Should You Check-up on Your People?

Scenario: "Hey, we gotta ask how Sally's doing every hour of every single day. The best manager check up on their workers, constantly. Yay!" Sure, checking up on workers might seem beneficial -- but doing too much of it, and you'll drain their productivity like a mofo. Most "check-ups" add no value to the employee's work, and instead end up hindering their performance. According to recent research on such interruptions:

U.S. office workers get interrupted on the job as often as 11 times an hour, costing as much as $588 billion to U.S. business each year.

"But what if my workers need me every second of every day of every freakin' year?!"

Two things could happen:

1. You haven't tried "letting go."

   People -- that is, good people -- want independence to discover the best route to a destination you/your-company/your-client has set. When you dictate that route, you trash their creativity -- and in turn: drain their productivity.

2. You hired the wrong person.

   If the person needs constant hand-holding, you probably need somebody else. A person that needs babysitting will drain your time, resources, and hurt company-wide results.

So when you're trying to improve the kick-booty rate of your company, use the following template to get your badass started:

"I will let go."

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