Your employees constitute a diverse team of people, with different working habits, personalities, unique skills, as well as talents. Some of them could be early birds while others are night owls, some might procrastinate, while others approach work in a planned manner. To truly leverage the skills of your employees, you’ll need to learn how to manage this large cast of characters, such that they each can shine.
You might not know about all the skills that your employees might have brought with them. By learning how to manage different personalities in the workplace, you help bring out the unique skills of your employees.
You’ll be encouraging them to perform their best, to contribute at work, as well as to work as a team. Your employees bring with them different perspectives, but by managing the different personality types, you ensure that everyone gets heard. How can you do this?
4 Ways To Leverage Each Employee’s Unique Talents
1. Getting to know your team
The key to managing different workplace personalities lies in knowing your team well. You won’t be able to lead them if you don’t know who or what you’re dealing with. When you understand their approach to work, you can better delegate tasks that they’re likely to do well at.
You’ll also find out which of your employees work well together, and which don’t. When you ask two employees who don’t work well together to work on a project. Then they may not be able to get the job done as well as you would like. To avoid such scenarios, you’ll need to know more about the workplace relationships between your employees.
You can conduct a workplace personality assessment, to learn more about your employees. Even an MBTI test can help you learn more about your employees. This assessment can act as a cheat sheet that helps you identify the right employees for the right projects.
2. Playing to the strength of your employees
The benefit of managing employee personalities is that you’re able to understand what the strengths of your employees are. If a certain employee is better at analytical thinking, don’t give them work where they have to creatively brainstorm. If you know a certain employee procrastinates, then don’t ask them to monitor the schedule of the project.
Instead, you should assign tasks that your employees are likely to be good at. Don’t expect all your employees to be good at everything, but instead try to ascertain what they’re likely to excel at.
A lot of businesses in the US still aren’t focusing on the strengths of their employees. To better enable your business to grow, leverage the talents that your employees bring with them.
3. Develop a positive work environment
If you want to find success in managing different personalities at work, then the culture of the workplace should be a positive one. You ideally want your employees to be happy at work and feel as if they’re supported at work. At the same time, you should also emphasize that no one should be disrespectful to one another.
A study was done by the Harvard Business Review that involved over 20,000 employees and a survey. Through the survey, they revealed that employees who felt their employers were respectful, showed greater focus and also prioritized their work more. They also had better health and improved well-being. They were also more likely to engage actively at work.
Give your employees space to voice any concerns that they might have. Your employees should also feel comfortable with bringing their ideas to the table, instead of feeling as if their ideas won’t be accepted. People tend to work better when they feel more positive about their work.
4. Asking questions
You may have found that you have a wide range of workplace personalities to manage. Not only should your employees feel free to ask you questions, but you should also be able to ask them questions as well. Remember to check in with your employees on a regular basis, to find out how they’re doing.
You’ll need to foster emotional intelligence among your employees. During team meetings, devote some time to socializing and networking as well. Be active about making sure that all your employees feel that they can ask any questions that they might have. You can also ask these questions at your team meetings:
- How well the employees are working together
- What the ground rules are, regarding workplace behavior
- How employees can communicate better, and improve their decision-making process
Ask your employees to contribute to solving these problems. That way, you’re likely to find various solutions, and your employees will be more likely to adopt those solutions as well.
Conclusion
When you can manage the different personalities of your employees, you can better leverage their unique talents. You’ll need to assess what your employees are good at, build a positive work environment, encourage your employees to communicate and collaborate, and more.
Use the tips in this guide to make full use of the knowledge and skills that your employees bring to your business.
Read Also:
- These 7 Recruiting Mistakes Are Costing You Top Talent
- How Artificial Intelligence Transforms Talent Acquisition and Management
- How Small Business Can Compete with Business Giants on Talent
Author: Chloe Donian
