There are so many factors that slow down a resource ramp up, especially in the situation of middle management. Businesses are cropping up overnight that staff for positions that have no one who came before you and no strategy in place for after you leave. How long did it take you to really get into the groove of things? 3 months? 6 months? Longer? Yeah.. I’ve been there. The problem really does become prevalent in most situations that don’t have a concept of maturing management techniques nor do most young execs have the time to hash out what your process should be because they are busy building the stuff above you.
There are several challenges that prevent smooth transitions:
1 Lack of a traditional business skill-set
2 Lack of the technical knowledge assumed by the position
3 Some form of personal strife external to work which inhibits the growth of the first two.
The first two are easily identifiable given that you have a resource which is open and unafraid in the face of such scrutiny of their core working ability. The third is perhaps a bit harder still to bring to bear in the light of concern for the employee. This must mainly be dealt with passively in the form of proactive management expressing the safety and trust surrounding any need an employee might have to confide and seek help with personal issues. Flyers and handouts on the wall are a great way to foster the surmounting of this communication barrier.
The W5h ( who, what, where, why, when, how ) method is a project management technique which circumvents all of the guesswork that is immediately undertaken by the resource who finds her/himself in a situation where there isn’t adequate direction to expand appropriately into a given role. In situations where you have resources that are wrought with any of the three perils listed above, this will create an immediate sense of connection and clarity about their role and the direction they will need to take their work.
W5h can be described in answering 6 questions in complete detail, no more than a paragraph.
Who are we?
This question is answered by starting out with the name of the role then continued. The answering of this question will elaborate the reason for having the role in the company and give the employee a sense of purpose that will connect them to the whole of the organization. This will also let the employee know their inherent value they provide in doing their job.
What do we do?
Answered correctly, this question will be a very high level of the focus the employee has on their subset of the company’s product or service as it interacts with the real world of business. A well written answer also breaks liberally into how a person in this role regularly goes above and beyond the call of duty in the performance of their job.
When do we do it?
This one is a killer. Here is how you define what the queuing system will be for an employee to begin a certain type of execution on a particular task. This question will also shine a light through all the holes in your own inadequately functioning processes as you have to spell out in detail that your still relying on someone remembering to email someone else about that place you put that thing that time.
This definition provides a comfortable and stable position of reliance that an employee knows when to do the work they have been assigned.
Where do we do it?
Now were getting somewhere, aren’t we? W00t! This section will underscore a few things that cover your company’s WFH policy and can deliver a clear expectation that a company with a lot of consultants on the road are expected to perform in the myriad of hotels, coffee shops and airports. Careful attention must be paid to this that you don’t enslave the people who work from home or the road as there is no clear geographic separation of work and home.
Why do we do it?
This is where most employers simply fall down on the job and forget to offer meaning to the people they ask to trade half of their waking lives to them in exchange for money. This could be the last chance an employer has to make a good impression on a person. This can mean the difference in having a resource who will eventually leave or a team partner for the life of the company. You need to tell them why the company was started, what the founder had in his/her head the very moment they said, “That’s it! I’m going to build my own company!!”. That moment of truth the founder had needs to transcend the conscious plane of the workforce and permeate the identity of the corporate personality. You are providing a dream, a direction, a culture. Live up to the task and give them more than money. Give them something that validates why they share your company, at your company.
How do we do it?
This question can answer a broad range of business etiquette specifications and cover a lead-in to a highly scoped and exacting methodology prescribed by the model of your business or the mandate of your department. Everything that you didn’t cover in the 5 above can be highlighted here as its kind of a universally encompassing form of interrogatory verbiage in one word.
The W5h method can be applied to any team of any scope on any scale in an organization. It will give your compatriots confidence, connection and identity on such a wide range of levels which they can always fall back on should there be any confusion as the business trail blazes on.