How to manage a difficult team?

Managing a team is a job not to be taken lightly. A manager leads his team while developing his skills. The manager must also know how to recognize the qualities and strengths of each of his members and be able to use them to the advantage of the whole team.

However, it can sometimes be complicated to manage a team faced with complex personality traits: rebellious, anxious, introverted, authoritarian…

Discover in this article how to manage a difficult team and how the intervention of experts via an interim management firm can solve this problem.

1) Communicate with your team

Communication is very important within a team. Indeed, it makes it possible to maintain cohesion within the team and to avoid conflicts.

In addition, communicating will highlight the difficulties encountered by the team . This makes it possible to prevent them in advance to work better.

Within a team, communication is an essential element: it will reassure the members and will allow everyone to get to know each other. Communication helps to avoid conflicts and build cohesion within the team.

3) Communicate individually

Communicating individually with your colleagues will allow you to identify the cause of their behavior. Why is your employee negative, withdrawn or rebellious?

Your collaborator will then provide you with information on his motivations for working with you. This will allow you to adapt your management to its needs.

Individual communication is an effective way to escalate the problems encountered by the team.

Thanks to one-to-one meetings, you will be able to know the feelings of your employees. Thus, it will help you know how to manage a difficult team .

4) Be neutral

To have effective management, it is important not to be personally involved. This will be passed on to your team and will have a negative influence on your employees.

It is important to remain neutral even if you are in opposition to a member of your team. Your objective will be to encourage the employee to dialogue in an attempt to understand him.

In one-on-one communication, adopt a neutral tone and use a positive attitude . For example, ask open-ended questions to see the employee’s reaction, rather than closed-ended questions to get an answer.

5) Be emphatic

Essential in the management of a team, empathy is defined as the ability to understand the emotions and feelings of others . It is a key element in managerial communication.

You must be able to identify the problem posed by your employee. Next, you must show that you understand the employee’s emotional state. Even if you don’t have the solution, you have to reassure him and let him know that you are taking his concerns into consideration.

Indeed, empathy will help you to understand the difficulties encountered by each member of the team and to remedy them. It also allows to have a global vision of the situation, to share it with the management.

6) Involve your team

To be a good manager , you have to know how to involve your team . This is one of the problems faced by managers: they fail to involve their members.

You have to convince them to participate in the realization of a project. For this, you have to be positive and give confidence to your team. Being open to different ideas and suggestions will allow the team to engage with the project.

Finally, they must be held accountable. Show them the value they bring to the project. It will be easier to involve them if they feel that they are part of the success of the project.

Be careful, despite all these good intentions, some members of the team can take advantage of it to destabilize you and play a role in the disappointing results.

7) Be encouraging and grateful

Many employees admit that they do not receive recognition for their work, which can frustrate and discourage some. In a company, the recognition of a job well done is an important element. A company that does not recognize a job well done is a company that does not go far.

The manager must also be encouraging. You have to give the team confidence and show them that the company values ​​their efforts. We must therefore remind them of the results obtained and thank them for their involvement in the project.

This is intended to motivate the team and make it progress in its work . Thanks to this, she will be happy to work to achieve the goals set by management. It is also a way to reduce tensions within the team and develop group cohesion.

8) Use leadership

It is important for the manager to know how to use his leadership. Indeed, he must know how to win against his team.

For example, when it is excessive, the manager must demonstrate authority and refuse excesses. The manager must know how to communicate with his team using his leadership.

9) Go through an interim management firm

You are at the head of a poorly motivated team that has not shown any involvement for some time. You think a new manager is needed to re-energize your team. But how to get this result?

There is a solution to help you in this situation: go through an interim management firm.

The Interim Manager is a professional with managerial expertise. He acts as an advisor and support to develop, implement and evaluate action and organizational strategies .

The Transition Manager will have all the necessary skills to overcome the crises encountered internally . It can intervene internally over a defined period for:

• Restore the balance of a team in difficulty,
• Reorganize teams in difficulty,
• Create a new “state of mind” in a reluctant team or a difficult terrain,
• Support a manager in difficulty.

Managing a team is a job that requires special expertise, especially if it is complex. To solve this type of problem, call on an interim management firm: Reactive Executive has all the skills to allow effective communication with your team and rebuild the link.