Episode 220 - What Supervisors Need to Know, Part II: The ‘Soft’ Skills

Welcome to the Workplace, a podcast by Cal Chamber. I'm Matthew Roberts, Associate General Counsel for Labor and Employment with the California Chamber of Commerce. Welcome back, listeners. In this episode, we will be doing part two of our Supervisor Essentials series. In part one, we discussed, quote unquote, hard compliance and lessons and tools employers can provide to their supervisors to help work towards compliance with various employment laws. If you missed that episode, please give it a listen as our guests provided a wealth of valuable information. In this part, however, we will discuss soft skills that employers can help boost leadership and provide more confidence to our supervisors with the hard compliance skills. To discuss these concepts, Cal Chambers Senior Employment law counsel Erica Barbara and Cal Chambers Employment law subject matter expert Vanessa Green, rejoin us. Good to have you both on again.

Glad to be back, Matt.

Thanks, Matt. I'm really excited about this topic because I used to be an HR consultant, as you know, and this was one of my favorite things to train on was soft skills.

So. And I know with your prior experience as both an attorney and with your human resources consultancy, you've taken to heart that combining soft skills with those hard compliance efforts we talked about in part one is really important. So let's just start with some basics. Can you explain why equal attention should be given to this area of competency?

Yeah, absolutely. It's so important for supervisors to have both the soft skills and the compliance knowledge. When we say soft skills, we're really talking about those interpersonal skills. So things like effective communication and active listening and conflict resolution, those are all really critical leadership skills. So a supervisor might follow every rule in the book from a compliance perspective, but they could still drive away employees and make the workplace awful if they lack these soft skills. So imagine, for example, a supervisor who correctly documents performance issues. They follow every disciplinary step, but the way they deliver feedback is really harsh or dismissive or condescending. Right. Employees are not going to be happy in that environment, and they're probably going to want to leave. And so I've seen situations where really great employees feel undervalued, their morale suffers, and then the workplace has turnover, even though the supervisor technically did everything legally right. From a compliance perspective. So having these strong soft skills, that really helps supervisors not only maintain compliance, but also build trust and retain their employees and create a really positive work environment.

Yeah. Great. And Erica, when we left off part one, we were discussing really the legal requirements for supervisors when they receive harassment complaints or other similar types of complaints for from employees. But something that I find interesting is that there's this big overlap as Vanessa's kind of leading to, with the legal requirements and the soft skills associated with just initiating and having this kind of difficult conversation with our employees about uncomfortable events happening at the workplace. So as you had mentioned in the first part about setting the tone, I think this is a good area to ask what are some good supervisory techniques in this area that you suggest?

Yeah, that's a great question. Because of course understanding the legal requirements is important, but we wanna make sure that our supervis supervisors also have the skills and the training to handle complaints when they come in. So what we're talking about here is, you know, training supervisors to have an open door for the employees that they supervise. If they have an open door. If employees feel like they are available and open to hearing from them, then those employees are going to be more likely to raise concerns. If the employees look at the supervisor and feel like that supervisor is not going to be receptive to me bringing up an issue, they may not raise a complaint and we're not going to find out about conduct that we really do need to be addressing. We also want to train our supervisors to take all complaints seriously. So there can be times where a supervisor is going to get a complaint from an employee and they don't really think it's serious. Or maybe they think the employee is overreacting. But their role is not to judge the person or the complaint that's being made. Their job is to gather information. So we want to make sure that they're not passing judgment on the complaint that's coming in and making a decision about whether this is something that's valid or not. They just need to listen, take it seriously, and elevate that complaint as needed. And one of the ways that they are going to be as effective as possible in responding to complaints is if they're being an active listener. So helping them understand how they can do that. So asking questions, asking follow up questions to get more and more information out of the employee who's coming to them. And thinking about the fact that the employee who's coming to them with a concern about the workplace may be feeling uncomfortable, they may be apprehensive about sharing this information with them. So the more they can be an active listener and help the employee feel comfortable to share that information, the more they're going to be able to get out of them and the more productive this conversation is going to be so they can do things to help the employee feel comfortable, thank them for coming to the supervisor with this concern, assure them that the company will handle this complaint. They will respond to the complaint, remind them that the company retaliation, so they're not going to be retaliated against because they've raised a complaint. And then lastly, making sure supervisors are aware of the confidentiality requirements. And Vanessa touched on this when we were talking in part one. But they need to make sure that they are keeping those complaints as confidential as possible so they're not sharing information with anyone who doesn't have a need to know. There's likely not going to be a reason to share that information with the other supervisors that they work with. Right. They're going to share it with HR and really make sure that they're keeping that complaint as confidential as possible. That also helps employees be more willing to come and raise concerns if they know that those concerns aren't then going to be broadcast to everybody else in their department or on their team.

