Being a manager comes with a unique set of responsibilities, from managing a team of employees to developing performance plans and ensuring tasks are completed to schedule. But often managers make their job more difficult by taking on additional stress in areas that they don’t need to. Whether it’s by manually monitoring things that HR systems could take care of or dealing with stressors that aren’t necessary, here are ten things that managers should drop from their to-do list immediately:

1. When people arrive at work
2. What time members of the team leave work
3. How much holiday staff members have taken
4. Ensuring employees bring in sick notes for absences
5. Asking employees to provide reasons for their holiday requests
6. Forcing people to work a set 9-5 schedule
7. Asking for every decision to be signed off by them first
8. Expecting staff to work extra hours regularly
9. Worrying about where or when staff are working
10. Listening in on rumours of job moves

Managers Should Allow for Autonomy

It’s important for managers to allow employees to determine for themselves how much time they devote to their jobs. Some will want to give extra and some will feel they’ve given as much as they can for one day and need to head home. Ultimately, as long as an employee is working hard and completing their tasks each day, how long they spend at the office is their decision. Likewise, holiday requests and absences are something that Software for HR management can keep track of and manage, without managers having to worry about them. The software can send reminders to individual staff members about their holiday allowance and make it easy for them to request time off, so all managers have to do is approve it.

A Positive Stance on Flexible Working

Flexible working is something that every employee is entitled to ask for and a factor that plays into a person’s happiness at work. Working for a company that respects an individual’s priorities outside of the office massively impacts how much someone is prepared to give when they’re in the office. Forcing employees to work more than their necessary shifts will only alienate them and will not result in a trustworthy relationship. It also puts added stress on the manager’s workload. Issues of how often and to what extent a staff member is working – and to what standard – are issues that should be raised during staff reviews rather than on a regular basis.

Worrying about these factors daily will only cause stress to the manager, so it’s preferable to raise these concerns in a more controlled and regulated fashion where the issue can be discussed properly, and appropriate action plans recorded for future reference. By following procedures properly and allowing team members to determine for themselves when they leave the office and how they use their time off, managers can foster a healthier relationship with their staff for a more enjoyable work environment.