Want to know a fast way to both irritate employees and empower them at the same time? Start referring to both your management and administrative teams as "background employees"! Sounds backwards right? In today’s society, it almost sounds like a demotion at best…a passive-aggressive insult at worst. People get into management, and they expect to be in charge! Even if it’s not the reason they got into leadership, most people have a degree of (justifiable) pride when they get that promotion. Having authority over others is a sign of trust and responsibility. It’s a mark of authority that often shows appreciation for contributions to the company as well.

Background Leadership

One thing I will often refer to is a concept I like to call “background leadership”. Background leadership, as its name implies, is the concept of leading from the rear. The best leaders are the ones who are not only familiar with this concept, but they embrace it in their personal lives as much as they do in their work life. Its best implementation is when managers and administrative staff are encouraged to support and eliminate obstacles for your front-line employees without them consciously realizing it.

Background leadership is one of the most empowering forms of management. There are many managers/supervisors in the business world who try as hard as they can to embrace this daily! They want to make things as easy for their teams as possible. They don’t want to be getting on everyone’s case for sales, KPIs or processes if they don’t absolutely have to. Managers who work with the “background” mindset want to be there to empower the front-line employee so they can give their customer the best experience possible. They want to teach and help those under them to be the best versions of themselves without turning their team into mindless, task-crunching automatons. They want to see their people succeed and they want their team to enjoy what they do. They want to lead from the background!

Getting Feedback

In a previous post, I talked about reflecting on company habits being one of the hardest things for a business to do. Reflecting on personal habits and interactions, though, is just as difficult. It’s hard to ask for feedback from someone who works “under” you! It’s quite humbling to ask a subordinate what they think of you as a supervisor, and it can be rather frustrating too! Some of the time managers will get an answer that, while honest, puts them on the defensive. “Where does Ted come off criticizing me without knowing half the stuff I do for him behind the scenes!” More often than not, though, they’ll get an answer that tells them absolutely nothing. “I appreciate that compliment, Bill, but it doesn’t help me do any better for you.”

From the employees perspective, giving that feedback directly is just as difficult. It’s unnerving at best to give honest feedback to someone who has the authority to terminate your employment…unnerving if not downright terrifying! There are tons of tools available to get those answers anonymously, but they often require some initiative on the employees part to take the time to use said tool. What if there were a third-party that you could bring in to work directly with the employees to get those answers without any fear of retribution? How much would your management team grow knowing the honest criticism in a way that they could work on it rather than getting defensive? How much more would employees be encouraged to provide #kingdomclass service when they know that their concerns are being heard as much as their praises?

Stay Interviews

At Serve BC, we want to empower YOU! Through our anonymous employee stay interviews, you can get this invaluable feedback to grow your management into the background and let your front-line employees shine!