WAVES for Success Blog
Learning
Outcomes:
Tuesday, November 1st
10:00 - 11:00 PDT
* Learn Proven Strategies to Decrease Employee Turnover
* Improve Customer Service
* Grow Sales & Profits
* Provide Recruiting Strategies
* Develop Retention Programs
* Inspire Management Motivation
* Learn why Today's Teens are the way they are
* A Success Story
Not Just their Attitude... What About Yours?
I've primarily focused on feeding the attitudes of your teenage employees. With that said, I can't think of anything that can have a bigger effect on a teen's attitude than your attitude! A condescending, disrespectful attitude showing no personal interest towards your teen employees will send them out the door, and working down the street.
I'll be the first to admit that it can be hard to maintain a positive, outgoing, caring and personal attitude. But if you have a young workforce it's a discipline you are going to need to excel at if you want your employees to serve your interest at work.
Getting a teen's attitude in line with your needs may be a moving target. But you are always in control of yours, and it's the one small thing you, and your managers, can do on a daily basis that can have a huge impact.
Following is a quote from Charles Swindoll about attitude:
The longer I live, the more I realize the impact of attitude on life. Attitude, to me, is more important than facts. It is more important than the past, the education, the money, than circumstances, than failure, than successes, than what other people think or say or do. It is more important than appearance, giftedness or skill. It will make or break a company... a church... a home. The remarkable thing is we have a choice everyday regarding the attitude we will embrace for that day. We cannot change our past... we cannot change the fact that people will act in a certain way. We cannot change the inevitable. The only thing we can do is play on the one string we have, and that is our attitude. I am convinced that life is 10% what happens to me and 90% of how I react to it. And so it is with you... we are in charge of our Attitudes."
I can't think of anything else that will have a larger positive impact on a teen than the attitude that is directed towards them by an adult.
Provide Variety
Patience is not a virtue with today's teens. To say they bore easily is an understatement. Be cognizant of the functions and tasks individuals regularly do. If there is never any variety, do what you can do to create some change of pace at work. A little cross training goes a long way to build bench strength and makes you more flexible.
This is classic! We all know that every generation thinks they had it
harder than the young generation, and this might be truer today than ever. This
was an email that was sent to me that I wanted to share. Pretty funny, but true.
Today's Teens simply have no idea how much has changed in so little time!
That's scary considering it was not very long ago that the below was the ONLY
way of life. Sometimes I wish we could go back to those days. All this
'technology' stuff can be too much at times.
-Jeff.
If you are 30+, or older you will relate !
When I was a kid, adults used to bore me to tears with their tedious diatribes
about how hard things were. When they were growing up; what with walking
twenty-five miles to school every morning.... Uphill... Barefoot... BOTH
ways...yadda, yadda, yadda
And I remember promising myself that when I grew up, there was no way in hell I
was going to lay a bunch of crap like that on my kids about how hard I had it
and how easy they've got it!
But now that I'm over the ripe old age of forty, I can't help but look around
and notice the youth of today. You've got it so easy! I mean, compared to my
childhood, you live in a damn Utopia! And I hate to say it, but you kids today,
you don't know how good you've got it!
1) I mean, when I was a kid we didn't have the Internet. If we wanted to know
something, we had to go to the damn library and look it up ourselves, in the
card catalog!!
2) There was no email!! We had to actually write somebody a letter - with a
pen! Then you had to walk all the way across the street and put it in the
mailbox, and it would take like a week to get there! Stamps were 10 cents!
3) Child Protective Services didn't care if our parents beat us. As a matter of
fact, the parents of all my friends also had permission to kick our ass! Nowhere
was safe!
4) There were no MP3's or Napsters or iTunes! If you wanted to steal music, you
had to hitchhike to the record store and shoplift it yourself!
5) Or you had to wait around all day to tape it off the radio, and the DJ would
usually talk over the beginning and @#*% it all up! There were no CD players!
We had tape decks in our car. We'd play our favorite tape and "eject" it when
finished, and then the tape would come undone rendering it useless. Cause, hey,
that's how we rolled, Baby! Dig?
6) We didn't have fancy crap like Call Waiting! If you were on the phone and
somebody else called, they got a busy signal, that's it!
