Intro:
Being a member of business management can be a big challenge.
Part of the reason for this is that leadership isn’t always intuitive or easy.
The simple fact of the matter is that most humans aren’t naturally well equipped to be effective leaders.
Most humans need to learn leadership skills in order to effectively lead teams to victory.
With that being said, learning to communicate as a manager is a vital part of this process.
This is even more important when you’re leading a team who’s traveling away from home.
Hotel Engine says that “statistics show that in America alone, there will be more than 405 million business-related long-distance trips per year.”
When people travel, they’re already stressed—so being a great communicating manager becomes even more essential in these settings.
So in this blog post, you’re going to learn our 5 favorite manager communication best practices that every manager should know.
Let’s dive into it.
1. Always Be Team-Focused
As a manager, your primary responsibility is to help lead effective teams—and this will require a team-focused mentality.
Working together in a cooperative fashion to accomplish projects is really the winning attitude here.
What you don’t want to do is create an exclusionist environment where people don’t feel like they’re given the proper tools to work together as a team.
2. Be A Servant Leader
Gary Vaynerchuk actually talks about this a lot.
But the function of a leader isn’t just to order people around and force them to care about the outcome.
The goal of a successful leader is to inspire and motivate others and to also provide them with everything they need to succeed.
In other words, being a leader is actually a very service-oriented task.
The leader needs to be at the front of the action. When they see to this appropriately, they’ll set their team up to do the best job possible.
Speaking of being on the front lines…
3. Lead From The Front
As a leader and a manager, it’s in your best interest to lead by example and to lead from the front.
When you have a team of people who you’re responsible for, remember this…
If you can’t be a great example of a team player, then why are you leading?
The simple fact of the matter is that if you want your employees to act and work to a certain standard, then it’s in your best interest to actually legitimately live that standard by example during the day-to-day processes of the business.
This is why true leadership is actually a lot of work! It’s not a ‘luxurious’ position. It’s a huge responsibility.
4. Be Empathetic
Great leaders are empathetic leaders who care about their team.
A lot of leaders adopt this coarse, calloused, “I don’t care” approach to their teams.
But this is very destructive, and it undermines long-term progress.
The truth of the matter is that every person on your team is a human—and has their own concerns, worries, and life situations to think about on top of work.
And as a leader, it’s in your best interest to be as empathetic and as understanding as possible.
This is really what you’ll want to do to equip your team for success.
5. Be Firm, But Kind
As a leader, you really do need to have a firm grasp on boundaries, policies, and procedures.
You can’t just have employees running around willy nilly doing whatever they please.
There has to be some kind of a program and a set of policies that dictate workplace behavior.
And as a leader, you do have to enforce these things.
With that being said, it’s also really important to understand that kindness is the best tool for making this happen.
If you can’t figure out a way to enforce boundaries while also being kind, then you may not be cut out for leadership.
That, or you may need to take a small break and learn these skills so that you can properly execute the next time around.
Conclusion
There you have it.
Our 5 favorite manager communication best practices that everyone in leadership should know and practice.
Being a leader is a big responsibility.
But you can do it!
Now get out there and make it happen.
