How Many Direct Reports is too Many?

'The Road Less Travelled' (M Scott Peck's bestseller, first published in 1990) dives into the serious work it takes to effectively 'love' someone. M Scott Peck argues love is not just a feeling or something romantic, love is a huge undertaking deserving of careful and proactive thought. In fact, he argues one can only really love a small number of people at any one time.

Sharing your opinion

One of the commitments involved with loving someone is to only share opinions with them after serious and due thought has been given to the situation. In fact, only step in with your view if you are highly confident your opinion is right and certain it will benefit the individual. More often than not, giving your two pennies is an unhelpful contribution towards someone's journey to self-fulfillment.

I think it is interesting to apply this theory to a business. Of course leaders aren't expected to love their employees, but it is not enough for companies to bleet 'we care for our employees!'. There must be deep consideration by those setting the culture and managing others, into what people need and how they are best guided.

So how do organisations ensure they look after their employees? Below are some practical steps that can be taken to demonstrate care for employees.

Leadership time and development

I'd argue that leaders need 40% of time to lead themselves: time to reflect, regulate and re-energise. Secondly, they need a small number of direct reports who they dedicate almost all of their remaining time to. Giving leaders too many people to manage is asking for poor treatment of employees and burnt out, exhausted managers. Set your managers up for success with reasonably sized teams.

Effective feedback

Feedback is a gift but it's pretty much useless, unless it is very carefully given. Feedback needs to be timely, delivered by the right person, forward facing and relevant. To hit all of these points, due time must be taken to pause and consider, is it right to give feedback to this person? How do I do it well?

It can be nerve-wracking to give constructive feedback and having difficult conversations with others is a skill, however a sometimes neglected step is working out if the feedback is actually necessary. Getting this step wrong has catastrophic consequences. So it is important to think carefully: is this feedback relevant? Is it worth it for this individual's growth and essential to meet business goals? Or maybe this person just has a different point of view from you, that needs to be listened to.

Listening

Validating feelings is essential for good emotional health inside and outside of work. Giving people the time to share how they feel and really acknowledging their emotions, rather than getting defensive, is an essential skill that all leaders must hone.

It can be frustrating and scary when you are a manager to acknowledge someone's negative feelings, perhaps it's easier to bury your head in the sand, just do some of the work for them or hope you've misinterpreted the situation. But discussing an employee's mental health openly with them, especially when you think it may be strained right now, is important and essential for the health of the individual and in turn, the organisation.

These are just some examples of how people deserve to be treated. As with the theme of this blog, consideration must be given to what is right to each organisation, each team and each individual. It might not be possible to get it right every time, but with experience and self reflection, hopefully progress can be made in this crucially important space.

#roadlesstravelled #inclusion #hrconsultant #hr #hrthoughts #people #peopleleadership #hunanresources #peoplemanagement #companyculture