Think you’ve found the perfect employee? Think again. Nobody’s perfect — not your star programmer.

Not even your top sales gal. That’s why you need to focus on building a truly exceptional team of people whose strengths offset each others’ weaknesses.

We see the dynamic over and over again in sports. For instance, a football coach will place a short, quick guy as running back — not on O-line.

This player’s capabilities are in running quickly, catching the ball, and heading straight for the end zone while somebody else bulldozes the other players. Coaches harness their players’ strengths to offset their weaknesses.

Managers — you’re coaches, too. Pair employees with complementary strengths and weaknesses to build exceptional teams that completely dominate.


1. Focus on Strengths
If you fixate on weaknesses, you’ll get bogged down. You hired your team for a reason — everybody’s good at something. Everybody possesses amazing strengths. Let your employees do what they do best.

Your job as a manager should be to encourage growth and skill-building. Give more project ideas to creative-types and more responsibility to the industriously minded. Position these complementary types together for dynamite results.

2. Design Around Weaknesses

Weaknesses are inevitable, and if you’re not prepared for them, you’ll be blindsided. As a manager, you can’t just look the other way. You can’t be a jerk about it either. What you need to do is build structure — fit the job to the people and the people to the job.

For instance, many think of low stress tolerance as a potential weakness. Rather than blaming the employee for inherent personality traits, be constructive. Come at him with only constructive criticism and avoid pointing the finger. Prepare him for pressure-filled situations by keeping him as informed as possible.

3. Provide Snippets of Feedback

Stop waiting for performance review season to provide feedback to your employees. Training — both formal and informal — should be a continuous part of the job. Provide employees access to resources and courses for continuous self improvement. Have a shy employee that you want to groom for a better position? Connect her with a class like Toastmasters to boost her confidence. Continual feedback for improvement benefits everyone.

Always be constructive, and always be future-minded. Your job as a manager should be to give employees the resources that they need to succeed.

4. Lead by Example

…And choose your leaders wisely. Not all managers are good leaders, nor are all good leaders good managers — so make sure that you’re setting a good example in the best possible way that you know how.


Read more: http://cream.hr/blog/how-to-handle-employees-weaknesses/#ixzz2JTr73dkO

Read more: http://cream.hr/blog/how-to-handle-employees-weaknesses/#ixzz2JTqqOVn6