We did a FOT Webinar with our friends at Halogen Software a week or two ago entitled, "Get My Agent on the Phone - How Smart Managers Position themselves as Career Agents."  You can get the replay of the webinar here.

One of the things we talked about is the biggest key in terms of employees feeling like managers are agents for their career.  It's pretty simple - the best managers include WIIFM in every conversation they have with employees.  WIIFM stands for "What's in it for me?", and the question has to be answered with anything company or job-related you're discussing with your employee.

I can't stress enough how game-changing this is. Most managers want to simply tell someone what they should do - but study after study shows that really blows as a management best practice. If you really want an engaged employee, you've got to include WIIFM into every conversation.

Want examples?  OK - regardless of the conversation you're having with an employee, if you're asking them to to something performance-related, you can emphasize WIIFM by talking about the following:

-How the performance request in question make the employee more valuable

-How it can get them more $$$

-How it can make them better than their peers if executed correctly

-How it chanes how the external world might view them if they nail it

Bottom line - leverage through self-interest sells.  Have you ever thought of a training program for managers to change their world-view to this?  You probably should.

Some slides below - enjoy.