Your Leading Role: Define The Roles Of Your Troops
By Bigg Success Staff
03-05-08
Leadership Skills
We recently wrote an article, 248]. Just like a general leading soldiers into battle, you guide your troops through their daily challenges.
As the leader, your role is to define the roles of your troops. You’ve already communicated your vision of victory to them. Now, your troops need to understand how what they do fits into that vision.
Novice leaders often relegate duties willy-nilly. Established leaders delegate responsibility, and accountability, for achieving clearly established goals.
6 things your troops need to understand about their roles
Duties
Every person in your command needs to understand exactly what they are expected to do and by when they need to do it. Break their tasks down so they clearly know their responsibilities.
Procedures
You have developed proven ways to accomplish each task efficiently. Outline that procedure for your troops so they don’t have to learn it on their own. Of course, you will always be testing new ways to do things even better, but you have to give them a launching point.
Resources
Let your troops know where they can get help when they have questions. Depending on the nature of the question, it may be general help or something specific to their job. You may develop a page of frequently asked questions or have a page that shows who to contact for questions on a variety of subjects.
Expected results
Your troops also need to understand the exact outcome you expect. Just providing them with a list of duties won’t inspire them to action – agreeing to specific accomplishments with target dates will, if you have the right person in the job.
Evaluation
Let each of your troops know when their performance will be assessed and the standards upon which they will be judged.
Show them upfront any forms you may use to appraise their performance. Help them understand how you will measure results. Your troops will appreciate this forthrightness and objectivity.
Rewards
You can’t motivate your troops; that has to come from within. But you can inspire them by giving them a valued prize for success. And it doesn’t necessarily have to be financial.
Some of your troops may prefer something else – like an extra day off. If you can customize the reward without being unfair to the rest of your troops, do it! You’ll reap the rewards!
With these things done, you can put together a Position Manual for every position in your charge. We’ve detailed it here for entry level positions. As you move up in the organization, your Position Manuals should focus more on results, and less on methods.
By clearly delineating roles, you’ll show your troops you trust them to achieve your vision. Of course, you’ll check up on them from time to time. But the hard work is done – everyone in your organization knows what they need to accomplish!
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(Image by Thiru Murugan, CC 2.0)
