11 Great Employee Qualities: Do You Have Them?

Are great employee qualities disappearing in the workforce? If so, then you should quickly see if you can adopt some of these traits and make yourself competitive. Don’t wait to start improving how you work! Some great employee qualities bosses appreciate include:

1. Managing Yourself

Manage yourself by knowing your roles and responsibilities in your company. In addition, learn to know what it takes to go a step beyond what your current role entails. Know what makes you a competitive advantage to your boss. How do you improve yourself? Do you know your key strengths you can play up? Weaknesses you should seek to lessen via training or even self-learning?

2. Managing Your Boss

Perhaps one of the more important great employee qualities is being able to manage your boss. That does not mean to suck up to him. It means knowing his likes and dislikes, and how he works. For example, if he likes to be updated via e-mail, he is perhaps a very visual based person. On the other hand, if he likes being updated verbally, he’s probably more auditory. Learn how to break bad news to him, prepare him for meetings, and the unexpected. You will soon become a key competitive advantage in his team.

3. Managerial Attitude

Even if you are in the lower rung, make sure you have a managerial attitude. This is one of the important great employee qualities. Behave like a manager and see to it things are done the way they are supposed to be done. Manage expectations of everyone in the team from the boss to colleagues and peers within the department. Stick to time lines; follow up with next steps after every meeting, have progress reports ready even if they are informal ones like an e-mail.

4. Managing Your Time

Prioritize your work and manage your time well. Know when to do what. Do not procrastinate on work especially when they involve cross department participation. Your delay will affect other people’s work. Great employees know how to manage their time well and even manage their boss’s time well.

5. Work to Get Results

Work with objectives in mind. What is the overall objective of the project? Work towards the aim everyone who is involved in a project big or small has a role. Everyone must contribute towards that goal. You must learn to get results and expect high performance of yourself. Do not just do enough to get by. This is one of the most important “great employee qualities.”

6. Out-Do Yourself

Great employees have the stamina to do outstanding work. They set the pace for others to follow. If you want to be great at what you do and be appreciated by the boss, look for ways to outdo yourself. Be the best you can be. Even if perfection is elusive, go out and get it. Even if you fall short of perfection, your near perfect would have pushed you further than you would have thought possible.

7. Can Do

Have a “can do” attitude. Ever worked with someone who is always so negative, that everything is impossible, nothing is easy, things are too troublesome and a million other excuses and reasons why things won’t work? Do you catch yourself making the same mistake? Have a “can do” attitude. Have the courage and patience to work things out and figure things out even if it sounds very challenging. Bosses trust people who have a “can do” attitude in approaching work.

8. Strive For Excellence

In everything you do, strive to be the best you can be. Take the initiative to ensure things are going right and make sure the details are tied down. Spend time doing what everyone else takes for granted.

9. Enjoys Work

Peter Drucker, the management guru said, “Those who perform love what they are doing.” Even if it means a routine work, as they know each step and each detail builds on another and helps achieve the company objective. A boss can feel whether employees enjoy their work or otherwise. Someone who enjoys their work will naturally bring their best to work.

10. Contribute Positively

A great employee takes personal responsibility for everything they do. To be a great employee you must contribute positively to the organization. Take initiatives, give suggestions, or even be the silent hero who solves challenges quietly, that is how a great employee works. They work to help achieve greater goals for the organization.

11. Work Relationships

Being nice to people and have great working relationships across departments and ranks is one of the important great employee qualities. It means you can get a lot more cooperation and strong network to help you get your work done. Hence, making your boss look good in the eyes of management. Your boss will have less people problems, too.

Do you have these great employee qualities? Perhaps you already have them and what you need is a plan to bring them to be noticed. If you don’t, start to see which of these qualities you can adopt and start on first. It will help you move up the corporate ladder a little easier.