Bev Kaye, author of Love 'Em or Lose 'Em, explains why good employees stay. The most common reason people leave is a bad manager. Kaye offers 26 strategies grouped into Development & Growth, Relationships, and Culture, and suggests managers ask each employee which three actions could improve to keep them.
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You're listening to the Proteus Leader Show with Erika Andersen, where you'll get practical tools and insights for leading, managing, and staying ready for the future. Erika is the founding partner of Proteus, a firm that focuses uniquely on leader readiness. A nationally known executive coach and bestselling author, you may already know her as one of the most popular leadership bloggers on Forbes.com. Ready for something you can use today? Here's Erika.
Hello everyone, and welcome back to the Proteus Leader Show. My guest today is Bev Kaye, a longtime international bestselling author and advocate for good people management. Bev founded and then led her organization, Career Systems International, for almost 40 years before selling it a few years ago, and has since become, as she says, A guide on the side and a sage on the stage. So welcome to the show, Bev.
Thank you. Nice to be here.
Yes, I'm so happy to have you here. So much of what we at Proteus talk about and teach is how to lead and manage well, and I believe your and our thinking is very much aligned. And so I thought your insights and your really deep experience in this area would be truly valuable for our listeners. So thank you so much for agreeing to be my guest. I appreciate it.
You are welcome.
All right, so let's get started. Um, my first question: your hugely popular book Love 'Em or Lose 'Em offers 26 strategies for managers to retain and engage employees, one for each letter of the alphabet. What would you call out as the key threads that run through all of your approaches?
You know, we had to figure out key threads because when we tried to move from the book to a training or learning design, talking about 26, like people would slit their throats.
Right.
So we divided it into 3 clusters, and, uh, 3 clusters of letters, 6 or 7 letters in each cluster. And we named the clusters. The first one was development and growth, that a talent-focused leader, engagement-focused leader Yeah. Second cluster was relationships. A talent-focused leader— and now I'm learning an inclusion-focused leader, a remote-focused leader— all requires a relationship to be built.
Yeah.
That really nurtures people. And thirdly, a talent-focused leader has to build a culture. that people really want to work in. So 6 or 7 letters fit in each of those clusters, and they form kind of the theme of the whole book.
I love that. So development and growth, relationships, and culture. So let's talk a little bit about culture. I'd love to hear your thinking on that. What are the key elements of culture that you think about?
So everybody lately is using that word culture.
Yeah, yeah.
Everybody defines it differently. So I'm not a culture expert. I didn't write a book on it. But when we studied the data we had, which really was the answer to the question, why do you stay? Not why do you go?
Right.
That's how we came up with the names for each of those 26 letters. And in the culture cluster are things like information. Like, if I'm in an organization and I get the information I need—
Yes.
—to do my job, if I understand where the company's going and I understand what issues are afloat, you have a good chance of keeping me. And in this remote environment, I've seen information become even more important.
Yes.
Than it ever has been.
So it's a lot about what people nowadays call transparency.
Yeah, the information part. Yeah. The other big piece of culture that we plugged in there, the W was for wellness. And now there's a big move on For, you know, emotional safety and psychological safety.
Yeah.
And, you know, wellness in general. And I think I read recently that the United States has the highest depression rate.
Oh, yes.
Of any country in the world.
Yeah.
And no, it, it doesn't surprise me.
Yeah. And so much, I mean, you were really prescient in saying that when the book first came out, because there's been so much research now that the more we focus on the whole person, And at work, the more likely they are to be happy and productive and team well. And wellness psychologically and physically is a big part of that.
And speaking of the word happy, one of the other chapters or practices in Culture, the K is for kicks. And the subtitle is, are you getting any? Because for some people, people to have a laugh at work.
Yes.
Have a colleague you smile with.
Yes.
To be able to feel the freedom to be silly.
Yes, yes.
At work. And again, it's very, very individual.
Absolutely. But for— I agree, a lot of people, humor is such an important connector. Oh, that's great. Okay, well, let's, let's go to the dark side. So, um, you know, what would you note as the most common lose-'em things you see managers doing? Not the good things, but the things that they should be avoiding.
In the relationship cluster is the J stands for jerk, and it says, are you one? And our publisher, when we first suggested it in the very first edition 20 years ago, said, do you have to have that? You know, everything's so positive, that's not positive. And we said, if we want to be true to our data, we have to. Because we asked people, why did you really leave? And even when we interviewed them in their next company, yeah, they said, my boss was a jerk.
Was a jerk.
Yeah. So the McKinsey study on the war for talent said people don't leave organizations, they do leave managers. They leave bosses. And we found that to be very true.
Yeah, yeah, yes. And it's so important for people to know that. It's so important for anyone who's trying to manage well to know that, that how you behave and how you're perceived is really critical.
Exactly. And some of the managers who attend our training, we have a jerk checklist They go back to their teams and say, look, you know, I went to this course. Here's the jerk checklist. I know what I think I do. But what do you think I do?
Yes, yes, yes.
And isn't that wonderful?
Really wonderful. If someone can be vulnerable and honest and open enough to do that, I think that's fantastic and wonderful advice. So let me, let me ask you for some more advice. One of the things I always promise in this podcast is that our listeners will get some practical takeaways. So if you had to suggest just one thing that a manager could do starting right now to become a more love-the-love-'em boss, what would that be?
So I'd say since everybody's an individual and since everybody has a different want from you, yeah, maybe the best thing to do is to go on the internet and just download a The table of contents and show it one-on-one to your direct reports and say, which 3 of these could I do more effectively in order to keep you on my team? And then ask questions.
Yes.
Probe.
Yes.
So that, you know, if they say it's the U for understand, then you might say, well, I understand you. Oh, that's not the way to do it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. An example, you know, how could I do it more effective, etc.?
I love that. It's so respectful. And it's so— back to what you were saying before, it's each person is an individual, and you're trusting them and respecting them, their perception to say, yes, these are the 3 things I'd like more of. And then to your point, it's really critical To then be curious, be open, really get interested in what they're saying first, because you could really lose it at that point if you didn't respond in that way, right?
Right. No, you could. And, and, and if you don't understand their words, ask for more information about a word.
Yes.
So you use the word, um, hate.
Yeah.
You know, you used it with very strong vibes. What about it do you hate? Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Oh, that's great. That's such good advice. Oh, thank you so much. I think we could— I know we could talk more and more. And I think this is going to be so helpful because it's so simple and true and practical. And I know that our listeners are all trying to be the best they can be, the best managers and the best leaders. So listeners, if you're interested in finding out more or in having Bev speak to your group, you can just go to her website at Bev Kaye, B-E-V-K-A-Y-E.com. And to find out more about how we at Proteus support managers' development and success, you can go to ProteusLeader.com, click on Topics, and choose Managing People. So Bev, thank you so much.
You are welcome.
I can't tell you how much I appreciate this. I appreciate this even more than I usually do. So thank you everyone for listening. And until next time, here's to creating the life you truly want.
We hope you're feeling better equipped to create the career, the business, and the life you want. For more insights and tools for leadership and management, join us at prudiusleader.com. Have an excellent day, and thanks for listening.