Yeah, and I really like that active listening component. When I do supervisor training in this area, one thing we'll do is we'll role play a complaint that they might get from their employee. And the first thing I tell them to do is as soon as they recognize something like this is coming in, turn your monitor off, put your phone away, get your notepad out, look them in the eyes and start the conversation. Because you can't honestly be an active listener. And a lot of us have experienced this when we've tried to talk to somebody and they're flipping on their phone or whatever, trying to do two things at once, that kind of defeats the purpose. And so that's something that we talk about. That active listening component is really important. I know Vanessa will get into that here as well, to describe that in more detail. So going back to you, Vanessa, then maybe the most essential job function for supervisors is to manage the performance of the workforce under their supervision to ensure that the needs of the business are met. What kinds of recommendations you have for employers to work on with their supervisors on how they can effectively communicate expectations, as you mentioned in part one, and performance concerns to their employees?

Yeah, that's such a great question. Because I think we're not always thinking from an employer perspective like, does our supervisor have these skills to be able to do this well? Right. So they want to make sure. Employers want to make sure that supervisors are, number one, being direct and specific about expectations around performance. So not saying things that are really vague, like, hey, you need to step it up. Well, what does that mean? You know, that doesn't give the employee a clear path to how they improve. So being really direct and specific with what the performance issues are is important, but it doesn't stop there. Because to tie active listening back in, that is so critical in like every aspect of what a supervisor is doing in the workplace. So when, when we're telling our employees, you know, here's your problems, here's the performance issues, supervisors really want to actively listen and try to understand what is happening with the employee, engage in two way communication so that employees feel heard and engaged with rather than just criticized here. And ways that they can do that, or one of my favorite phrases really that they can use to do this is asking, can you help me understand? Right. So let's say a supervisor has a situation where an employee was supposed to complete some reports by noon on Friday, but they didn't get done. Supervisor, go talk to your employee and say, you know, can you help me understand why the reports were not completed by noon on Friday? Right. And that, and then just actively listen, like, listen to what the employee is saying, because that could really give the supervisor some insight into what's going on. Maybe the employee forgot or maybe they were so overloaded and they have so much on their plate right now that they're really struggling with what to prioritize. And so then that supervisor has the opportunity to come in and really help come up with solutions together, which is part of being a supervisor. Right? It's being a leader, it's being a coach, it's really being that partner to help the employee be successful. And then I think a final thing that supervisors need to think about here is follow up, because follow up is key. And just because we have a conversation about expectations or concerns, that's not a one time event. Supervisors need to circle back, check back in, see how it's going, offer support continually, and really recognize when an employee is improving. And when you're seeing that positive change, tell them, say something, acknowledge them for that. Employees love, absolutely love hearing that positive feedback.

Yeah. And Vanessa, I think I'll stay with you here in this area that we're talking about because something that you've talked with me about in the past and what you really like to promote is something called the coaching mindset. And I really like the analogy in there because as a youth sports coach, I can kind of latch onto this and understand what we're talking about here. I need to maintain control, discipline, keep my kids on task. But I also want them to come back to the team and I want to promote growth and see them excel and succeed. So using this coaching mindset, how do we make maintain this balance in the workplace to meet both our production goals, but then also seeing the growth that we want to see from our employees.

So a coaching mindset, we can really use this as a mental shift. And we're thinking about it from the perspective of we're shifting the supervisor's role from just managing tasks to really developing employees and driving them towards success. And so like a sports coach, like you mentioned, Matt, I mean, I grew up playing sports and. And you were, even if you weren't an athlete. Right. Maybe you were in music, you probably had a coach or a teacher. We all can have people in our past who we can relate to that kind of coached us and really helped us identify things like clear goals. They gave us regular feedback, they gave us motivation, they held us accountable. That's the things that the coaching mindset really focuses on. So it's not this purely directive approach where supervisors shouldn't be coming from a place where they're simply just telling employees what to do. We really want to have that coaching mindset that comes from a place of asking open ended questions, problem solving, really trying to understand what it is that the employee's challenges are and how the supervisor can support them, motivate them, hold them accountable in those situations. And I think coaching also involves recognizing someone's strengths, not just focusing on the areas that they need improvement. So as a supervisor who has a coaching mindset, they're going to really be looking for opportunities not just to coach the employee on improvement, but also to tell the employee like when they're doing things well and to really make them feel valued and supported and to focus on their positive strengths and how do we leverage those better in the workplace? Right. How do we look at the tasks that are being performed, what people's strengths are, and figure out how to leverage their strengths and then maybe fill some of the gaps on where there's some weaknesses. And so I think that's really where we're coming from. We're coming from this perspective of we're a leader. Right. We're a leader. We're not just a rule setter in the workplace.

Yeah. And I think those are wonderful thoughts, especially around this whole area of how do we manage, just manage a workforce beyond just being enforcer of the rules. Erica, we also talked about discipline and termination in the first part of this series. We know that, you know, failing to do this the right way can really make it right for claims. I know it was for me as a plaintiff's counsel and probably for you as a defense counsel, you saw a Lot of the claims for the same reason, but beyond just the document, document, document that Vanessa said last part, it's often the way the message is delivered that exposes an employer to claims. I can tell you, when I was a plaintiff's attorney, everyone came into my office just angry. And the first step was just kind of lowering the temperature in the room. Because as attorneys, we just look at the facts of the law. But. But that's the reason they're in my office. They're angry in the way that they were talked to or the way that the message was presented to them is what really drove them over the edge. So, Erica, what are some ways supervisors can engage in these difficult conversations and discipline determination in both a productive but direct way?

