You'll burn out your team with these 5 leadership mistakes

Challenging goals and short-term pressure can certainly have a motivating effect and provide a brief boost to performance in the team. However, if this pressure persists for too long, it triggers stress. The result: Your employees no longer feel good at work, become ill or, in the worst case, even quit.

How it works better: Exceptions, in which you have to demand a little more at short notice, must remain an exception and be explained plausibly. If your team understands why it is important to go the extra mile, they will be motivated to do so. Precise yet emotional communication will help you achieve this. You can find the right tips for this in my online seminar "Successful Communication - The Art of Listening and Persuading."

Also, make sure that a phase with a lot of pressure is followed by a time (e.g. a week) with opportunities to relax.

Many supervisors focus only on outstanding performance. The broad segment of average (and thus still good) performance is ignored and taken for granted. For employees who form the backbone of the team with solid and average performance, this behavior is very demotivating. 

How to do it better: Make sure that ALL work results are regularly appreciated. Even in a work result that you are not satisfied with, there is work and heart and soul from the team. In practice, a simple "thank you" works wonders.

"Please compile the current status of the project for me!" If you, as the boss, formulate your work orders so vaguely, your employees will not know exactly enough what needs to be done. In case of doubt, they will rather invest too much time so that nothing is missing. If, however, you only need the milestone planning "from the current state", you have created a lot of reactive power with your imprecise work order. Of course, your team will also notice this and will be frustrated accordingly.

How to do it better: Make sure that you formulate tasks and goals as precisely as possible. The SMART method is well suited for this and easy to apply.

"So, how's the pitch for client AB looking?" What at first glance appears to be a friendly inquiry from the boss can be received very negatively by the team. The interpretation quickly arises that you don't trust your team or that you're not moving fast enough.

How to do it better: Make sure that you build up and maintain a trusting working atmosphere with your team. For this, it is important that you let your team work in peace. Part of working together in an atmosphere of trust is trusting your team to get back to you when things don't go according to plan.

As a manager, you are constantly acting as a role model for your team. Your team observes (sometimes unconsciously) your behavior and interprets it. If you regularly sit in the office until 8 p.m. and even write e-mails at 11 p.m., you are setting a very high pace as a role model. In the team, this behavior will lead to your employees finishing work at 6 p.m. with a guilty conscience in the best case. In the worst case, they will take over your working hours.

How to do it better: Make sure that you yourself have a balanced time, self and stress management. In practice, this means that you should allow yourself regular time-outs and a closing time before 7 p.m.