Virtually all managers I’ve ever worked with have been far too slow to admit when somebody on their team is starting to underperform. They don’t admit it to themselves, let alone to their bosses or to HR. When I teach management classes, I often ask people to put names in quadrants on the talent management grid. I tell them there are no consequence

Ask each direct report to create a document with three to five columns; title each with the names of the dreams they described in the last conversation. Then, list the skills needed as rows. Show how important each skill is to each dream, and what their level of competency is in that skill. Generally, it will become very obvious what new skills the

But I can’t bear more than about five hours of 1:1 time in my calendar. Listening is hard work, and I don’t have an endless capacity for it every day. So I like to limit myself to five direct reports.

here’s a paradox of being a good boss. Most people prefer the challenging “jerk” to the boss whose “niceness” gets in the way of candor.

Giving space for people to talk about dreams allows bosses to help people find opportunities that can move them in the direction of those dreams. This makes work more satisfying and more meaningful and ultimately improves retention. But retention was the by-product—satisfying, meaningful work and productive relationships with the boss were the prim

He taught every manager on his team to have a succession of three forty-five-minute conversations with each direct report over the course of three to six weeks.

Instead, I learned to focus first on staying centered myself, so that I could build real relationships with each of the people who worked for me. Only when I was centered and my relationships were strong could I fulfill my responsibilities as a manager to guide my team to achieve the best results. Shareholder value is the result. It’s not at the co

Eliminate the phrase “don’t take it personally” from your vocabulary—it’s insulting. Instead, offer to help fix the problem. But don’t pretend it isn’t a problem just to try to make somebody feel better.

When putting the right people in the right roles on your team, you’ll also have to challenge people even more directly than you did with guidance—and in a way that will impact not just their feelings but also their income, their career growth, and their ability to get what they want out of life. Building a team is hard.