Conflicts in the team and the leader of the organization. How should a manager act in such situations?
In 2014, I founded true.code. I was enthusiastic, loved my job, and worked at a government company at the same time. I was lucky to meet some like-minded people at the very beginning.
Like any aspiring entrepreneur, I have encountered many difficulties. I could write not just an article but a whole book about my experience of overcoming these difficulties. Today I will tell you about only one aspect – mistakes in team management and ways to correct them. Why is a team not a family or a friendly get-together? I will share my experience and give real examples. You will find two interesting stories from the life of the true.code company.
New managers, take note!
Why does this happen?
Many people who decide to start their own business have no experience in either entrepreneurship or management. And while business processes may be logical, managing people is a unique and specific process.
From childhood we are taught to negotiate, take into account the opinions of others and follow the principles of democracy.
With such a wealth of knowledge, the new entrepreneur begins to manage his first team. However, it turns out that in management, all this does not work.
Spoiler – you need to be a strict and fair leaderready to part with valuable personnel and make difficult decisions.
It should be brought to the foreground their understanding of life values, justice, work processes and the structure of the world.
YOU are the leader of this company, and only you know the path to its success. Your team must trust the leader and share your views on the world. Let's figure out “how it should be” using examples.
Story #1
One day, I decided to implement the Time & Material approach in my work and transfer the accounting of programmers' time spent on tasks to Bitrix. However, people do not always welcome changes: when everything is familiar and convenient, suddenly you have to work in Bitrix, the usefulness of which is not entirely obvious.
What did I encounter? After the introduction of the new rules, no one started tracking time in Bitrix. Employees “forgot”, “protested”, said that it was inconvenient for them, and so on. I spent a lot of time explaining, persuading and demonstrating, but all was in vain. It was a small rebellion of the team against Bitrix and me personally.
Then I decided apply stricter measures: if someone does not track time in Bitrix, they receive a fine. Although I am not a supporter of fine systems and believe that it is enough to simply explain to a smart person why we are doing this, in this case we had to announce a fine.
What did I get? After a month of work, half of the team still hadn't started tracking tasks. I had to call a meeting, open Bitrix on a big screen and announce the amount of the fine to everyone who forgot to track time. The fines were small, about 500 or 1000 rubles, I don't remember.
However, the fact remains: If you ignore your manager's instructions, you may receive a derogatory comment at a planning meeting. Fortunately, after this, everyone started tracking time regularly and responsibly.
At that time, as an inexperienced manager, I faced some difficulties. Now I understand that I would not have allowed such a level of ignoring the tasks set.
I came to the conclusion, that employees should not ignore my instructions. After all, this is a business, and if someone categorically disagrees with its rules, he can leave and find a job in a company where there is no monitoring and the need to learn new things.
If a person ignores your decisions and considers it acceptable not to complete tasks, let him create his own amusement park with blackjack and boats! Ignoring the boss's directions means disagreeing with the leader and not accepting the way the company achieves its goals. Don't allow this behavior to happen in the first place.
Story #2
Around the same time, when I was just starting out, I had a lot of responsibilities. When you start a business, you have to juggle a lot of different roles. One of them is assist with administrative matters. I could choose a suitable computer, help install programs, and so on.
One day a colleague asked me to help her install something. She left her computer on and open for me to do it after her workday.
I logged into her account and started the installation, and at that moment my eyes fell on the open Telegram. There was a conversation in a group where part of my team was, but not me and the other manager. I could say that I didn’t read it, but we are here for honesty and openness, and I read all the conversations in that group.
There they negatively discussed me, work in our company and another manager. This group was created by a former employee and he called on everyone to quit and go freelance because he liked his new job and he had a negative attitude towards me personally. He left in a conflict.
All chat participants were invited to a meeting, and the most dissatisfied and active employees were immediately fired. The remaining participants decided to write a resignation letter before committing another violation. Some of these statements were used, and others are still lying around. If you want resolve the conflict, it is always possible to do this, forget about the problem and continue working.
However, if the conflict is not resolved and you simply try to get a job with us again in a few years, then you should understand that we will not accept into our team a person who acts contrary to our principles and does not admit his mistakes.
Conclusion: no hidden chats, no gossip and discussions of managers and the company behind your back. If you have any questions, feel free to come to us and speak directly. If the problem is not solved, everyone has the right to choose a company, a leader and live in harmony and agreement.
It is now becoming obvious that talking behind our backs should stay outside of true.code. Such people are not suitable for us, and we have no business being on the same team, as our values differ.
True.code working principles (my principles)
We currently identify such candidates early on and reject them from joining our team. If someone does make it through the selection process, we do not hesitate to let them go as soon as the first signs of behavioral problems are detected.
We do not teach people mature communication skills and do not educate them. Everyone must grow up on their own and come to us to work, study and develop in the profession. In addition, there is always an opportunity to find friends and like-minded people.
Conflicts and problems – This is a normal part of life. The main thing is to be able to solve them. If you have any problems, discuss them with your manager. If we can help, we will certainly do so, because good employees are important and necessary for us. However, it may happen that your views contradict the company's goals, and then you need to soberly assess whether they are compatible with your life or not. But no offense or insinuations!
Team – This is the most valuable thing for any company like ours, but it is important to understand that the team is only effective when each of its members supports the company and does not work against it. This is exactly the situation we have now, and now we know how to achieve it!
Once you have selected employees who share your values, the further selection process becomes easier. The work becomes a coordinated team effort, like in a sports team, where everyone plays their role and strives for a common goal, giving their best.
I recommend clearly define your rules, recruit people with similar values to your team, and don’t be afraid to part with those who don’t see you as a leader, because that’s normal. Remember that it’s impossible to please everyone, so Look for people who share your views and are willing to work with you.
Thanks to everyone who read the article to the end!
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