Set expectations for employees

Self-disciplined employees aren"t cultivated overnight. Staff members who have been accustomed to close supervision aren"t always prepared to manage themselves. Just as supervisors may need to adopt new attitudes toward those that they manage, your employees may also need to adjust their own views.

Employees need to think of themselves as significant contributors to your organization"s long-term goals. Only those who understand the overall ives and their roles within these will be willing to assume the responsibilities and rewards of self-management.

Setting clear expectations yields positive payoffs for organizations, including:

• Employees can monitor their own progress   When clear expectations are defined for each role, employees can understand exactly what"s expected of them. Too often, employees are assigned tasks that have no defined or measurable ives. When expectations are clear, employees can monitor their own progress and establish new goals as milestones are met. When employees" expectations aren"t clear, self-management can"t take root.
• Employees can be held accountable   Accountability depends on clear expectations. No self-managing employee will exercise error-free judgment all the time. When mistakes arise, it"s important that the employee assume responsibility. This is more likely to occur if expectations have been established from the outset.
• Employees feel ownership for their actions   Ideally, setting expectations should be a collaborative exercise between employees and their managers so that both parties agree to a common set of goals. This kind of collaboration gives employees a sense of ownership, which leads to willingness to assume responsibility for errors and learn from mistakes. 

Reward autonomy

As your organization makes the shift to a self-management culture, its disciplinary and incentive systems should be evaluated. Many organizations send conflicting messages about self-management by punishing initiative and rewarding rule-based behavior. What are your systems communicating?

If your organization has historically focused more on disciplining employees than rewarding them, you will need to establish ways to recognize and applaud self-managing employees. As a positive behavior to be modeled, self-management is a workplace value that should be encouraged, and employees who take initiative should be celebrated and rewarded.

Just how self-managing employees are rewarded will differ from organization to organization. Be sure that your organization:

• Acknowledges self-managing employees among their peers   Don"t make the mistake of recognizing self-managing employees only in private reviews
• Openly praises and attributes new ideas or methods generated by self-managing employees   Many organizations will happily implement innovative new systems but fail to appropriately credit those whose creativity led to the innovation.
• Rewards self-managing employees in ways that are meaningful to them   One employee may value a leadership role, while another may prefer training opportunities. Still another employee may appreciate time off. To be effective, rewards need to reflect the preferences of the employee. Make sure that your rewards are genuine incentives.

Cultivate a culture of self-management

Self-managing employees require less oversight, so they improve productivity by reducing the need for continuous supervision. But that"s just the beginning. By seeking out opportunities for growth and professional development, self-managing employees foster an environment of creative problem-solving, innovation, and personal accountability that strengthens the organization"s strategic advantage. Although you can"t train your employees to manage themselves, you can cultivate an environment conducive to self-management through support, recognition, and rewards for employees who take initiative and exhibit self-discipline.

About the author   Michele Shauf, Ph.D., is a business consultant specializing in organizational change, strategic communications, and training.