While this sounds so common sense, it is amazing how many people work with very general instructions from their supervisors. Most people know how to do a job if they have been trained properly, but they rarely know why they do it or what the expected outcome is. Alternatively, many people are told the outcome, but not the process of how to get there.

Being a supervisor today means responsibility for more people than you can truly take care of. I find it typical for people to supervise 30+ people. Under these circumstances, it is even more important that each communication be useful to both parties. That means knowing which information the person needs—process or outcome, or both.

Communicating your expectations clearly takes more time at the beginning, but it saves more time along the way and achieves more positive results. When assigning a job to an employee, use your time efficiently by clearly stating the outcome you desire. The more complex the task, the more important this becomes. However, even simple tasks are often assigned with vague instructions such as, “Get me a copy of the XYZ report when you have time.” The employee doesn’t know whether that means drop everything and do it now, do it by the end of the day, or do it in the next couple days. People generally want to please their supervisors. Give them information to do that.

If you want to achieve consistent results from employees, you must be consistent in your reinforcement. This is the element that takes more time, but has such a big payoff.

When you see people taking actions you want, tell them so. This doesn’t have to be a flowery speech. It can be a simple, “You’re on the right track,” or “Thanks for getting on that project so quickly,” or “Looks like you’ve made that correction we talked about yesterday.” You can also leave a post-it note or send an email.

When people go off-track, get them back on the right path quickly by clarifying your instructions and the outcomes you stated earlier. Make sure they have the resources to get the job done—that means people, knowledge, and tools. Let them know the impact their error has on the product or process so they know why you are correcting them. Give them useful information that will help them succeed, such as “When you don’t get that part sanded smooth enough the first time, it means the next person has to stop and fix it before they can do their part of the process. This causes delays and extra work for others. Please make sure you sand the parts smoothly enough that the next person can fit their part on easily.”

Like Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz who had the power all along to go home if she chose, supervisors do not realize the power they hold in achieving the results they want. The majority of employees want to succeed, but they don’t know what the supervisor is looking for, so they try different things to get attention—sometimes the wrong things. You get consistently right behavior when you ask for what you want, define the details as necessary, and reinforce it when you see it.

When I heard this quote recently while watching the movie, The Polar Express, it hit me how often we fail to get on board in life, in leadership, in commitment to being the best we can be. We often run alongside the train or watch from a far hill, but don’t step up to get on.

What’s keeping you from being the best leader you can be? Is it time? Is it knowledge? Or, is it just old habits that are hard to change?

Frankly, I have found as a manager that it takes less time to lead people to do the right things than to have to correct and push them constantly to do it. Once my staff knew the standards I expected them to achieve, they went after them because they knew I would be watching for them and reward them when they did. People are constantly looking for that ray of sunshine from their bosses but they rarely get it. They usually only get the pushing and shoving when they do something wrong. And, you know, it’s a lot more fun to work in a positive atmosphere than one where the only communication is punishment.

If you don’t think you have the knowledge to be the best leader you can be, that’s easy to fix. There are tons of books on leadership or seminars to attend. And if you don’t have time for that, get books on audiotape or CD. Listen to them on your way to work in your car. It is amazing how much you can absorb just while driving around town. I have had subscriptions to book summaries on tape, which are a pretty good idea to get the basic ideas from the latest books. Then if you want the whole book, you can go buy it or get it from the library.

If you are finding it hard to change old habits, you are in good company. I have found that this is the biggest stumbling block for most people. You manage in ways that you have learned from watching others and what you think works in your workplace. You do it automatically without thinking. To do something different would require you to stop and analyze the situation and then decide how to approach it in the most effective way. You might say things differently or react differently. Often these behaviors seem strange when you first do them and you are afraid that you might look silly or less than competent. Since as leaders we want to look competent, we avoid doing things that make us look incompetent. So, even when you learn a new technique, if it doesn’t work right the first time, you go back to the old way—even though that doesn’t work either. It’s just more comfortable.

However, if you will make the commitment to take the time to learn some new techniques and practice them daily, you will soon discover the real payoff to leadership vs. management. You will build a greater rapport and trust with your employees and more job satisfaction. The measure of your employees’ work is in the results they achieve. The measure of your work as a leader is in helping them achieve it consistently and flawlessly.

“Sometimes the things in this world that are the most real are the things you can’t see.” This quote from The Polar Express summarizes the effort it takes to make the commitment to leadership. You may not notice the subtle changes in your leadership effectiveness from your commitment, but they become more real the longer you do them. And one day, you will look back and say you are thankful you decided to get onboard.

When you set goals you are looking for specific results, but there are often many ways to achieve those results. By focusing only on one set of behaviors, you may be limiting yourself in achieving the results. On the other hand, there will be behaviors that will keep you from achieving the results.

To achieve your goals I believe it is a combination of the what and the how. The what is the result you are trying to achieve and the how is the behavior that will get the right result. You can not do wrong behaviors and expect right results. You can, however, have multiple behaviors that might be acceptable.

When setting goals, I think it is important to talk about the hows as well as the whats. It’s about setting parameters for the hows, not about proscribing them. Provide examples of acceptable and unacceptable behaviors. Then offer freedom to create within those parameters to achieve the results.

Great performance comes from having a goal and knowing what it will take to achieve it; then get feedback along the way as to whether you are on the right path or not. As a leader, it is your job to provide this.

Lencioni says that the three miseries are not caused by the job, but by the way you are treated by management. He pointed out how highly paid executives, sports figures, and celebrities can feel just as miserable in their high-paying jobs as those in a low-paying jobs if these three factors are ignored. In fact, he includes a variety of work examples at the end for illustration beyond the story.

I plan to incorporate these ideas where I can in my coaching and training with management as it reinforces what I have already been espousing, which is that the most important long-term motivators are about more than money. I welcome your thoughts on this.