Four
universal truths about Leadership:
1. Leaders are responsible for the performance of those that they lead.
2. One of the main responsibilities of Scout Leadership is to take action when a volunteer’s performance is not up to par.
3. Confronting a volunteer’s performance problem is one of the most difficult (and also the most avoided) discussions a Leader can have with a volunteer.
4. Many volunteers feel their Leaders micromanage them, pick on them unfairly, or get all over their case for things that really don’t matter. In other words, they feel their Leader is a nag.
So, what is the big gap between a Leader doing what a Leader is supposed to do and the volunteer’s reaction?
It’s often because a leader doesn’t know the differences between legitimate performance issues, bad habits and personal pet peeves.
Often this lack of awareness isn’t just a new leaders issue – you see it just as much with experienced leaders that really should know better.
The best way to illustrate the difference between a performance issue, work habit, and pet peeve is to give a few examples of these
1. Performance issue
This is probably the easiest one to get your head around. Performance issues are the results or outputs of a volunteer’s efforts. It’s what a volunteer is meant to do in the role they have been appointed to. Sometimes it’s measurable, but not always. Some examples:
- Too few kids in the Troop/Pack/Crew
- Too many parent complaints
- Bad (boring) programmes
- Too many complaints from the other volunteers in the unit
Although confronting a volunteer with these kinds of issues can still be challenging, volunteers are less likely to become defensive or take it personally. After all, the issue is the job – not the person.
2. Work habits
Habits are the way a volunteer is fulfilling their role. Although not direct performance outputs, poor habits will impact performance. Some examples are, and I have attempted to correlate these to the performance list above:
- Not following up on recruitment leads
- Being rude to parents and youth
- Not taking the time to prepare adequate and suitable programmes instead dashing them off at work on a Friday afternoon.
- Making inappropriate remarks
When discussing a work habit, you need to take the time to make sure the volunteer understands the clear connection between the behaviour and their performance and the group’s performance and response. “Mark, when you don’t listen to your parents and interrupt them, they feel disrespected, which leads to complaints, which leads to the group loosing kids”.
3. Pet peeves
Pet peeves are those little things a volunteer does that irritate you. Some examples using the same bases are:
- A disorganised Scouter
- deliberately provoking arguments regardless of the sensibility of the objection
- writing emails/programmes while sitting in a meeting
- Making dumb jokes that no one really finds funny
- You say tomaytoe, I say tomawtoe
Some of you probably think the pet peeve list sounds very similar to the work habit list. And in reality, given the role and context, one leader’s pet peeve may be another leader’s legitimate work habit. So how can you distinguish between the two, so you can be sure you’re doing your job as a Leader and not being a nag?
Here are two acid test questions:
1. Can I make a clear connection between the behaviour I am upset by (or lack of) and the performance output?
2. If the behaviour doesn’t stop (or start), are you willing to take progressive disciplinary action, up to and including asking the volunteer to leave as a result of a formal disciplinary?
For example, can you show the effect on the youngster’s development over a year when programmes are planned and when they are scratched together on a Friday afternoon? Probably.
Would you be justified in instituting a disciplinary for the volunteer who refused to plan their programmes? You probably could. Could you make the same connection between volunteers that work on emails/programmes in meetings and those that don’t? Probably not in fact, there might be an inverse correlation in respect of productivity.
However, I know a lot of leaders that would get upset and demand that Scouters do not work on programmes in district meetings even though this activity things have no impact on their outputs and performance. They do it simply because they don’t like it. That’s called nagging at best, or a lack of tolerance. At worst, it’s an obnoxious abuse of power, or discriminatory, that will lead to an unnecessary turnover of talented scouters.
Here’s another non-work related, husband and wife example:
Putting the toilet paper on the “wrong” way (facing up or down, whatever your preference is) is a pet peeve. Leaving the toilet seat up is a work habit. It can lead to a splash in the middle of the night, and ultimately a messy divorce if not corrected.
What about a work habit that’s NOT directly impacting performance? For examples, what about the “toxic scouter” that consistently produces great results but wreaks havoc on the rest of the district team. Or the leader that gets outstanding results but violates the values of the Association. Again, as long as you can show an indirect connection between the behaviour and the organisation’s performance (in these cases, it may be the performance/morale of others), and you are willing to get rid of the volunteer if it doesn’t stop (assuming you have used a progressive discipline process), then it’s perfectly appropriate. In fact, it probably takes more courage to take action in these cases.
1. Leaders are responsible for the performance of those that they lead.
2. One of the main responsibilities of Scout Leadership is to take action when a volunteer’s performance is not up to par.
