SITUATION: As part of the PC&P Management Conference, which I volunteered to present at, we were asked to address a specific work-place issue. I have access to People Survey break-downs, I noted that BHD remained higher than the Civil Service average.
TASK I decided to focus on active listening skills, to empower Managers to have difficult conversations. (Ensure important messages are communicated) This would take the form of an interactive presentation with supporting materials.
ACTION In order to approach this in an enthusiastic manner rather than critical and lose engagement early on, I opened the presentation with the background of us all being workplace coaches regardless of our roles. Focusing on active listening helping us build team trust and wellbeing. (clear purpose) I incorporated a poll to reflect on when Managers in the room had not be listened to and how this makes people feel (using Whiteboard) to share answers, so no focus on a particular situation, but for people to collaborate and reflect on how it makes people feel when they are not listened to (maximise understanding). Giving Managers time to reflect on how they may have felt perhaps when their own management hadn’t listened or responded to their concerns/training needs, is a good starting point for their own leadership skills. (diversity of interests) I then went through the advantages of active listening, using a presentation, and videos, acknowledging the backdrop of a busy organisation (different communication methods) and completing tasks for our time, continually acknowledging the difficulties
they face as Managers. Subsequently moving on to why it is worth taking the time to listen, with a focus on essentially speculating to accumulate with your time, to get to the issue or focus on the development and how this will save time in the long run, either by addressing a behaviour of concern and truly understanding the issue so it has less chance of escalating down the performance route and leading to damaged relationships, or developing someone correctly so they contribute to team performance, thereby reducing piece meal input or complaints/concerns from other team members. (important messages are communicated) Getting Managers to give up their time or make time in their busy schedule even though it can be difficult to see the value in this against demanding workloads. (positivity & enthusiasm, encourage other to do the same)
RESULT Feedback was positive within the session, interaction was good and 95% said they would recommend the session to others, and three requests to deliver it across DWP in learning hours. It will take time to embed within teams so it will need to be assessed again against the scores mentioned at the outset next year. (respecting changes)
