Time is Money in HR

Did you realize strong time management skills can effect the regulatory and compliance aspects of human resources? In this episode, Pandy shares a page from the workshop "A Big Step; moving from Peer to Supervisor" on how improving time management skills and training supervisors on this competency can eliminate all sorts of HR violations.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00: 0:19

Time management. I know. None of us have enough time. How can you manage something when you don't have enough of it? I, you know, it's funny. Um, and let me let me back up. Thank you so much for listening. We love having you here at the Human Resource. And I have actually this week I was a little torn because I wasn't quite certain what we were going to talk about. Um, we've we've had a number of comments come in, but uh for those of you who were on LinkedIn and see the podcasts occasionally or or me post things in the different groups, um, we just completed a series of classes on the big step, moving from peer to supervisor. And I know that sounds like a very organizational topic. And and I I stay in my wheelhouse. You know me, I don't I don't like deviating from the regulatory and compliance aspects. But when you really think about it, under having an individual move from a peer to an authoritative position, that puts the company at huge risk if we don't have the right person. And this particular uh workshop, and it is a workshop, I mean, it's there wasn't a one, there wasn't a single one that we did that was less than two hours, uh, because there were so many questions and so many different conversations and such. But um new supervisors are are they're raw. They they have so much that they need to learn about employment law and and how their decisions or how their actions affect and and put the company at risk. And I have yet, and again, I've been doing HR for over 44, 45 years, I have yet to find a company that has a very defined and structured training program for this particular level of individual to assure that they totally understand what they're getting into. Here in Ohio, uh, if if a supervisor complicates, denies, or or uh contributes or retaliates to a harassment case or a discrimination case, then they could be held liable. And and let's think about this. The company cannot defend, the the legal counsel for the company cannot defend the company as well as the supervisor. That's coming out of their pocket. And I'm real quick to make sure that they understand that. I mean, do you have uh that kind of cash sitting around that you can pay for your defense when an attorney is going to charge you anywhere from six to eight hundred dollars an hour? And there's no guarantee that you're gonna win. So you might have to pay there the the uh plaint's court costs. I mean, it just so training supervisors is just very, very important to me. And we had such great, we've got great testimonials over that class, peer to supervisor at the big step. But one of the sections in there was on time management and helping these individuals understand that this is very, very important. And so I thought we'd go over just why each of you should be working or at least planning on addressing the whole concept of training for time management when it comes to your management team. And you know, it's not just the newbies. I I've seen senior leadership, I've seen owners who have no sense of time management. But when we break it down into the risks and liabilities that the failure of time management can create, it makes it a little bit easier to digest and explain to a senior group look, I need the money, I need this in the budget to train these individuals and not only time management, but a number of areas. But today, time management. The first thing I want you to think about is understanding the importance of when and where to do things. And what I mean by this is a brand new supervisor needs to understand that urgency and sometimes patience are very important traits. And we don't train people to understand that. We don't train people to have the instincts to know when to charge in and when to back off. But when, as an authoritative person, as someone of a supervisor speaking on behalf of the company, if they're getting a claim of harassment, if someone's coming to them and saying, I feel discriminated against or I feel bullied, and they're not addressing it, there is a major issue there. And when I'm talking about time management, I'm talking about are they waiting till it happens three or four times, or are they managing it on the spot at the time and controlling all that activity? And then are they doing it on the floor and reprimanding individuals or calling individuals out for activities that may not be true? Are they fact-finding, out actually out on the floor conducting a pseudo-investigation, as they might call it, um, not knowing how to do it in a professional manner? It's not something that we put in our orientation checklist for new hires when we promote somebody. I get it. But think about the importance of this. Think about what situations you've already been placed in as HR or as the HR representative that could have been prevented if we had just coached our new supervisor to say, oh, you know what? This is this is the time when you pull them off the floor and you have that conversation with a witness back in another office. Or this is when you start documenting and you ask for a statement, and you do it as soon as they make a comment or they uh come to you with a concern. How about understanding how timing affects the morale and behaviors of the rest of the team? You see, they're probably so busy trying to still be somebody's friend that they may not understand that if they're denying an individual's complaint and saying, oh, come on, buck up. You know, you you know this guy. He just jokes around for the fun of it. He's not bullying you or nah, come on, he just loves pulling pranks and jokes. He's not, he didn't mean any harm. How about just the mere fact that they are not a part of the team anymore? And being able to address that correctly is important and helping them understand how to do that properly. Are we doing it? How about learning the power of managing stress and chaos through time? We can't guarantee any supervisor, young or old, newer old uh veteran, we can't guarantee anyone that there isn't going to be stress on the job. And we can't guarantee that there isn't going to be moments where there just is no right answer. Things are moving at the speed of light. We don't even really know whether we're doing this the right way. We're just trying to get through. And if our new supervisors don't understand to slow down, take a deep breath, and manage the time that they have to be the most productive, we can end up with all sorts of emotion on that workplace. We can end up with all sorts of stories and rumors and gossip and all sorts of chaos that it's gonna take months. And what happens to your good employees when all this is going on? If they don't feel like their supervisor has a good grip on what's going on, that they have control of the floor, they have control of the narrative, that they know what they're doing, you're gonna lose the good ones. They're not gonna stick around. They don't want to be a part of the chaos, they want it to end. They've got enough chaos at home. And and, you know, again, it's something to consider. What situations have you been in or have you witnessed going on in your company that you can back up and go, wow, you know what? He's not dealing with the stress. He's not dealing with the chaos. And we really need to jump in here and help him or her to understand how to control their own emotions, but also control the chaos and the stress. What can they control versus what can't they control? How about proper timing? And I put on here proper timing improves performance and results. The biggest issue on this button is how many of your brand new supervisors who probably haven't been trained on how to do evaluations, reviews, maybe not we maybe we haven't even trained them on one-on-ones, the importance of them, where to have them, how to to what the agenda should be, how to conduct that conversation. Understanding how to manage that and how to fit that into their busy schedule is huge because that will have an effect on the performance of the employees. They will respond if they're getting the feedback, whether it's good or bad. But again, do you want your supervisors to understand? Of course you do. Of course you do. And the more you can help them with the time management of look, if somebody's doing something wrong, we got to talk to them right away. Don't let bad behavior, don't let poor performance go on. That's called enabling. We don't want enablers. Talk to them, manage the time, and and um you'll see good results. And then the last one is probably the most obvious. Time is essentially money. You see, if we can manage our time, if we can learn to be the most efficient at what we do, the company is bound to make better more and and gain more, whether it's in Intel, whether it's in status, whether it's more clients, maybe it's more um Google reviews. But when we're managing our time and being the most productive that we possibly can be, the company overall will benefit. And, you know, I I know there are a lot of people out there who say, oh, you know, the we can't always do everything for the company. What about the little guy? Well, the little guy isn't going to have a job unless we take care of the company. And when the company is doing well, it will give back to the the little guy. And the little guy's not little because you are the company. You're doing the work. You are important. And you know what's crazy is you, the little guy, may be the next supervisor. So time management is a great topic. And it might be something that you have in at a luncheon learn. Maybe you talk to your teen, both veterans as well as the newbies, about how they and what they do in regards to how they manage their time affects the rest of your teeth. You see, I can always tie in regulatory and compliance topics. I I can always do it. Give me anything, and I can pull it back to employment law. Oh. Listen, I hope all of you are having a wonderful holiday season. Thank you so much for supporting us this year. And again, we hope to take care of all your concerns and help you as best we possibly can in the coming year of 2026. Keep your comments coming because that's what we're here for. Here at the Human Resource.