Listening conveys trust and gives employees a great deal of ownership over their work.

Invest in employee development by sitting down with everyone to create Individual Development Plans (IDPs).

Recognize strengths.

Don’t sweat the small stuff.

Both positive and negative

Focus on the action, not the actor.

Offer recommendations and guidance.

Make it a two-way conversation.

Providing context and stakes for each task, setting clear expectations, and picking the right employees for the right tasks.

Focusing on commonalities instead of dwelling on differences

Asking questions

Practicing “radical listening” by giving employees your full attention

Pay attention to your employees’ energy levels and moods.

Host weekly one-on-one meetings with each of your direct reports so you can hear about any problems and read clues to detect issues your employees might overlook or be reluctant to mention.

Acknowledge the problem instead of pretending that it doesn’t exist or that it might go away on its own.

Let the feelings flow.

Pinpoint the actual problem (outside of all the emotions) and the underlying need driving it.

Propose a solution and then talk about it.

Energize your employee recognition strategies with our ideas and templates.

Be humble and give credit to the entire team.

Be transparent and reveal your plans for the future.

Offer an employee training plan, and other forms of career development.

Frequently host team-building activities

Pair new or developing employees with veteran buddies to make them feel at home.

Hold safe-zone brainstorms so people can get to know each other’s communication and thinking styles.

Use teamwork and collaboration tools, such as Slack, Trello

Be the approacher.

Practice active listening.

Share more about yourself.

Figure out what your employees like to talk about

Monitor your nonverbal signals to avoid conversational shut-down.

Keep a go-to list of open-ended questions.

Even if it’s against your nature, brag about the work your team is doing.

Listen first and make yourself heard later.

Consider the positives that may come out of the conversation.

Breathe deeply to calm yourself.

Lay out a few key points to guide the difficult conversation, but avoid reading from a script

Truly listen and respect other perspectives and feelings.

Keep the conversation slow and steady.

Keep the goal of a resolution in mind.