enlarge

David Lee

David Lee is founder of HumanNature@Work and an expert on managerial and organizational practices that optimize performance. For a free copy of his report “53 Questions That Can Transform Your Workforce,” e-mail him: David@HumanNatureAtWork.com

'Jurgen," a very bright engineer, descended upon a manufacturing company after his parent company acquired it. While he had great intentions and high aspirations for dramatically increasing the operational efficiency, he was met with fierce resistance. I was asked to come in and find out why.

Meeting with Jurgen, I found him to be very bright, personable and an interesting conversationalist. I liked him. However, his team didn't. They despised him.

As I interviewed both his direct reports and others who worked with him, I was regaled with stories of arrogance, disrespect and intimidation. While he had big hopes of inspiring greater productivity and turning the plant around, his behavior laid the foundation for his failure.

Jurgen was about to self-destruct because -- like many other brilliant (and some not so brilliant) managers -- he was blind to the career-stalling and work force-alienating behaviors he was inflicting on others.

In his new book, "What Got You Here Won't Get You There: How Successful People Become Even More Successful!," executive coach Marshal Goldsmith highlights the 20 behaviors that frequently cause the careers of senior executives and high-level managers to swerve into head-on traffic.

When I read his book -- which is perhaps the best management book I've ever read -- I found myself reacting to most of the items in his list with: "Yep, I've seen that destroy employee morale and commitment time and again," "Oh yeah this is definitely one of the classic things that employees despise."

These 20 behavioral blunders don't just put a screeching halt on a once-meteoric rise to the top, they're also a who's who of sure-fire ways to destroy employee motivation, morale and engagement.

Gallup researchers have found that the majority of employees are basically "doing time." In fact, 55 percent of employees are what Gallup labeled ROAD Warriors -- Retired on Active Duty. Only 26 percent of those surveyed reported being "highly engaged" -- i.e. caring about helping their employer succeed.

Therefore, avoiding the behaviors that lead to disengagement should be on every management team's to-do list.

While Goldsmith identifies 20, I want to focus on the five I see as most damaging when it comes to employee engagement.

NEEDING TO WIN ALL THE TIME

The same drive that leads to high achievement can also destroy relationships and one's effectiveness. Think of people you know who have to win every argument, have to establish their superiority in every discussion and always have to be right. Gets old, doesn't it? One of the challenges high achievers face is knowing when they're winning at the wrong things -- i.e. their "win" is really a loss. What to do about this? When you're poised to pounce and once again land on top, ask: "Is it worth it?"

ADDING TOO MUCH 'VALUE'

When you're really smart and knowledgeable, it's hard not to "tweak" your employees' suggestions so they're even better. However, the overall effect of such "added value" is often a net negative, according to Goldsmith. While your input might increase the value of a direct report's idea by 5 percent, the resulting 50 percent loss of commitment to executing the idea -- because now the idea is yours, not theirs -- is not worth that extra value. Obviously, sometimes your added value is important. Learn to discern when the net value is positive and when it's not.

'LET ME EXPLAIN WHY THAT WON'T WORK'

If you've ever had a boss who had this response as a default position, you know what a motivation destroyer this behavior is. Such wet-blanket responses lead all but the most persistent -- or masochistic -- people to give up bothering to offer their opinions. While the wet-blanket person might think they are demonstrating intellectual superiority by shooting down others' perceptions, others don't...