Post Appraisal Blues- The Friday Syndrome

Recently promoted supervisors are often victims of the so-called "The Friday Syndrome". Management promotes them on Friday afternoon and expects them to be effective leaders by Monday morning!

The transition from an employee to a leader is not easy. Employees are often promoted because they are good at the current job. Management assumes that a good employee will make a good supervisor. This is often not the case.

Employees who are good at what they do, often do it instinctively. They do it without thinking about it. It is often difficult for them to explain how they do so to others. They sometimes get impatient when people don't learn or understand as quickly as they do.

New supervisors need training. Unfortunately, it cannot always be provided. Someone has to help them make a good start. In a perfect world, their managers would take the time to do it. Most often they don't. HR can step in to fill the void by giving managers an outline for the discussion. If the manager doesn't take the hint, HR can take the initiative to do so.

Few tips to help the supervisor to get off to a good start:

• Help them choose their priorities carefully. New supervisors often try to fix everything at once. They have to be taught to focus their attention on the most important things first and work on one or two of them at a time.
• Help them focus on the positive. Sometimes new supervisors are so busy trying to make things better, they forget to show their appreciation for people doing things right. Nothing builds credibility faster than a sincere 'Thank you'. New supervisors need to be sure to demonstrate appreciation for people who are doing things right.
• Make them aware to be firm, but fair.
• Help them in learning to get all the employees in the department involved.
  

Most of us get comfortable doing things the way we have always done them. When someone comes along and starts telling us to do them differently, we get defensive. Whenever possible, new supervisors need to give people a chance to contribute to their finding new ways of doing things.

Ref: TheManageMentor