3. Confronting a volunteer’s performance problem is one of the most difficult (and also the most avoided) discussions a Leader can have with a volunteer.
4. Many volunteers feel their Leaders micromanage them, pick on them unfairly, or get all over their case for things that really don’t matter. In other words, they feel their Leader is a nag.
So, what is the big gap between a Leader doing what a Leader is supposed to do and the volunteer’s reaction?
It’s often because a leader doesn’t know the differences between legitimate performance issues, bad habits and personal pet peeves.
Often this lack of awareness isn’t just a new leaders issue – you see it just as much with experienced leaders that really should know better.
The best way to illustrate the difference between a performance issue, work habit, and pet peeve is to give a few examples of these
1. Performance issue
This is probably the easiest one to get your head around. Performance issues are the results or outputs of a volunteer’s efforts. It’s what a volunteer is meant to do in the role they have been appointed to. Sometimes it’s measurable, but not always. Some examples:
- Too few kids in the Troop/Pack/Crew
- Too many parent complaints
- Bad (boring) programmes
- Too many complaints from the other volunteers in the unit
Although confronting a volunteer with these kinds of issues can still be challenging, volunteers are less likely to become defensive or take it personally. After all, the issue is the job – not the person.
2. Work habits
Habits are the way a volunteer is fulfilling their role. Although not direct performance outputs, poor habits will impact performance. Some examples are, and I have attempted to correlate these to the performance list above:
- Not following up on recruitment leads
- Being rude to parents and youth
- Not taking the time to prepare adequate and suitable programmes instead dashing them off at work on a Friday afternoon.
- Making inappropriate remarks
When discussing a work habit, you need to take the time to make sure the volunteer understands the clear connection between the behaviour and their performance and the group’s performance and response. “Mark, when you don’t listen to your parents and interrupt them, they feel disrespected, which leads to complaints, which leads to the group loosing kids”.
3. Pet peeves
Pet peeves are those little things a volunteer does that irritate you. Some examples using the same bases are:
- A disorganised Scouter
- deliberately provoking arguments regardless of the sensibility of the objection
- writing emails/programmes while sitting in a meeting
- Making dumb jokes that no one really finds funny
- You say tomaytoe, I say tomawtoe
Some of you probably think the pet peeve list sounds very similar to the work habit list. And in reality, given the role and context, one leader’s pet peeve may be another leader’s legitimate work habit. So how can you distinguish between the two, so you can be sure you’re doing your job as a Leader and not being a nag?
Here are two acid test questions:
1. Can I make a clear connection between the behaviour I am upset by (or lack of) and the performance output?
2. If the behaviour doesn’t stop (or start), are you willing to take progressive disciplinary action, up to and including asking the volunteer to leave as a result of a formal disciplinary?
For example, can you show the effect on the youngster’s development over a year when programmes are planned and when they are scratched together on a Friday afternoon? Probably.
Would you be justified in instituting a disciplinary for the volunteer who refused to plan their programmes? You probably could. Could you make the same connection between volunteers that work on emails/programmes in meetings and those that don’t? Probably not in fact, there might be an inverse correlation in respect of productivity.
However, I know a lot of leaders that would get upset and demand that Scouters do not work on programmes in district meetings even though this activity things have no impact on their outputs and performance. They do it simply because they don’t like it. That’s called nagging at best, or a lack of tolerance. At worst, it’s an obnoxious abuse of power, or discriminatory, that will lead to an unnecessary turnover of talented scouters.
Here’s another non-work related, husband and wife example:
Putting the toilet paper on the “wrong” way (facing up or down, whatever your preference is) is a pet peeve. Leaving the toilet seat up is a work habit. It can lead to a splash in the middle of the night, and ultimately a messy divorce if not corrected.
What about a work habit that’s NOT directly impacting performance? For examples, what about the “toxic scouter” that consistently produces great results but wreaks havoc on the rest of the district team. Or the leader that gets outstanding results but violates the values of the Association. Again, as long as you can show an indirect connection between the behaviour and the organisation’s performance (in these cases, it may be the performance/morale of others), and you are willing to get rid of the volunteer if it doesn’t stop (assuming you have used a progressive discipline process), then it’s perfectly appropriate. In fact, it probably takes more courage to take action in these cases.
Managing volunteers performance isn’t an exact science, but
if your follow these guidelines, you stand a better chance of being known as a
“firm but fair” leader instead of the Pointy Haired Boss (PHB).
And you will keep the good scouters and parents on your team and make them
better.
