Dear Anne Marie: How do you get people to turn their reports in on time? Almost every week someone is late with his or her weekly report. This means my report to the VP is always late. I'm tired of nagging. HELP!
    —Kathy T.

Dear Kathy: It's evident you are a responsible person who understands the importance of consistently meeting deadlines. It is true that how you perform today creates or closes opportunities in the future. You are wise to address this problem now so you can protect your prospects for the future.

Managing The Moment

The "Moment to Manage" is your feeling of dissatisfaction. Chronic dissatisfaction can lead to a feeling of peevishness, which can quickly turn into irritability. This will cause people to avoid you, further hindering your ability to communicate in a meaningful way and to inspire great performance.

The Game Plan

First, make sure your credibility is intact. Do you respond promptly and fairly to requests for help from your staff? Do you consistently follow through on your promises? Your personal credibility needs to be "squeaky-clean" if you hope to bring your staff into line with the integrity you hold for yourself and which, as a leader, you hold for them.

Second, take the time to build solid relationships. Your staff will be more willing to co-operate when they know that you care about them.

Third, get the facts. Find out why the reports are late. If people are struggling to manage a huge workload, the report will be put on the back burner until it becomes "urgent." Together, review the tasks that bumped the weekly report. Be certain that these tasks were not more important than the weekly report before you let them know why it is in everyone's best interest to complete them on time.

Fourth, engage them in the process. Ask them what they feel they can do each week to motivate themselves to do the reports in a timely manner. This will help take you out of the nagging position and will be empowering for them. Finally, ask them what you can do to help them stay on task with their commitment to complete the reports.

Finally, implement a superior communication system. Life is imperfect and people are not going to be able to meet deadlines all the time. By building solid, caring relationships with your staff, you will be in a position to insist that they contact you immediately regarding reports that will not be timely. This will allow you to choose a course of action that takes into account all of the issues at stake, thus respecting your needs as well as those of your staff.