You have a mediocre employee who has been under-performing for a while. They are loyal and have some great attributes and have been with you for a long time. What do you do? This is just one type of dilemma that gives a business owner pause when it comes to confronting their employees in a healthy way.
I liken confrontation to exercise. It’s hard to do at first but it gets easier and more natural the more you do it. Regardless, if you are a people pleaser or not, confrontation is hard for people to initiate in a healthy way.
Confrontation done right is a real asset to your business. Confrontation done wrong is disastrous.
Here are 8 characteristics of healthy confrontation. Check them out and ask yourself, as you are reading, how good you are doing in each area.
#1: Healthy confrontation has great people repoire built behind it. If you want people to respond well to feedback, they have to know that you care. That means that you have to connect with them on a consistent basis to build a relationship.
#2: Healthy confrontation is timely. Address problems when they are small. This is obvious yet it’s easy to let things slide until issues start to build up. Hey the quicker you address an issue, the quicker that issue has a chance of being resolved.
#3: Healthy confrontation is about making people on your team right not wrong. No one is perfect or is beyond reproach. I had client recently tell me that they “hate making people on their team wrong.” That’s great because you don’t have to. Confrontation is to close a gap between what should happen and what is happening. You are communicating to find a solution.
#4 Healthy confrontation confronts issues not people. You may have a hard time confronting someone in your business because you don’t want the other person to feel attacked. This is why it’s important to confront the issue that is occurring in your business and not the person.
#5 Healthy confrontation is concise. This point is so important because this is an easy place to lose your power when confronting someone if you are not concise with your message. This means that you stick to one issue. You use facts not feelings. Lastly, you need to be specific about what the issue is. Don’t meander around the topic hoping that the other person picks up on the hint.
#6 Healthy confrontation occurs with a reasonable tone of voice. When was the last time you confronted someone by yelling at them and it turned out well? Never? Me too. Lose you cool and lose the power of great communication.
#7 Healthy confrontation contains a resolution or next steps. Don’t walk away from a confrontational situation without a future game plan for change. This is a complete waste of your time when resolution isn’t achieved. It defeats the purpose of confronting in the first place.
#8 Healthy confrontation includes following up after your initial conversation. Do you want to create impact with your confrontation? Set the tone that you are serious about change by following up with the person you confronted to let them know that you still care about the situation that was confronted. This is also a great way to remind the other person that you also still care about them.
Great confrontation is about coaching people to perform at their highest level. Everyone needs feedback and healthy confrontation allows for two people to get in a gap and create lasting power and resolution to problems. Exercise your confrontation muscles and create great connections with your team.
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