ADVOCATE. IT’S NOT JUST A NAME OF A HOSPITAL.

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As a manager, your role is not just making sure your team is meeting deadlines and maximizing strengths. It’s also to offer guidance and be a mentor to help them be recognized which will hopefully lead to retaining them. Among reasons people leave a company/position, “recognition” is almost always on the top of the list. I mean recognition in two ways. Praise and “thank you” for a job well done are a great start, but also understanding their fundamental professional and personal goals is important to see them as a person and not just a star employee. I mean a celebratory donut might work on me, but most want more than a warm apple fritter as a token of appreciation for a successful campaign.

Some employees would like more recognition at meetings, in emails, or in-person. Some would like a fair merit increase (Let’s face it, most do!). Some want a work-from-home option or at least a hybrid of WFH and office. Some would like a promotion. The point is you have to identify what your employee desires to stay at the job and then advocate for it. And this is where many managers fail. The reason why a manager may not advocate for an employee may vary. Perhaps it’s because they don’t think the decision-makers will agree to it, so they don’t try. Maybe it’s because they don’t want to put their own job at jeopardy. Maybe they don’t want to change the current status because it’s what’s working right now and they don’t want to shake things up. Or perhaps, the manager doesn’t think the timing is right. The employee depends on supervisors to be the voice to an audience they may not always have. By delaying even an attempt to speak on their behalf may be what causes the employee to start looking elsewhere for a position that is more in line with their aspirations or lifestyle.

Whether or not you are successful at advocating for your employee, the fact you are trying can lead to respect by your team. It also usually gets the wheels turning for decision-makers on other ways to retain the employee or, at the very least, put them on the radar for a promotion/position down-the-line. I am unaware of a scenario where respectfully advocating for an employee caused the manager to lose his or her position. More often than not, HR or upper management will give you reasons why certain policies are in place or decisions are made. If you’re afraid that asking for different work hours for an employee who might need to drop off their child at daycare in the mornings will jeopardize your own position, then you may not be in the right place.

In a perfect world, an employee’s strong work ethic, talent, personality, and other team-building traits would naturally lead to his or her goals, but we don’t live in a perfect world and the support of a manager may be the sole reason for staying at the job. No pressure or anything.