Work Place Psychology!

A very big subject, I will never stop learning in this broad and very important field.
When I read articles or abstracts regarding psychology always interested in the conclusion, I check where it applies in my field and work on using it.
My best recommendation read lots of books, on the subject and never stop learning.
Here are a few principles to follow that will help manage the environment one lives in.
Keep attendance look back always what is your rate of absenteeism and drop out, it directly correlates with job satisfaction.
Job satisfaction the most important, we spend more time at work than at home! Sad but true, we work and live with people that we did not choose but circumstance dictates we must work with and spend time with.
Manners help us deal with this stress, always work on one’s language structure.
I have seen young men spend all day on the job talking how they would like to quit, hate it, do other things after a scolding from their supervisor.
Where a request or plea would have corrected the action and one would have a helping young man that will try better on the job.
When one wish’s to engage in management issues that deal with personal matters, best never sit across from them on a desk, or be standing while they are sitting. Communicate at eye level.
A typical is when I started to work for cabinet company as young man and the owner in his office across a big desk and tells me, “My office is always open to you”. In the years that I worked for the company never seen a worker once enter his office.
Another instance which actually convinced me the way industry deals with labor is not sustainable and healthy. When reviewing contracts between car manufactures and union regarding time management. Completely adversarial!
None of the above scenarios create an effective long-lasting work environment for industry and employee.
Take another example that my professor brought up, multinational Japanese steel conglomerate executive visiting a Canadian steel fabrication plant. In the walk through the plant notices machinist work bench is dirty, out come the coverall he cleans it!
Privately held businesses owner always says I built this! Yes, the owner did! As soon as he/she has employees, the employees also make the business and build it for you! That makes the owner or manager "the leader"!
The problem comes when labor is looked at as expendable. Just get a new guy! When union just get another guy from union hall.
With management attitude like this there is no continuity for the labor! So one can not expect loyalty from employees to go the extra mile. More importantly to emotional care about their work or product! That simple fact to get the worker emotionally engaged in the product and company is all that it is about! The key to quality control, efficiency, productivity and customer satisfaction!
To manage and retain employees one needs a  feed back system, does not need to be labeled as such, but a way of monitoring that it integrates into the work flow and  yes involve the work force in the decisions!
For those who read business management articles what I described is bottom up management versus top down management. Especially construction is very much top down management. What is better? Well take a look at the economies of German, Japanese they are generally bottom up management techniques.
How to make this work you need my help for not that easy! What I described are very simplified situations!
One point I would like to teach in this section, some very basic positive communication skills, and yes everyone needs to practice, even myself.
When I used to teach leadership, would start the class with the simple question, how do you help people, the hands would fly up and first thing that comes out is! You tell them what to do!
The perception of leadership in our society is by telling another person what to do, arises from exposure to media, from when one wakes up to going to sleep. We are under a constant barrage of how to think, what we need, and what to like!
The reality is leadership can take on many different forms to broad to go into detail here.
But one can starts is with positive communication.
Practice rules.

  1. Avoid using the word no, it is a negative comment!
  2. If one needs to change something that a person is doing, make at least two positive comments about their actions, then suggest the correction, then list the reasons why one needs the corrections.
  3. If a person is doing something different than you anticipated, step back listen and physically help the person, even if it goes a different pathway. When working with them and they get stuck because of the direction they choose show them a better way! Like the saying goes “there are many ways to bake a pie, but only one is the right one.” One always ends up with pie at the end!
  4. Never correct or try conflict resolution in front of team, or public.
  5. If one needs to correct behavior or technique in public always address the team, never pick out individual for good or bad reasons, unless one wishes to be thank full for help.
  6. One can never say often enough!                                                                                                                  Good job! Thank you! You did really good today! Awesome!
  7. If one is frustrated with the individual one is working with think of many good points the person has, before trying to correct one.
  8. Let the person you are dealing with know the good points they have!
  9. Review in morning before you start work and at end of day, what one needs to fix about one’s communication technique!

Practice! Practice!
This is just a very short version of positive communications techniques.

As a manager if one wishes to engage the employees get out in the field work with them! Best advice I can give! No scolding, derogatory remarks, no showing off. Just simple do the physical labor job. Do it not just for 5 minutes, work for a while. If one has supervisors listen to them it’s their department.
If one is running around in office clothing, for the job site one should always have coveralls and boots handy.
I shun the office in today’s world my contacts are on my phone my reminders are on my phone reports can be typed in on the phone. My laptop does both the drafting and data keeping and with cloud service everything stays updated. Multi-tasking and working in the field is the norm.
Studies have shown if the brain is really working physical exercise is beneficial gets rid of the stress.
The action is on the job site, the office is for selling, looking good and collections!