When we have too big of a challenge in front of us, we get overwhelmed and discouraged. When we have too little of a challenge, we get bored and disengage. When we have the right amount of challenge we are turned on and do our best work.
It’s the same for your employees. Too much and they are overwhelmed and give up. Too little and they get bored and stray. And each employee has different abilities in different areas. What overwhelms one is a good challenge for another. As leaders, we need to keep our people engaged by assigning the “goldilocks challenge” for them.
Measuring progress and immediate feedback whenever possible are also crucial especially when employees need an adjustment time to really understand what is expected of them.
I totally agree. It’s important to give people tasks and decision making responsibility up to their level of competency, then building on that base with training and instruction.
I believe one of the great failings of business today, particularly dealing with entry and second level employees is that supervisors don’t adequately evaluate their upside. Consequently people with a significant potential often leave and employees deemed “reliable and competent” are promoted to positions they are not qualified for and then receive little or no training to bring them to that level. While “reliability” is a key factor for a good employee, it does not, by itself, qualify them for promotion, particularly if training is minimal.
Ray McKelvey