Finding The Boss Balance

5 Ways To Be A Better Boss

Being the boss is a difficult task, you want to find the right balance between employer, mentor, and friend in the office. We’re going to make finding that balance a whole lot easier with the following tips on how to be a better boss:

[success]1. Teams[/success]

Know how to build teams and be there to manage any situations that need a little more encouragement but otherwise, let the team figure things out for themselves. Take notes on how they delegate work, who comes out as a natural leader, and which employees seem to prefer individual work instead of teamwork. That way, you can continue to build groups for larger projects and know how they’ll do. For the employees that enjoy individual work – don’t penalize them, simply give them individual projects – they’ll give you the best results.

[framed_box width=”0″ height=”0″]Related Topic: 5 Hiring Questions to Ask Yourself [/framed_box]

[success]2. Talk the Talk[/success]

We know that you’ve got years of experience under your belt and that you want to seem professional, but toning down the work jargon whenever you can is much appreciated by your employees. It’s not that they don’t know what you mean, it’s just that certain phrases induce automatic cringing like “merger” or “paradigm shift”. Switch it up and keep the language generally relaxed by replacing them with “fusion” or “big change”.

[success]3. Fun[/success]

Everyone loves a fun boss, sure. The kind of boss that buys everyone lunch one day out of the blue or lets everyone off work a half an hour early on a beautiful day. But this can be taken too far way too easily. Example: fictional boss Michael Scott from The Office. He means well, but he’s forcing fun on his employees and at the end of the day well…that’s just not fun.

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[success]4. Be the Boss[/success]

Being nice and easy going is great, but you have to know when to put your foot down too. It’s that fine balance that you’re looking for. So if someone repeatedly takes ‘sick days’ and thinks you’re cool with it, make sure they get the message that they can’t walk all over you by letting them know how many paid sick days they have left and to “feel better”. That way, when they’re actually sick and have to take a day off, they’ll think twice before trying to pull a fast one on the boss in the future.

[success]5. Motivate[/success]

Do your employees want a raise? Probably. But trying to motivate them with money just isn’t the way to go. Really get to know your employees and see what drives them to do better. Then you can motivate their sense of growth, purpose, and competence. Besides, no one likes being lead on to believe they’re going to be getting a raise only to realize it was all empty promises to get results.

[error]What qualities would your ideal boss have? What has been the worst experience you’ve ever had with a boss? Comment below![/error]

photo credit: Kumar Appaiah via photopin cc