1. Look under the hood before buying. Always conduct reference checks before making a new hire. For current employees, it is essential make arrangements to review the employee's permanent personnel file prior to making an offer.
2. Probationary Period- Use it or lose it! This is your best opportunity to review and evaluate a new employee's ability to be successful in the position.
3. Consistency is essential. Strive to treat all your employees the same with regard to expectations, privileges, and exceptions.
4. You get what you reward. Acknowledge and reward good performance. Don't limit your feedback to criticism and corrections.
5. No good deed goes unpunished. If we had a nickel for every supervisor or manager who thought she was doing the right thing by tolerating or minimizing employee problems.
6. Walk the walk. If you expect good attendance, performance and conduct from your employees, make sure that your attendance, performance and conduct sets the example.
7. Put the value back in evaluations. Performance Evaluations should be viewed as an important management communication tool.
8. How did this molehill become a mountain? Call us for help early on, when the problem is simple and easily corrected. Employee problems rarely get better on their own.
9. Whatever happened to Employee Jane? Occasionally employees are absent for extended periods of time and/or fail to provide sufficient medical documentation for their leave. We can help you resolve the situation appropriately.
10. A-B-C, 1-2-3, can somebody help me? Don't overlook the alphabet soup of policies that protect employees, e.g. FMLA, ADA, CFRA, ESL, PDL, FLSA. We can help you navigate the soup.
(from UC Davis http://www.hr.ucdavis.edu/elr/supervisor/top_10_tips_supervisors.html)
