4 Leadership Areas to Train Your Unit Managers
Franchisees sometimes assume the franchisor will equip their teams with everything they need to succeed, but that’s not true. The reality is that the franchisor will provide you with the training and tools to duplicate the brand that you invested in.
- However, the leadership and management skills your people need to turn that brand into a profitable business must be taught by you.
One of the skills you need to train your Unit Managers in is leadership. This skill is critical, as it serves as the foundation for everything else they do when managing the unit. Not only that. If they don't know how to lead and inspire the team effectively, they will struggle with performance every day.
Within leadership skills, there are four specific areas you must train your Unit Managers in to ensure your franchise's success.
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Leadership Skill #1: Leadership Actions
The first area of leadership you need to train your Unit Managers in is what we call leadership actions here at the American Franchise Academy.
Leadership is a huge topic with many approaches to teach it. Trust me, I know… Probably half of my books are about leadership. But because it's so broad, it can also be very hard to teach. However, I’ve found a way to do it in a short period of time, which we have incorporated into our training programs.
We have summarized 13 actions of a leader, and we train these Unit Managers in them so they can identify what a great leader looks like and how they can develop the skills to be really good at those particular leadership actions.
So, if you want to train your Unit Managers in leadership, you must be aware of the actions they should take every day to become great, inspirational leaders.
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Leadership Skill #2: Situational Leadership
The next thing you need to train your Unit Manager in is situational leadership. That way, they’ll be able to adapt their leadership style to each employee's motivation and skill level. If they do that and then also apply the proper leadership action, they will be able to manage, lead, and inspire the team effectively.
Think about it! Will you treat a new employee the same way as an experienced person who has been working in the unit for a long time? No. If you leave the new employee to figure things out on their own, it’s very likely that they will make mistakes, and that poor performance might demoralize them. On the other hand, if you micromanage an experienced employee and constantly question every move they make, that won't go well either.
Here’s where situational leadership comes in play, and why it is so critical that your Unit Managers understand how to apply these leadership styles based on employees' motivation and skill levels.
A new person would need some micromanagement so they can be taken through everything they need to do to be successful in the job they just started. In the meantime, a superstar employee would only need to know the goal so they can act on it and get recognized for their work.
That is what situational leadership looks like. If your Unit Managers can adapt their leadership style to the employee and the situation, the team members will feel cared for because they are being treated exactly the way they want to be treated.
Keep learning: From Present & Dependable to Loyal: How to Improve Team Engagement
Leadership Skill #3: Time Management
The next skill you want your Unit Managers to learn is time management. About 80% of what these leaders do every day is dictated by daily operations, including: when to open and close the unit, when to bring people in, when to take care of customers, when to make orders and do schedules, when to clean the units and do walkthroughs, and so on. However, 20% of what they do is managerial activity, and they need to decide when and how they’re going to do it.
And, if Franchise Managers don’t know how to manage their time well, they could end up working too many hours to do those administrative tasks that go beyond daily operations. This could also affect their personal time with their families, friends, and even their kids.
This is why having effective time management skills is so important. If you train them in this leadership area, you will not only help them with their day-to-day unit management but also with having a happy home life, enabling them to come to work with a positive attitude every day.
Leadership Skill #4: Positive Culture
The fourth leadership area you need to train your Unit Managers on is how to build a positive culture.
Unit Managers work closely with people within the unit's four walls every day. That’s why who they are as leaders, how they communicate with the team, what values they stand for, and what mission they strive to achieve each day will determine the environment in which employees will work.
Will it be a positive or a negative culture? Will it be exciting and inspiring? Will employees want to work in that unit, with that manager, or will they see their jobs as a bad experience?
Your Unit Managers need to understand what it takes to have a positive culture, how to set a daily mission, and which values all employees should embody. They also need to know how to communicate this to team members and motivate them to achieve it every day.
- This is a critical skill because, at the end of the day, being a great leader in the unit does not just mean having people do the work. It also means inspiring them to do great work!
This is what we call discretionary effort: when you inspire them enough that they go above and beyond just what they're hired to do.
If your Unit Managers understand situational leadership, apply the appropriate leadership actions, manage their time effectively, and drive a positive culture, your employees will give you not just what they were hired to do, but also that extra effort because they're loyal and committed to the team and their leader.
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What other skills within the leadership area do you believe that Unit Managers should have to be successful at running a franchise business? I would love to hear from you, so reach out below
If you are a franchisee and you don't have the ability, skills, time, or even the desire to train your Unit Managers in these leadership skills, let me offer you a solution: our MANAGE Program.
This is a training program designed specifically to give the Unit Managers the skills they need to be amazing leaders and so much more. If you'd like to learn how we can partner with you to train your Unit Managers, visit UnitManagerTraining.com.
Reflections:
- How would your franchise business look like with Unit Managers who have all of these amazing leadership skills?
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