Managers. Do you under-estimate your influence?

Now back to the creative thinking workshop you may be thinking well, the fallout from that wouldn’t be great. The worst consequence may be the waste of money and people no further forward, but there can be far reaching consequences of a mere throw-away remark….

If you’re my age you’ll remember the story of successful high street jeweller Gerald Ratner. For those who don’t, he made a throw away remark about one of his products being ‘total crap’ and his business fell off the edge of a cliff.

Our team will pick up on how we behave:

• if we ever slag off a customer in front of our team
• if we put an individual down in front of colleagues
• if we lose our cool with a supplier
• if we ignore a cleaner
• if we denigrate one of our own products or services

all send a clear message to our team that this is acceptable and sets the tone for our business.

Benjamin Franklin said, “Remember not only to say the right thing in the right place, but far more difficult still, to leave unsaid the wrong thing at the tempting moment.”

It’s important that we understand and model the behaviours that we want to see in our team, and cut out those we don’t, because the way we behave will influence the way our team behaves.

Our values must come first, and demonstrating those values everyday will build our culture. More of that next week.

Do one thing: think back over the last week, have your words and actions had a positive impact on your team?

Thanks for reading.