In this manual we will review and discuss communication skills, effective orientation and training methods, how to improve productivity for teams, conduct performance appraisals, resolve conflicts, and discuss how to improve employee relations. Once we cover all of these supervisory responsibilities, you will have better know how on what it takes to be an effective supervisor.
Communication is one of the most important roles that a supervisor must know in order to be an effective supervisor. It is one of the most important because a supervisor must know how to guide employees in their job tasks, and while doing so know how to encourage and motive at the same time. How does a supervisor guide and motive his/her team? Well that is simple; communication! When a supervisor understands how to communicate with his/her employees, then guiding them seems to be easy. First one major goal in communication is understanding what employees want and what it will take to motivate them individually while also as a team.
Once a supervisor knows his/her team, then he/she will be able to guide them according to their job titles and duties. Once this has been accomplished, then the supervisor may find ways to make the job a bit more interesting for the employee, who in return shows faith in the supervisor which reflects a light on the whole company.
Another way that a supervisor can demonstrate good communication skills is by being open minded and persuasive.
One of the best ways for a supervisor to be open-minded is to be able to listen to suggestions for the company form the employees. By a supervisor listening to the employees, this shows the employee that they are important while also encouraging the employee to want to work if they are doing something they thought of themselves. As a supervisor one must know how to be persuasive and there are ways of persuading that will be more appealing to the employee, or in other words they will be more apt to be persuaded. A supervisor can be more persuasive to an employee if his/her communication is presented the right way. “Supervisors often have ideas that others oppose. To persuade other people to accept their ideas, supervisors must be able to communicate effectively”(Rue, L. W. , & Byars, L. L. , 2004, chap. 3, p. 2). So we know that if one can guide, motivate, be open-minded, and persuasive, then they will have the understanding of being able to communicate effectively as a supervisor.
Another major task that a supervisor must know how to do and be good at is to know how to do orientation and training. Orientation and training are both apart of a supervisors job in knowing what is best to find the right people for the job, and then to be able to train to the best ability possible. As supervisor it is ones job to be able to have staff work for them to do their job successfully. When a supervisor gets the right staff to do the job, then the supervisor is doing his, and it looks good on him to have great staff. Orientation is where all the elements of the job are covered through test, videos, and a walk around. I believe the first step at orientation should be to first either play a video or verbally discuss how the business came to be, and how it has keep going as long as it has. Discuss the history of the store and what it will take to become a successful employee. Then to show each step of the job, and what they will be doing on their job. After all that is done, then you will proceed to show the employee a hand’s on walk through of the job.
When it comes to training it is best to explain the job, and show how it’s done. “Demonstrate the proper way the work is to be done. Simply telling a person how to do a particular task is usually insufficient. You have to tell and show. How to perform work seems difficult when we merely hear it described — and some work is not easy to describe. Do a little at a time, pausing to point out the components and the key points.
Let the trainee ask questions. Be reasonably certain that a component is fully understood before going on to the next step” (Urbaniak, Feb2004, p. 7). Making sure that the employee fully understands each step, and can perform all the step with no trouble shows a successful orientation and training process!
When a supervisor knows what it takes to successfully improve productivity, the company will have many benefits like higher quality, higher productivity, lower waste, less delays, and happier customers. The first step to improving productivity is to understand the ways to show employees that it will not only benefit the company, but them as well. Most often when employees thing of enhances their work performance, they think that this will involve working harder for the same amount of money. If a supervisor can show by example that work will not be added but altered, and will be more efficient for the employee as well as the customer, they will be more apt to the change. As supervisor you will try to eliminate unnecessary work, and focus on the more productive tasks at hand.
A supervisor goes about improving productivity by evaluating the task at hand, and deciding what can be done to improve that task. Every task at a job can be improved by evaluation and then change. When looking at the current task a supervisor may ask themselves, what part of the task is showing effectiveness and what parts can be eliminated that are meaningless. After this has been accomplished then a supervisor can decide what will enhance the task to improve productivity.
Now that a supervisor knows what can be eliminated, and what can be added, then he/she can implement it into the task. As a supervisor it is important to make sure that the new and improved task is possible so he/she should be an example for the work teams to see that the new task is possible, and more productive. Having done this, you as a supervisor will have successfully accomplished improving productivity, while also make the employees and the customers more satisfied with the change.
One major part of being an effective supervisor is to know how to conduct effective performance appraisals. This is one of the most important tasks to perform as supervisor. “Performance appraisal is a process that involves communicating to an employee how well he or she is performing the job and also, ideally, involves establishing a plan for improvement” (Rue, L. W. , & Byars, L. L. , 2004, chap. 11, p. 2). Without conducting performance appraisals on a regular basis, the employee will not know what areas he/she needs to improve on and productivity for the employee will never enhance.
