What Example Are You Setting?

Are you a role model to your employees? If I were to ask them who their role model is, would they say it was you? You sure hope they would!

When you look at yourself in the mirror, do you see a role model?

As the leader in your company, you have the daunting yet wonderful opportunity to create a culture that instills integrity, care, respect, fairness, commitment and fun.

It starts with you and it ends with you.

I had the privilege to set up a call center from scratch. I found the building, I hired the managers and representatives, I delivered leadership training and all the while I role-modeled behavior that I wanted my staff to emulate. The latter was the most important job I had. Every day, I consistently greeted everyone and called them by their name (don’t forget that people love to hear their name!). I talked to the employees throughout the day. I held meetings and shared company results with them. I recognized employees’ exemplary achievements. I wrote personal notes to them if I saw them do something special. It didn’t have to be a huge event. It could have been someone helping a peer, caring for someone who had a personal tragedy, someone who had just had a baby or had just become a grandparent. Whatever the occasion, I made efforts to recognize those employees and let them know that I noticed them and cared about them.

We had training classes filled with new employees. I would always spend several hours with each training class introducing myself and finding out about the class members and specifically why they had joined our company. My relationship with the employees began there but it didn’t stop there. At the end of training, we had a formal graduation ceremony and we even played Pomp and Circumstance at the beginning of the ceremony! We wanted the employees to feel they had accomplished something significant—which they had! This was a way for me to thank them publicly for their accomplishment and to wish them the very best of luck. 

In general, we held recognition events small and large to say “Thank You” for a job well done. It was all about the employee. During, before and after these events, I continued to role model the behaviors I wanted everyone to emulate.

To be a role model you have to believe in being genuine, sincere, fair, respectful and consistent in your actions. The employees will always be watching you.

Yes, whether you think they are or not—they are watching!

They will watch you as you walk through the doors in the morning and see what your body language and facial gestures are. They are watching to see what your mood is that day. They are watching to see how you act and react.

They are always watching.

Consistency is the word. Be consistent with your mood. Always be positive and look at life as the cup half full. Be consistent in your actions and reactions. Be predictable. Be the role model.

You want your employees to say, “Yes, my leader is my role model. I want to be just like them!”

Are you that role model?