- Turn up the Volume.
This is a sure fire way to erode team trust. If others aren’t listening, just turn up the volume. This is especially effective if you’re the boss. You can drive authentic sharing and important perspectives underground in less than a second.
- Not always right… but never in doubt.
Certainty is sure to teach your team to be helpless. Always sounding like you’re right shuts down curiosity, shortens meetings and teaches your team to rely on your brilliance. Pretty soon they will stop thinking altogether and just ask you for the answer. This is one of the best ways I can think of to become exhausted and frustrated that your team doesn’t grow. It’s also an excellent way to limit your career growth.
- Get personal
Connect criticism to correction. To be even more effective in destroying your team, add just a hint of contempt. Not enough to be obvious, just enough to let them know they will never be good enough. Rolling your eyes whenever anyone else speaks is sure to get your point across. This is probably the best technique to keep work separate from your personal life because no one will ever want to see you again.
- Drowning in an “Ocean of Emotion”
Strong emotional reactions will have a very predictable response. It’s great way to get a false sense of security as a team leader. This is a fabulous technique to keep people guessing all the time. Adding unpredictability to your emotional outbursts really keeps people on their toes and ensures quiet meeting where only you are talking.
With these four techniques you can have a revolving door installed for your office to keep the flow of people coming in and out of your department. After a while, you’ll secure a fine collection of co-dependent, emotionally dead, unproductive, non-contributors that are easy to manipulate using these proven techniques.
Of course if you want to build a high performing, high trust team… just do the opposite.
Stop Guessing 