HACKENSACK, N.J. -- If you want your business to succeed, stop being a jerk. Really.
Most of the time, people switch jobs because they have a bad relationship with their boss.
And with 76 million baby boomers readying to retire in the next decade or shortly thereafter, keeping good workers will be more pressing than ever for employers because labor shortages are widely predicted.
But learning to be more civil to employees doesn't mean managers have to transform themselves into some warm, fuzzy types. In fact, most workers would rather maintain an air of professionalism in the workplace and leave the more light-hearted moments for their personal lives.
"Employees are not looking for a boss who is a fun-loving, back-slapping buddy," said author Terry Bacon, chief executive officer of the global human-resources consulting group Lore International Institute, based in Durango, Colo. "What they want is a professional, respectful manager who is honest, fair and has a strong work ethic."
Mr. Bacon knows this because his company queried more than 500 workers in various industry sectors to help business folks better manage their professional relationships. What the West Point graduate and Army veteran found is offered up in "What People Want: A Manager's Guide to Building Relationships That Work."
It's a book Lisa Clifford says "jumped out" at her among the stacks of others on her desk. As the leadership-education specialist for Mercedes-Benz USA in Montvale, N.J., Ms. Clifford says she's always looking for practical information she can use to help train employees, especially those who manage others.
"It just grabbed me because it's very realistic," said Ms. Clifford, who has worked for Mercedes-Benz for 19 years. "It's not suggesting people have to change their personality."
Ms. Clifford also says she likes the way Mr. Bacon acknowledges how experts in a field wind up getting promoted to management positions without having an iota of training.
"It's no longer just managing projects and deadlines," she said. "You have got to work through and with people."
That may not come naturally if your forte is designing engines, crunching numbers or filling pipettes.
More than anything, Mr. Bacon's research found that employees wanted to feel trusted.
"That means you can't micromanage people," he said. "You've got to delegate responsibility because if you don't trust them to do the work, you've got the wrong people."
Workers also want to feel challenged, involved, excited and appreciated.
"What they don't want is friendship or companionship with a manager," Mr. Bacon said. "They don't want caring and emotional support either. What they want is respect and honesty."
Mr. Bacon, who has done consulting work for more than 25 years, says he wrote the book after more than one struggling manager asked him "how to be a people person."
"It's unlikely you'll change your personality at this point, but you can behave more like a people person," Mr. Bacon recalls telling the managers he was coaching.
To improve employee relations, he recommends "treating people like human beings, not human resources." In the book he gives practical examples that plenty of bosses forget to use, such as calling people by their names and learning a tidbit or two about their lives. And, he says, if a worker says something as simple as, "I liked working with you on that project," respond with a specific question about why.
"It's about going a little bit deeper to build the relationship," he said. "It really is common sense."
For those who call it hooey (and Mr. Bacon says plenty do), he offers some data on why treating people well is good for business.
A Gallup Management Journal report, for example, found that 15 percent of the work force is "actively disengaged" on the job.
"These are the people who are the malcontents, the cynics with high absentee rates who actually work against the company," Mr. Bacon said. He noted that Gallup estimated the loss to American businesses at $300 billion in lost productivity each year.
"I think a lot of this is because the relationship between the manager and employee is not what it should be," he said.
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