Lack of role clarity is one of the psychosocial hazards that employers need to be addressing under the new legislation. It has been identified that lack of role clarity has the potential to cause harm to workers. Although a seemingly obvious part of managing a team, discussing the expectations of what good looks like and tracking progress of the individual against that benchmark is often over looked. When team members know where they stand and what is expected of them, it offers a level of safety to them. It is not fair to call out poor performance when the boundaries of what is expected were never established. The minimum we can do to enhance our team’s psychological safety is to provide them with clarity about their role purpose and parameters that they need to work within. There is of course the ole "expanding job role" that a lot of high performers find themselves in. What I have found is that people rarely reach the point of a psychological injury by only doing their job (as defined by the position description). It is when they take on other tasks, get involved in workplace politics, worry about things that are outside of their control and heaven forbid "care too much" about the bigger picture that they find themselves in overwhelm and stressed to the point of distraction. Regularly reviewing the scope of the role is required and if the role has expanded, determine if it is the best for the additional work be handled by the person whose lap it has landed in. It is quite likely that the lap was a convenient recipient because they like to help and gain validation from adding value. Linking performance goals and KPI's closely to the role responsibilities also helps to reinforce expectations. Edwin A. Locke and Gary P. Latham are both researchers and authors in goal setting and performance. Locke found that over 90% of the time, goals that were specific and challenging, but not overly challenging, led to higher performance when compared to easy goals or goals that were too generic such as a goal to do your best. Dr. Gary Latham also studied the effects of goal setting in the workplace. Locke and Latham published work together in 1990 with their work “A Theory of Goal Setting & Task Performance” stressing the importance of setting goals that were both specific and difficult. Work with team members to set challenging yet achievable goals and then support them to achieve them. An essential part of this support is providing the opportunity to regularly review the goals. Regardless of whether the goals are linked to bonuses, high performers always want to be growing. Set the expectations for their day-to-day role but also give them some targets to work towards to give them motivation and a sense of achievement. Defining what you expect the team to achieve is critical for them to achieve it. Once you set the expectations your team are exponentially more likely to meet them.
Did you know that a private Brisbane based health and wellness centre has seen a 684% increase in enquiries for stress and burn out in the last 12 months! If you have one of those expanding roles where you find yourself in overwhelm you may find that regulating your nervous system, setting boundaries and rediscovering the art of focus might help.
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