Employees need more than just a good pay cheque from a job. So, what do they really want?
Turns out employees care about purpose, conversations, and, most importantly, a good manager. According to Gallup, the manager accounts for 70% of the variance in team engagement.
But nothing sets up for failure faster than a company that says, ”Just manage, will you? It’s not that difficult.” Especially when it’s a first-time manager or someone with limited exposure to responsibility.
You want to do right by your team so that they are engaged and can achieve their goals. That is why you must set clear expectations and communicate effectively to build an agile and resilient workforce.
Let’s break down everything you need to know about setting manager expectations to unlock the full potential of your workforce.
How to Set Manager Expectations
Summarize this article for me pleaseWhy is Setting Manager Expectations Important?
Setting clear expectations in the workplace is extremely important to ensure a sense of purpose, direction, and success.
With clear expectations of goals and key performance metrics, all team members understand what success looks like, which prevents confusion or miscommunication.
Most importantly, it leads to greater accountability, which unlocks a productive and efficient workforce. This ensures that all projects are completed without delay and according to the KPIs set for success.
Summarize this article for me pleaseHow to Set Manager Expectations?
Now that we know that setting manager expectations is important, how do we set them up? Here are four useful tips to help you:
1. Establish clear and specific goals
Start with clear communication to set expectations. The SMART goal framework is a commonly used method for managers to establish clear goals for project management.
But what is a SMART goal?
They are defined as Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-bound. This means that every project goal needs to include what needs to be accomplished, how to track progress, whether it is realistic and attainable, whether it aligns with the individual’s job responsibilities and company objectives, and finally, has a deadline.
A good example of a SMART goal could be to create a training program that reduces time spent on customer service by 10% within 3 months.
2. Communicate clearly with your team
To set clear expectations with your team, skip the jargon and get to the point. Short yet clear instructions can communicate your point better. It helps teams absorb the necessary information to work on their tasks.
You should also ensure consistent updates via meetings, emails, or quick check-ins so everybody stays in the loop.
3. Match expectations with metrics and feedback
However, after establishing goals and communication, the final step of setting expectations is perhaps the most important: connecting expectations to metrics and feedback.
Your team members need to understand how their performance will be evaluated. The metrics need to be objective, measurable, and clearly defined. If possible, incorporate 360-degree evaluation questions from their peers, customers, and you to understand how they performed.
This survey can easily be launched through ClickUp’s Feedback Form Template, which can help create a platform for voicing concerns and opinions. Your team members can gather valuable insight about their work ethic, performance, and social skills through these completely customizable forms equipped with data analysis and insights.
As we’ve established, there’s more to being a manager than delegating tasks. Key takeaways from Camille Fournier’s The Manager’s Path can break it down for you!
Summarize this article for me pleaseTop 10 Expectations of a Good Manager
Now that we have understood how to set manager expectations, we will break down the top 10 expectations of a good manager
1. Effective communication
You need to identify and regulate communication channels for all project discussions. But the truth is that long meetings for project updates can be a waste of time, while communications tend to get missed on different channels, like Slack, email, etc.
Aim to create a comprehensive communication plan that outlines the strategies and objectives for internal and external communication within an organization.
A good plan must include the target audience, types of messages, how to communicate them, and how often to communicate. The more comprehensive the plan is, the better it will be for your project’s success.
Communication plan templates like the ClickUp Communication Plan Template are built with plenty of sections where you get specific about project details, objectives, executive summary, analysis, research, and competitor analysis. It ensures that all important information is on one centralized document.
2. Giving praise & recognition
Underappreciated employees are more likely to get frustrated if they aren’t recognized. In fact, 80% of employees would work harder, maybe even smarter, if appreciated.
It inspires them to perform to the best of their abilities and reinforces desired behavior. This can also help in employee retention and increase revenue and productivity.
3. Fostering strong culture
As a manager, you are responsible for developing a company culture where every teammate feels heard and valued—beyond praise and recognition.
A strong workplace culture is the backbone of any successful business. It can help unite employees, build trust and motivation, and create a unique identity.
