Do you know when to keep your mouth shut? Neither does the boss sometimes.
It was just months after Thejo Kote launched his company Automatic, which connects cars to the internet, when he faced a giant fork in the road.
One of his investors and closest advisors questioned his core business model. It was early 2012, and the advice would have dramatically changed the entire company.
Kote had imagined his San Francisco-based company appealing to individual car owners, who could use Automatic to diagnose engine problems, get reminders of where their car is parked, and get feedback on their driving styles in order to save money on petrol. Instead, the investor suggested targeting businesses, allowing fleet managers to track the speed, location and mileage of company drivers.
You have to make sure you have all the context and the right level of expertise.
What the investor didn’t know, Kote said, was that there was already strong competition in the business of marketing such devices to fleet managers. Trusting his instinct, Kote politely ignored the advice and instead kept with his original plan.
Since then, his company has grown from two to 60 employees. Kote said the moment taught him about the importance of how and when to give advice, especially to those who report to him — and about when leaders should avoid offering a solution.
“The thing about giving advice is that you have to make sure you have all the context and the right level of expertise to make a suggestion,” Kote said. “As a manager, that’s not always the case.”
It’s more likely an employee asking for your advice is an every day occurrence, and it’s just as likely that you’re expected to have all the answers. Knowing how to react — and especially whether you offer any answer at all — often helps define a great leader.
Becoming an advice expert
Those who master the art of giving advice have a far better chance of success. Research shows employees are more likely to remain in jobs, earn promotions and enjoy what they do if they have access to good career support, said Shoshana Dobrow Riza, assistant professor of management at the London School of Economics.
“The key to giving good advice is to have your inter-personal skills in tune as much as possible,” Dobrow Riza said. That means being sure to listen and show respect and empathy — all the things that show you care about your employee and the problem they face.
It also means figuring out the right format for offering advice to an employee, said L Frank Demmler, adjunct professor of entrepreneurship at Carnegie Mellon’s Tepper School of Business in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
Advice ought to be one-on-one; it rarely works in a group setting. It’s also helpful, Demmler said, when the manager can offer a similar anecdote.
“It’s best if the manager can share a personal experience that’s similar to the problem faced by the subordinate,” Demmler said. “This helps your employee understand that you have been in their shoes. You faced this and you figured it out.”
Two-way street
The chance to give advice can also be beneficial for the manager, Dobrow Riza said. It’s not only rewarding to see your advice turned into success, but those mentor-mentee relationships are also a chance for a manager to check with what’s going on with lower-level employees.
You have to understand the abilities of the people who work for you.
If you’re like most managers, chances are, that when you’re asked for advice, you have little time in your day for one-on-one listening sessions. In response, good managers will plan for regular meetings in their schedules and also lay the ground rules about how advice will be given.
“Maybe your mentee is always asking questions by email or popping into your office uninvited,” Dobrow Riza said. “Then it’s time to set the standard on how often you’re available and how regularly you will be emailing.”
The lesson Kote learned from the advice he ignored at Automatic was that leaders need to be careful about when they offer advice. Often it’s the employee closest to an issue who is more apt to find the best solution when a problems arises. The subordinate may just need guidance in narrowing down the problem and executing the solution.
Kote, for instance, isn’t an expert in accounting. When someone from finance asks him for a solution to a problem, he’ll often turn it around and ask the employee specifics until they figure out the answer.
“The thing about giving advice is that you have to understand the abilities of the people who work for you,” Kote said. “If you have done a good job and hired people you trust, then you should trust them to make a decision.”
For good managers, keeping mum, listening and then delegating the decision making back to the employee might turn out to be the best advice of all.
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