Altitude, Attitude & Opportunity
In order to deal with problem behaviour, we must be clear on the actual problem. There are three areas we need to examine:
Altitude (capability, skills, competence, intelligence etc.)
Attitude (frame of mind – positive, negative or indifferent)
Opportunities for challenges (use of their skills and a chance to develop and grow)
If a person lacks altitude or capability, then training, coaching, on-the-job experience or other methods can be used to help improve their capability. Managers and organisations hire people who have average or medium capability, and then try to develop them through experience, training or coaching. Sometimes a person is hired or the job is revised and then requires a higher level of skills of which the person is not capable. If attempts to train, coach and develop the person are unsuccessful, it may be necessary to move the person to a different job inside or outside of the organisation.
The second area is attitude. Some people have a realistic, constructive and positive attitude. They point out what can be improved, work to make things better and may wish that things could improve faster, but they are not negative or critical of their managers and the organisation.
Indifferent people are apathetic, unresponsive and rarely volunteer or initiate solutions. They are neither positive nor negative; they don’t put energy into what you need them to do and they tend to live their life outside of work.
The person with poor attitude is negative or critical of others, their manager, the organisation, their co-workers and even themselves. In their opinion, few things are done right, particularly if it doesn’t fit with their idea of how it should have been done. This type of person debilitates others with their attitude and spreads a negative cloud around the workplace.
Some people have high skills and capability but have a negative attitude. Alternatively, they may be moderately capable and have a good attitude about most things except one aspect of the workplace or one of their colleagues. This negative attitude can flow through the workplace in meetings and behind closed doors and cause collateral damage.
The third area considers the opportunities a person has available to them. If a manager doesn’t give a person an opportunity to grow and develop, it will affect the employee’s attitude or performance. A worker may have high capability and a great attitude, but if they are not given opportunities or interesting challenges they may find another job.
To help you identify the problem with a poor performing team member, you can look at each of these three elements, rating them on a scale of 1-10.
Where does the employee rate themselves on these lines?
Is their rating realistic?
Can they describe the problem?
How is that different to your rating and perception of the problem?
If your rating is lower than their rating, what are the skills and behaviours they need to improve and by how much?
This defines the gap between where they are and where they need to be and is a good starting point to finding a solution.
Using this diagram can be a useful way to open a discussion and share views on performance and behaviour.