But this can be tricky. That’s where ClickUp’s Company Culture Template comes in! It is an easy-to-use, customizable template that can help you visualize and align your team around what matters, prioritize initiatives for cultural growth, and, most importantly, increase unity among teammates.
4. Project management
As a manager (even a first-time manager), you will have multiple projects with various teams under you. It is best to establish processes and systems to make work more organized and efficient for yourself and your team members.
Tools like work plan templates provide specific goals that help you organize, plan, communicate, and prioritize work. They can include sections like project goals and objectives, performance indicators, time frames, resource allocation, etc.
5. Delegating tasks transparently
All team members expect you to delegate tasks effectively for efficient workload management. To plan upcoming projects based on the capacity of your team members every week, you can use ClickUp’s Employee Workload Template.
With this template, you can see how much work is assigned to individual contributors. All employees know what is expected of them, which prevents burnout. Workload monitoring becomes easier through time estimates, sprint points, etc.
This helps to increase efficiency and promote collaboration between departments and teams.
6. Follow through with your commitments
As a manager, you must stick to your promises. Before committing, understand the steps involved and follow through with those steps.
When employees see managers follow through with their commitments, it encourages them to be more engaged and feel more connected to the project and team. When a chain of promises is initiated, it helps to establish trust and credibility, which leads to an organization’s success.
7. Fostering professional growth
Managers significantly influence an employee’s career, and every team member is well aware of it. So, you should actively identify your team’s strengths and weaknesses to assign responsibilities that leverage their capabilities and maximize performance.
With ClickUp’s Career Path Template, you could help team members understand what skills they need to develop to reach their career goals. It could make it easier for you to provide feedback, measure performance etc. Career map templates become a powerful tool to help managers and their team members clearly visualize the progression of their career.
8. Risk management
A manager should be quick and decisive in addressing risks. You could establish a structured approach to identifying and assessing risks and prioritizing effective mitigation strategies. More importantly, you should train every team member to be intuitive and communicate risks proactively.
Templates like ClickUp’s Risk Register Template can help identify risks before they become issues. It could also help you organize risk assessments and track risk status, ownership, and impacts in one place.
9. Leadership
Leadership vs. Management is a long-drawn debate, but no argument exists that a good manager must be a good leader.
Good managers have a vision for the team that can be easily broken down into actionable plans. They think outside the box to find solutions for problems (if any) and can motivate people with the right messaging and delivery so that the vision can be achieved.
A good leader should have integrity to ensure that no employee is treated unfairly and the flexibility to adapt to situations as necessary. Great leadership is a combination of effective team management and practice, and only after this do good managers become great leaders.
10. Respecting boundaries
Your team is your strength, and it’s important to honor their boundaries regarding time, personal matters, and physical space.
Your team members should feel comfortable approaching you with work-related concerns without fearing their personal lives being unnecessarily scrutinized. This helps create a professional space where employees feel valued and respected solely for their contributions.
Most importantly, to be a good manager, you should promote a healthy work-life balance, which enables your team members to recharge outside of work.
Summarize this article for me pleaseHow to Meet Expectations as a Manager?
Being a manager can be daunting, but every team relies on an attentive manager to guide them in achieving organizational goals wholeheartedly. Here are some tips to help keep you sharp and proactive.
- Stay updated: Know the business well. Closely follow the changes in your industry and embrace new innovations that you can use to help your team’s work efficiency
- Put the team first: Determine what best serves your team. Your team will put more faith in your decisions if you consider their needs while making them
- Master time management: Gain insight into deadlines and your team’s capabilities. Plan projects well in advance to avoid last-minute rush
- Enhance those motivational skills: Boost team morale by exploring fresh approaches to inspire them toward achieving collective goals
Summarize this article for me pleaseManage Your Team Better with ClickUp
Being a manager can be overwhelming, as you must manage multiple expectations between your team and upper management to handle projects effectively. Your primary focus as a manager should be developing great team management skills so that you can manage your team and contribute to organizational success.
Hot tip? Familiarize yourself with different tools, techniques, and templates to optimize your responsibilities effectively. ClickUp can be your all-in-one platform to nail communication and project management requirements simultaneously.
Sign up on ClickUp for free and transform how you manage your teams!
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