The New One Minute Manager

When it comes to managers, there's the "tough" autocrat and the "nice" democrat. You need both perspectives to be a good manager.

Goals

The goal is to facilitate in helping others to make decisions, not to make the decisions for them. You should show an individual how to do something, not do it for them.

After a while, you shouldn't need to participate as much. Your aim is to build autonomy and self-reliance, which necessitates stepping back.

Goals should be described briefly and clearly. Part of the manager's job is to define what good performance looks like. Ask the employee to review their goals each day, and to look at what they're doing and see if it's in line. If someone's behavior is out of line with their goals, ask them to re-evaluate it so they can realize their goals sooner.

Praisings

Your aim is to show in very specific terms what a person is and isn't doing well. It's a lot easier for someone to do well if they have crystal clear feedback on how they're doing. Feedback is invaluable too—it will help them succeed.

Help people reach their full potential—catch them doing something right.

Praise should happen as soon as possible. When you notice someone doing something right, tell them precisely what it was and how good it made you feel. By specifying exactly what someone is doing, they know you're being sincere. It also shows consistency.

Finally, you should pause to let the other person feel good, make it clear you have confidence in them, and encourage them to do more of the same.

Redirects

The purpose of a redirect is to help someone get back on track and achieve their goals. There's respect and caring behind a redirect.

Let the other person know what the facts of the mistake were and review it together. Be very specific. Then, walk the other person through how you feel about it and its possible impact on the team results.

Give the other person a few moments of quiet time to think about it. Then, remind the other person that you feel they're better than one mistake, you have confidence and trust in them, and you don't expect a repeat.

Sometimes you have to care enough to be tough—that is, tough on the poor performance but not the person.

By reaffirming your value of the person, it makes it easier to not react negatively to the redirect. You want to build confidence in others. When the redirect is over, it's over.

Personally, I like two things about the redirect.

First, it implies a small change. It allows you to not feel authoritarian.
Second, it's a service to the other person. When done right, it can be appreciated.

Explanation

Isn't the "one-minute" thing a little hokey? Can all feedback really be confined to one minute?

Of course not. But it's a way to make a complicated job more manageable.

Feedback is the number one motivator of people. People shouldn't have to wait for their performance reviews to get it.

Also, it's not effective to store up observations of poor behavior. When that happens, people usually end up disagreeing with the facts, or they stay quiet and become resentful.

Punishment doesn't work when someone is learning. All it does is discourage them from stretching. Redirects allow us to change behavior without killing motivation.

If you are first tough on the behavior, and then supportive of the person, it works better.

When our self-concept is under attack, we feel a need to defend ourselves and our actions, even to the extent of distorting the facts.