7) There weren't any freakin' cell phones either. If you left the house, you
just didn't make a damn call or receive one. You actually had to be out of touch
with your "friends". OH MY GOSH !!! Think of the horror... not being in touch
with someone 24/7!!! And then there's TEXTING. Yeah, right. Please! You kids
have no idea how annoying you are.
8) And we didn't have fancy Caller ID either! When the phone rang, you had no
idea who it was! It could be your school, your parents, your boss, your bookie,
your drug dealer, the collection agent... you just didn't know!!! You had to
pick it up and take your chances, mister!
9) We didn't have any fancy PlayStation or Xbox video games with high-resolution
3-D graphics! We had the Atari 2600! With games like 'Space Invaders' and
'Asteroids'. Your screen guy was a little square! You actually had to use your
imagination!!! And there were no multiple levels or screens, it was just one
screen.. Forever! And you could never win. The game just kept getting harder
and harder and faster and faster until you died! Just like LIFE!
10) You had to use a little book called a TV Guide to find out what was on! You
were screwed when it came to channel surfing! You had to get off your ass and
walk over to the TV to change the channel!!! NO REMOTES!!! Oh, no, what's the
world coming to?!?!
11) There was no Cartoon Network either! You could only get cartoons on Saturday
Morning. Do you hear what I'm saying? We had to wait ALL WEEK for cartoons, you
spoiled little rat-bastards!
12) And we didn't have microwaves. If we wanted to heat something up, we had to
use the stove! Imagine that!
13) And our parents told us to stay outside and play... all day long. Oh, no,
no electronics to soothe and comfort. And if you came back inside... you were
doing chores!
And car seats - oh, please! Mom threw you in the back seat and you hung
on. If you were lucky, you got the "safety arm" across the chest at the last
moment if she had to stop suddenly, and if your head hit the dashboard, well
that was your fault for calling "shot gun" in the first place!
See! That's exactly what I'm talking about! You kids today have got it
too easy. You're spoiled rotten! You guys wouldn't have lasted five minutes
back in 1970 or any time before!
As a repercussion of the quake in Japan, our coast line got hit with a Tsunami as well. Click here to view our harbor getting jolted.
Recognize Positive Behaviors
Have you ever lamented about all of the ways that today's teens
don't match up to you or others when you were that age? Are you always on the
lookout for the next screw up so you can pounce on your teenage employee to let
them know about their most recent mistake?
If you want to improve employee performance, forget about the constant vigilance about what they are doing wrong. Catch them doing something right! Even at the expense of telling them one more thing they did wrong. Every time they perform at the level you want to see repeated, let them know! Be specific about what they did to your satisfaction. They will respond to this type of interaction in a positive way. Build a foundation on compliments and they will be motivated to improve in other areas at work.
Set Goals and Empower
Empowering teens with more responsibility and goal setting may seem counter-intuitive for many. I often hear employers commenting on how irresponsible teens are and how they can't handle even the basic responsibility and workplace tasks they've been given.
Today's teens are the most knowledgeable ever. Not only have they been exposed to more information than ever before, but they also have been hard-wired to know how to instantly access relevant facts, data and ideas.
Turn them loose and make them part of the solution. When teens are micro-managed and not able to function in a way that is natural for them, they'll disconnect from your expectations.
If you have a challenge you can't solve, get your teenage staff involved in the process. Give them the background they need, limits to function within, and a vision of what a successful outcome looks like. Let them come back to you with their solutions. You have nothing to lose and will be amazed at the outside of the box approaches you will receive.
Don't
Let Them Quit
Often times when a teen quits it isn't because they are unhappy with their job. It's due to the fact that life priorities have taken precedence. School work, extra curricular activities or family commitments take priority. Those are larger issues than what is generally an entry-level, seasonal or part-time job.
Set up an "on-call" category of employees. These can be employees who you don't want to lose, but for the reasons mentioned above they can't work. By being on-call, they would never be scheduled or expected to check a schedule. But when you have a short term or emergency need, they are available to call, providing you with no loss of productivity.
Communicate with your on-call group as if they were regularly scheduled employees. Keep the connection. Attach criteria to how often they need to work or some way for them to demonstrate an ongoing interest. When their situations change, you will be the obvious choice for their job commitment.
