First, Break All the Rules: What the World's Greatest Managers Do Differently

by Gallup Press

II. If you want “strongly agree” responses to the items “I know what is expected of me at work” and “I have the materials and equipment I need to do my work right,” you must be able to set accurate performance expectations. This activity encompasses more than simple goal setting. You must be able to keep employees focused on performance today, no matter how tempting it is to stare at the changes massing over the horizon. You must know on which parts of a job you will enforce conformity and on which parts you will encourage your employees to exercise their own style. You must be able to balance today’s need for standardization and efficiency with a similarly pressing need for flair and originality. If you don’t know how to set these kinds of performance expectations, you will always be off balance, lurching haphazardly between enforcing too many rules and enduring too much chaos.