9 Reasons Your Team No Longer Want to Work for You

As we come to the end of 2016, and what a year it was, many people will be thinking about 2017 and be will planning their goals for the year ahead. One of these goals could be about finding a new job or changing their career. Given that, according to the research 50 percent of people leave companies because of their bosses, they could be setting that goal because of you!

Here are nine things that you did that will give your best staff good reasons to think about leaving.

You Set Impossible Deadlines

Not only does this overwork your staff but it also causes stress and can lead to burn out, which will make them resent you. As a leader, it's your job to set your staff up for success, and setting impossible deadlines, especially ones that require evening and weekend working doesn't fall into that category.

Take time to discuss and agree on the deadline with your staff as this will build trust and get them to take ownership and increase their accountability.

Your Micro-managed Them

No one likes to be micro-managed. It's number one complaint I hear from staff in companies that I consult for. Not only is it demoralizing but it also has a negative impact on their performance.

Set goals, empower people and then stand back and let them surprise you. It's ok to check on performance and offer your support, but this should only be once or twice per week, not every 1-2 hours!

You Wasted Their Time In Pointless Meetings

Time spent in meetings is lost productive time, especially if the meeting is just information sharing, or not relevant for the people attending. I worked for one boss who liked to hold 4-hour meetings and even if we had little to discuss he would keep us in the meeting because this was his weekly meeting and I think he felt it justified his position.

Those who attended just hated it, and even worse he insisted on no laptops or cell phones so we couldn't do any work in the meeting.

Review all your meetings, be brutal and if they are not needed don't hold them. If it's just informational, then send out the information. If you have to hold the meeting, try to reduce the time by 50%. Your team will appreciate it, and they will be more productive.

You Never Communicated With Them

It' true that knowledge can be power, but it doesn't necessarily mean that you should keep it all to yourself to protect your position. People like to know what's going on; they like to be aware of the bigger picture.

Keep your teams as informed as possible, it builds trust, and it also allows them to make better decisions because they have more understanding.

You Didn't Recognize Their Contribution

Failure to recognize achievements is one of the biggest gripes that people have against their bosses. And what surprises me is that for something which has zero cost, but a lot of return, that many leaders choose not to do it.

When you recognize people, not only is it good for them, but it's also good for you, because what gets recognized gets repeated, and why wouldn't you want people to repeat good work. Recognition is a win-win strategy, and all it takes is for you to say good job, well done.

You Didn't Deal With Poor Performers

As leaders as long as the team is doing well overall it's easy to ignore the poor performance of some of the weaker members of the team. It's no fun to hold people accountable, but when you avoid doing this, it damages the morale of the rest of team as it's your best staff who have to pick up the slack. Now while they may ok with this now and then, it cannot be the norm.

You have to deal with the low performers or that's all that you will be left with.

You Didn't Develop Their Skills

Talented people don't come to work just do a job. They want to be developed. They want to have the opportunity to develop their skills sets move up to the next level. If you don't take care of your best people, they will look for companies and bosses that will.

Even if you have limited training budgets or opportunities for them to grow, you can always offer to mentor them; this is a simple way to help them learn and develop and will also build a bond of loyalty between you.

You Didn't Challenge Them Intellectually

Too many leaders want to be the hero, but to achieve success on a bigger scale you need to develop hero's and one way to do that is to involve them in some of the bigger challenges. You don't have to hand these over 100% you can just ask them to think about it, to come back with suggestions. We need to make sure we don't overburden them, but pushing them and challenging them intellectually will help them grow, as well as stop them from becoming bored.

Your most talented people will often do extra hours for the chance to be involved in something intellectually challenging.

It Was No Fun Working For You

Just because there are tight deadlines, complex projects or difficult customers, that doesn't mean that there should be no fun in the office.

Try to find a way to keep your teams laughing and smiling, find a way to bring some fun into the office. Organize some social events because teams that play together stay together. It's also good for team building and boosting morale9