The first approach to giving a performance appraisal is to evaluate the employee on their job task, what they are and are not doing, and what can be discussed with them to enhance their job performance. It is very important to let the employee know how he/she is doing so that they know where they stand and what areas they may improve on. First a supervisor should complement the employee on the job well done that the employee is performing. This will make the employee fill well about their job, while also encouraging them to enhance their current job performance. The next step is to suggest some ideas to the employee about things in their task that they may be able to improve on.
One way to encourage this is by changing up the tasks a little, so that the employee stays interested in the job. A supervisor could also implement challenges for the employees, and rewards for performance. Most often people are encouraged by challenges that may seem a bit difficult, but possible to accomplish. Meanwhile if you as a supervisor express that the employee’s growth in the company depends on his/her performance, this could encourage the employee’s performance as well. If an employee thinks that his/her performance will depend on his/her growth and rewards in the company, he/she will be more persuaded to do a better job.
Conflicts can cause a lot of problems if they are not identified and resolved. It can cause problems with the entire staff and with the overall progress of the company if just one employee is having a conflict. How does a supervisor identify a conflict with an employee? The first signs that a supervisor can watch for are changes in the employees’ behavior. If the employee seems to be performing slower or more poorly than usual, then most ikely a conflict has occurred. Now that you have identified that there is a problem, then you should know how to confront the employee with help to resolve the conflict.
There are right ways to resolve conflicts and wrong ways and knowing what to do is the biggest step in the process. As supervisor you never want to confront the employee about the issue by informing that you heard what was going on from others. This could cause the employee to fill that the company is talking about him/her behind his/her back, which could make the issue worse.
Never talk about an employee’s issues with other co-work because this can cause un-needed gossip to occur and make the issue worse. Last, supervisors never address the issue and then try to solve it themselves. A supervisor should remember that they are not councilors and that is not in their job description. By trying to help solve the employee’s conflict on your own, you may miss lead the employees by giving wrong advise. After confronting the employee about his/her recent changes at work, and then proceed to offer the proper help for the employee that could guide them back on track at work. If the employee suggests that he/she does not need the help, you may be persuasive by implementing that seeking help may be the only way they can continue to work there. This action may be necessary to get the employee the right steps to help get back on track.
It is very important to make sure that as supervisor all the rules and regulations are understood by all the employees. By having set rules and regulation, employees will know what their limits are. They will know what is acceptable and what is not. Your job as supervisor is to make sure that the employees are reminded on a regular basis what the rules are, what they may are may not be doing to be within the rules and regulations of the company. It is important to be fair and to make sure that the rules and regulations are reinforced by the right disciplinary actions.
By enforcing disciplinary actions to wrong behavior will show all the employees that there is no favoritism to any one employee as well as show that the rules and regulation will be enforced. A supervisor should show that disciplinary actions are for correction not punishment, and this will also be more acceptable by the employees, and most of all be consistent with it. “Whenever possible, maintain consistency in your business’s policies and procedures”(Lewis, 5/19/2008, p. ?). Consistency is so important because you as a supervisor show that you will not bend the rules for any one person, and that the rules will be followed or disciplinary action must be taken. Normal forms of disciplinary action are oral warnings, written warnings, and expulsion.
Expulsion should be a last resort because this could cause more issues to arise with the desired employee, as well as cause the company to be out of a needed employee. The best ways to go about disciplinary actions is to just simply speak with the employee and give a verbal warning, or give a written warning. This will make the employee fill more comfortable with listening to the issue and correcting it, rather than filling as if they are so unimportant that the supervisor could not even discuss the issue prior to expulsion.
We have discussed many things that you as a supervisor must know to be effective in your role as a leader. To review, a supervisor must know how to demonstrate communication skills that involves guiding, motivating, being open-minded, and persuasive. We have also discussed effective ways to do orientation and training methods. You have learned how to improve productivity for teams by explain the importance of productivity and evaluating tasks for change. We have discussed how to conduct performance appraisals and why it’s so important to evaluate the employee and reward by performance.
Resolving conflict was discussed and why it is so important to understand an issue and be able to resolve the conflict with no further problems. Last you have learned how to improve employee relations by fully explaining to each employee what the rules and regulations are, and why it is so important to have rules and regulations. While at the same time make sure that you are consistent with your disciplinary action if needed to be taken. If you as a supervisor can incorporate all that you have learned from this manual into your job performance, you will have become an effective supervisor. Good luck in becoming the best supervisor you can be.
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