Many organizational leaders don’t spend nearly enough time with their workers. Yes, I know we’re busier than ever but there’s nothing more important than the investment of time you make with your people. I strongly believe that 20 minutes a day with your workers will prove its worth many times over, so let’s get going.
Go. Spend quality time with workers in their environment. Get to know them personally and get dirty with them. As Jack Welch has stated, you have to learn to “wallow with your people.” As leaders, when we spend important time with others, we can find more common ground than uncommon. Spending productive time with workers helps to build rapport, trust, and improves communications. Going to the space where people work is so important and should not be minimized.
Get. We get more when we give more of ourselves. This can never be understated. Meeting with workers on their turf, and getting their perspective is a set-up for sustainable success. Meeting with people in their space allows us to gain respect and obtain greater amounts of unfiltered and objective information about the good and bad regarding safety. About what’s working and not working. About what we need to continue doing and what we need to stop doing. It’s nice to hear “good things” about safety but hearing about the “bad things”, and acting upon them when necessary, allows us to make the greatest gains.
Grow. When we spend quality, face-to-face time with our workers and associates, we ensure the growth of others as safety leaders, safety champions, and safety coaches. Talking about cloning oneself! Engaging workers in safety, listening to them, and providing them with appropriate resources assures that we have safety leaders in places where formal leadership can’t always be – where the work gets done! Formal leaders can’t be everywhere at all times, but growing our workforce as leaders and safety coaches helps to enable greater forms of positive safety change.
What are you waiting for? Invest 20 minutes a day. Go to their space, get them engaged, gain their perspective, and grow your workers as safety coaches and safety champions.