From Observation to Inspiration: How Management by Walking Around Can Drive Employee Engagement
As a leader, being with your team, seeing what they see, experiencing what they experience provides an education unlike anything you can do from an office or in a meeting. In a previous article, Leading by Walking Around: The Power of Appreciating, Recognizing, and Encouraging Your Team, I covered the popular concept of, “managing by walking around”. I received questions about where that came from and wanting to learn more about it. So I am sharing some additional insights into the topic. Observation is the coach of coaching; without it, anything you work with your team in is basically theory. That can be challenging to engage productivity, and will erode trust over time. You have to know (from real experiences) what your team faces in their roles.
Tom Peters began the modern look at the role of leadership and the impact it has on businesses with his groundbreaking book, In Search of Excellence. First published in 1982, Peters and co-author Robert Waterman looked at what made great companies great. Leadership was at the core. Connectedness to the front line was the fuel that made them go. It was forward-thinking at the time, and has proven timeless since. Peters continues that work today and advancing the ideas that leaders, and the engagement they create with their teams, will lead to consistently positive results.
In the book, Peters highlighted management by walking around (MBWA) as a management technique where leaders and managers actively engage with employees by walking around the workplace, being visible, and interacting directly with their team members. This approach allows managers to stay informed about ongoing activities, understand the work environment, build relationships, and provide support.
The idea was to encourage managers to be present on the ground, engaging with employees, listening to their concerns, providing feedback, and understanding the organization from a grassroots level. It's a way to break down hierarchies and promote a more open and communicative work culture.
By implementing MBWA, Peters believed that managers could gain valuable insights into the organization, better address issues, and build a more informed and engaged team. This approach often fosters a sense of connection, employee empowerment, and increased productivity.
Ken Blanchard also used this concept in his book, The One-Minute Manager, and continued to expand on the concept through many of his other books and fables. In the Leadership Pill, he specifically uses the concepts I mentioned in the previous article where recognizing and appreciating employees as individuals versus “just part of the machine” made a huge difference. The subject of that story learned that by connecting with his frontline people he could build a culture centered around trust, respect, and collaboration. It proved successful in improving performance and increased job satisfaction.
You’ll find other references to the concept of managing by walking around in some of Blanchard’s other books, like Gung Ho and Raving Fans. The concept is powerful, and is highlighted in different areas and situations in these other books. You’ll see MBWA woven into nearly everything Blanchard and his co-authors write, these are just some of the more overt examples.
I used Lee Cockerell’s concept of MBWA in the earlier article I mentioned and tied it to the idea of, ARE you leading by walking around. ARE represents, Appreciation, Recognition, and Encouragement. Cockerel mentions these in his book, ’Creating Magic: 10 Common Sense Leadership Strategies from a Life at Disney.’Lee Cockerel is the retired Executive Vice President of Operations for Walk Disney World Resort. In the book, Cockerell emphasizes the importance of recognizing and appreciating employees for their contributions. He notes that when leaders take the time to recognize and appreciate employees, it creates a positive work environment that fosters creativity, collaboration, and a sense of ownership among team members.
There is no doubt that having a connection to your team, where they are, is a critical element of leading a team. It supports better productivity, customer experience, employee satisfaction, and nearly any other metric you can think of. If you cannot see it, you won’t fully understand it. If you don’t understand it, it is difficult, if not impossible, to effectively coach it. Beyond that, it will be challenging to understand the impact you can make in that environment. I know that whenever I am in physical retail locations, working side by side with frontline team members, the eduction is invaluable. It doesn’t take a lot of time to recognize many small opportunities, the ones that are easy to look past, that can make an outsized impact on the lives of the team every day.
How will you continue to build your skills in managing by walking around to support your team?
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