach and mentor that helps the senior management's strategic message get put into practice?