Working with your staff would be a cakewalk if the only tasks you ever requested of them were simple to tackle, easy to complete and well within their capabilities.

In today’s workplace, increasingly, you could find yourself having to make what seems to be an unreasonable request. The individual(s) assigned such a task might at first squawk. Anticipating such resistance will serve you well.

Your role is to offer staff guidance on how to get started, generate momentum, avoid pitfalls, and proceed to completion. The more challenging the task, the more often you likely need to stay in touch. In the early stages of a project, you could be putting in ten “units” of energy for every one “unit” of output you receive. That’s okay. You and your staff are in a concentration mode.

Later, as the project gets rolling, you might be putting in ten units and receiving a commensurate return. Ideally, when the project is humming along, one unit of energy then offers ten units of output. Now you’ve achieved momentum! When the people you supervise experience the exquisite experience of momentum, your odds of succeeding on the next challenging project increase significantly.