Yeah. Everything that you shared is so true. These are hard conversations, and we need to acknowledge that they're hard conversations both for the supervisor who has to deliver the message or the discipline or the termination, and for the employee who's receiving it. So my first suggestion would be to not go it alone. Right. Supervisors should not be handling this entirely on their own. Partner with human resources. Use HR as a resource, especially if you have concerns about how to deliver a particular discipline or termination message or how the employee is going to react. I like to have HR involved in all discipline and termination for a number of different reasons, but for relevant to what we're talking about right now. HR can really help with the messaging and help guide that it's important to be direct in these kinds of conversations, but also to be empathetic. So we want to clearly explain the reason why the employee is being disciplined or why they're being terminated. Don't sugarcoat it. Don't beat around the bush. Most of the time when an employee is being disciplined or terminated, it's not a surprise for them. They know that there's been an issue. They should know because we should have had some conversations about it previously. But we want to be clear about this is why we're doing what we're doing. Even if it's hard to deliver that message, we need to do that. If not, if we're beating around the bush, if we're giving vague reasons for the action that we're taking, then we've got a situation where an employee doesn't know what's going on. It opens the door for them to create their own story about why they're being disciplined or terminated, and they can decide that it's because of some protected class when in fact there was a legitimate reason for the termination. So really keep the focus on the reason for the action that you're taking and communicate that to the employee. But also be sensitive and respectful of the fact that it may be hard for the employee to hear this message. It may be hard to hear that they're being disciplined or that they're being let go. And we want to be sensitive to that.

You know, by partnering with hr, by looping HR in, we can have a discussion with them ahead of time about what, you know, how to approach this, what kind of messaging do we want to use in that termination meeting or in that discipline meeting so that the supervisor is then better prepared for the meeting or for whatever response the employee may have? It's important also to not to really go into this meeting with a game plan on what you're going to share and how you're going to share it. Supervisors shouldn't enter into a debate with the employee. If employees start to get upset, they start to get mad. The supervisor needs to make sure to keep their cool, stick to the purpose of the meeting, what needs to be communicated, and then wrap it up without it becoming a big issue or letting the employee's emotions take over the meeting and get out of control.

Great. Vanessa. I think you and Erica have really provided a lot of great practical considerations, some training ideas for human resources and ownership, and just ways that we might be able to just change our practices altogether to include these soft skills as part of it. But, Vanessa, something I've wondered about is whether employers should just look for these things in a person already before they make the promotion, or maybe put potential candidates through this kind of training before they fully promote them up to supervisor, that is giving them the tools up front on day one or finding them.

Yes, yes to all of that. I think one thing that I want to say that is so critical is being great at a job does not automatically mean someone will be a great supervisor. But what I see happen, unfortunately, so many times, is that when someone is really good at their individual job performance, they get promoted into a supervisor role. And the employer isn't always considering whether that person has the skills to lead and manage employees effectively. Okay? They're not always thinking about the soft skills. They're just, this person's so great, we're going to make him a supervisor. So yes to everything you said, Matt. Employers really want to first evaluate potential supervisors and look beyond just their technical skills and really assess the leadership qualities that they have. Do they have strong communication skills? Emotional intelligence, the ability to provide constructive feedback to their team? A strong candidate really should Be able to motivate a team and handle conflict professionally, be able to set clear expectations. You know, all those things we just talked about. It's so critical. And one of the best approaches is really to train our new supervisors. Right. You could do this even before they step into a leadership role. If you're kind of have an eye on them and you're thinking you might want to be promoting them in the future, start now. Or if they're new to supervising and they've just stepped into that role, do training now. Right. Or even if they've been a supervisor for a long time. Heck, we can all benefit from training on these skills because it's kind of a lifelong journey. You know, we're always trying to improve our communication. I don't think I know anybody out there who's mastered any of this stuff 100%. So offering those that training is really important. Another thing employers can do before they're going to promote somebody or even at the onset of a promotion is look for like a small leadership opportunity, like leading a project and kind of test that out and try that out and see how it goes with that person that you're wanting to put into a supervisor role. Right. Because then you can kind of have that opportunity to see them in a leadership situation and assess those skills before you just automatically promote them and send them on their way.

Awesome. Well, Vanessa, Erica, again, I want to thank you both for coming onto this show and having this important and really often overlooked discussion. We're so focused on what's the law, how do I avoid claims. And really it's important to recognize how these two things, hard compliance and soft skills, overlap. So thank you again for joining me on this two part series to help employers empower their supervisors and improve their operations.

Thanks for having me, Matt.

Always a pleasure, Matt. Thank you.

And thank you listeners for joining this discussion on the workplace. Again, if you missed part one, go ahead and tune into that one as well. And as always, please share and subscribe to Cal Chamber's podcast by visiting calchamber. Com.