Welcome back to the Look and Sound of Leadership, an ongoing series of executive

coaching tips designed to help you be perceived in the workplace the way you want

to be perceived. I'm Tom Henschel, your executive coach, and today

we're talking about having your team's best interest at heart. The original goal for Brendan's coaching was to polish his executive presence, but after I heard that two of his team members had transferred to other divisions and a third had left the company, I began to explore how he was managing his team.

I started the conversation by asking not about his team, but rather about when in his own career

he had felt most engaged and motivated.

He described a job he'd had a decade earlier in another city.

Maybe I've painted it rosier than it was, he said, but my memory is it was a great job at a great

company and he added with a fond smile I had a great boss I wasn't at all

surprised that Brendan's memory of a great job was connected to his memory of a great boss.

Research consistently shows a link between employees who are fully engaged with an affirmative answer to the following question,

does my boss have my best interest at heart?

When the answer to that question is yes, employees rank higher in job satisfaction and productivity

than those who answer no.

An old saying demonstrates this in the negative.

People don't quit their jobs they quit their bosses my fear for Brendan was

that the departures from his team were the proof of that point exactly

Brendan and I began to discuss the wide variety of ways bosses can demonstrate that they have their direct reports best interests at heart.

He and I discussed 11 different behaviors that help ensure employees rave

about their bosses. What follows in this podcast are five of those behaviors. The other six

will be in next month's podcast. Now I've

numbered the 11 behaviors only for your convenience as a listener but in truth they

...