Your company’s managers play one of the most significant roles in your business success. According to Gallup, managers account for 70% of variance in employee engagement. Employee engagement affects:

•  Customer loyalty
•  Turnover
•  Retention
•  Revenue
•  Quality
•  Productivity

Despite how important managers are for employee and company success, only 30% of American workers are engaged at work.

Bad managers lead to retention issues for many organizations. Talented employees may resign due to a lack of effective management.

Poor manager leadership can also hurt your recruitment efforts. For companies that want to improve their retention through better management strategies, here are four things effective managers do. You can foster these qualities in your own management workforce, look for these when hiring and identify when it’s time to make a change because your current managers are lacking these qualities.

1. Effective Managers Get to Know Their Teams

The best way to set employees up for success at work is to empower them to use their strengths in their roles. According to Gallup, when employees know and use their strengths, they’re 6x more engaged, have higher performance and are much less likely to leave their company.

Managers should meet one-on-one with whomever they’re managing to learn about:

•  Their professional experience and skillset
•  Their interests
•  What their career goals are
•  How they envision contributing to the team and company
•  Areas they’d like to learn more about and develop

It’s not always easy for employees to identify their strengths. Managers may consider giving their team a strengths finder assessment to spark the conversation.

Then, managers should align team members with roles and duties that play up to their strengths. Your organization will then know what to look for in new hires to fill in the gaps.

2. Effective Managers Support Career Development

As we reported in our career development plan post, a 2021 poll by Monster found 49% of workers expect employers to directly support career growth, but 80% of employees don’t think their employers actually do so. As the direct supervisor of team members, managers can play a vital role in supporting employees’ career growth.

Knowing employees’ strengths, managers can create successful career development plans with the following steps.

1.  Give employees tasks that both use their strengths and support company goals.
2.  Document career goals and progress made.
3.  Provide learning and training opportunities when available.
4.  Regularly check in and evolve plans as necessary.

Keeping track of a career development plan is an easy way to stay connected to employees and build stronger relationships with them. Employees will see that management is invested in their success. They can make better progress in their roles when they have clearly defined goals.

3. Effective Managers Improve Their Emotional Intelligence

Emotional intelligence is a game-changer for leadership. According to Harvard Business School, emotional intelligence accounts for nearly 90% of what distinguishes high performers from peers who have similar knowledge and technical skills.

What is emotional intelligence, exactly? Emotional intelligence is the ability to manage and understand one’s emotions and the emotions of others. It affects a manager’s ability to:

•  Collaborate with others
•  Deliver feedback
•  Coach teams
•  Manage stress

To improve emotional intelligence, managers can take the following steps.

Improve self-awareness

Managers should identify their strengths and weaknesses and evaluate how those affect their team. Managers should ask their own supervisor, peers and direct reports for feedback so they can learn more about how they’re perceived in an organization.

Manage emotions

Managers should think carefully about situations before they react to them. Managers can minimize stress in a work environment by avoiding anger and staying calm in high-stress situations. Managers may want to invest in self-improvement activities outside of work to improve emotion management, like meditation, yoga, journaling or therapy.

Practice empathy

Empathy is the ability to relate to other people and view situations from their perspectives. Managers can practice empathy to improve their social awareness and understanding of how their work environment affects their team. When managers talk with those they manage, they should try to see how certain situations affect them based on their unique points-of-view.

Focus on relationship-building

Great managers do more than manage tasks. They build relationships with people so they can motivate, inspire and lead. Emotional intelligence requires treating people fairly and resolving conflicts to create a more peaceful workplace.

4. Effective Managers Focus on a Vision & Mission

Being a manager means both managing the team, as well as supporting overall company goals. To improve teamwork, collaboration and results, managers should unite a team with a shared vision and mission.

Managers should set clear goals and deliverables so team members know what they’re working toward. They should recognize achievements and spotlight employees who have made significant contributions. Research shows workplace recognition makes employees feel valued for their work and motivates employees, which can increase productivity.

Great managers strive for better results by encouraging innovation, outside-of-the-box ideas and risk-taking. Managers should support career development and entrepreneurial mindsets among employees by giving team members the ability to take on new duties based on their interests.

Be Prepared for Management Issues

Managers in all industries, at all levels, in companies of all sizes are an important part of business success. Management positions are one of the most critical parts of a company.