Check out how managing a team in Singapore is similar to parenting

When I was given the opportunity to run a recruitment team in a Singapore staffing company at the age of 28, I was ecstatic!

I geared myself up to impress my team members and boss with all that I have. I reminded myself that I will not settle anything less than perfection for my team to excel both in the forecasted sales and their positive jibes.

Weeks into my new role, everything that a new manager was afraid to go wrong, I did it successfully. I began to be the spokesman for my team for the wrong reasons.

Whatever they want, I will propose to the management regardless of cost and effect on our business alignment. I wanted to be “Mr. Popular”, challenging my boss so as to showcase my ability to protect my team mates.

Basically, I positioned myself to be the head of a union. I spun different stories and provided different solutions when approached by different team mates for conflicts settlements.

At the end, I was miserable with poor sales and team mates have lost respect for me and they started to go directly to my boss for anything and everything. At that moment, my designation was as important as a typewriter. 

Now, I have 2 children of my own, both boys aged 14 and 7. I began to see a similarity in people management and being a father. Allow me to share some revelations that I have encountered.

Mean what you say and say what you mean

As children, they are gifted with excellent memory thus when you commit something to them, they will hold you accountable till you honor them or else they will cry foul.

Let your word be your bond. Although in the corporate world, only items or issues that are documented and signed off are considered approved and accounted for but many don’t realize that life and death comes from the power of the tongue.

Therefore, should you ever come to any deal agreement with your team mates, ensure that you are clear in what you are committing and have the ability and authority to approve. Never do a lip service, thinking you can buy some time off the situation and hoping that the affected person will forget about the whole event.

Find a Commonality

My younger son, Shane, is very much into throwing his folded paper planes around the house. That is his joy each night after finishing his homework.

As much as I am dead beat after work, I would make sure I spend some time in getting involved in his interest, folding paper planes and testing its aerodynamic.

After 30 minutes of solid play time with him and a home full of paper planes on the floor, I would be able to get him to do almost anything for me, from getting a drink from the refrigerator or a back massage from his pair of little hands.

Shane knows that not only have I put in effort to find commonality with him, I was very much involved in it too. It would be great to show interest in the lives of your team mates, be it their latest purchase , their current family situation or their exotic dinner they had last night.

This shows that you care but this doesn’t mean you try and pry into their private family lives. Space and respect must be given.

There’s a saying : People do not care how much you know until they know how much you care. 

Praise Publicly but Discipline Privately

When my elder boy, Ian, was 5 years old and he was kicking a big fuss in the shopping mall, I didn’t hesitate to discipline him there and then at the toy store. He refused to talk to him the whole night. I become concerned so I sat him on my lap and probed.

After much effort, he pointed to his heart and told me he was hurt and “shy”. What he was trying to tell me was that he was shameful to be shouted and spanked in public.

Always be sensitive when you are approaching a situation where you are going to scream your head off at your team mate for some wrong doing because the devil side of you will always manifest.

You do not want to be a manager where you can hear your team mates whispering to each other with “How’s the weather today? “.

I learnt to bring the person that I wanted to discipline into the meeting room and thrashed out what I need him/her to understand from me.

This session must be on objectives and facts, never about emotion. I can assure you that the affected person will still hold his/her respect for you after the 1-1 meeting. But of course when it comes to praising someone, let it out and loud.

Throw in the joyful emotion! Make sure it gets some attention in the office. It’s free, just do it. Notice the glow in their eyes when praised.

You do not have to act as a parent to your team mates. All you have to do it listen, empathize/discipline, communicate, compromise, agree on it and follow through.

Well, I will end here for now. Its paper plane origami time with Shane again.