How to field employee complaints about new leadership

A friend of mine — Lisa — is a senior director for a $20 million small business.

She was hired a few months ago to bring some discipline and accountability to one of the fastest growing areas of the business: engineering support work for the government.

Not that things were unruly; just that whenever things grow quickly, especially in small businesses, the leadership growth often lags the business growth, causing growth pains. So after making some mistakes and annoying their biggest customer, the company decided to hire Lisa.

After about six months of steadily improving performance, the owner had a meeting with Lisa to give her some feedback (Lisa’s manager was NOT in the meeting). Apparently, the owner had received some comments from Lisa’s subordinates that she was a micromanager and was not open to suggestions from her team.

When Lisa pressed for specific examples, the owner couldn’t give her any. The meeting ended amicably, but left Lisa worried about her job, especially since her direct supervisor never told her that anything was wrong.

This entire scenario is extremely common, and since you may someday hire competent leaders — like Lisa — to improve your business’ performance, here are some things to keep in mind as they start doing their work:


Read the rest at The Business Journals.

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