Developing Your People When Budgets Are Tight
"Leadership is the creation of an environment in which others are able to self-actualize in the process of completing the job."
--John Mellecker
In the early months of 2025, many government agencies experienced significant budget and staffing cuts. As is often the case in times of austerity, training budgets were one of the casualties. For example, OPM shuttered the Federal Executive Institute and terminated the Presidential Management Fellows Program. Many agencies have canceled or reduced contracts for external training and coaching.
During my three decades in government, constrained budgets were a common -- perhaps even cyclical -- occurrence. To ensure I could consistently develop my teams regardless of the budget situation, I relied on a set of leadership practices that enhanced the capacity of my teams while fostering motivation and innovation throughout the ranks.
The quotation above from John Mellecker is one of my favorite definitions of leadership and became one of the foundations of my leadership philosophy. Below I outline eight practices any manager can use to develop the next generation in the process of getting the job done.
Hold Scheduled One-on-One Meetings
Weekly (or biweekly) one-on-one meetings are a leadership superpower. One-on-ones are a great way to get to know your direct reports and learn about their strengths, motivations, and goals. Done well, these meetings can foster psychological safety, which is necessary for candor and strong teams. (Respectful candor is like oxygen for an organization.)
Regularly scheduled one-on-ones help managers get the best out of every employee. They enable us to get to know every one of our direct reports and ensure they feel seen and have opportunities to discuss their ideas and professional development with the boss.
I have encountered employees who go months without a one-on-one conversation with their boss. That makes them feel invisible, which is a horrible feeling. And that feeling has consequences: according to the Gallup Organization, only 2 percent of employees who feel ignored by their supervisor are engaged at work.
Weekly one-on-ones do require a time commitment, of course, so it’s important to put them on the calendar. Early in my career as a manager I recognized that one-on-ones would be useful, but I failed to put them on my calendar. As a result, they didn’t happen because they got squeezed out by the press of day-to-day work.
Once I started scheduling the one-on-ones, I found that they saved me time because we were able to identify and solve problems when they were still small. The regular one-on-ones enabled me to spend much less time putting out fires and more time engaging with my people.
Researcher Steven Rogelberg estimates that half of all one-on-one meetings are conducted in an ineffective manner, so it’s important to learn to do them well. I highly recommend Dr. Rogelberg’s book Glad We Met: The Art and Science of 1:1 Meetings and his November 2022 Harvard Business Review article, “Make the Most of Your One-on-One Meetings.”
Make It Safe to Ask for Help
During my first “get to know you” one-on-one with each employee, I share that I have three pet peeves: “Rudeness to Our Customers, Rudeness to Colleagues, and Not Asking If You Don’t Know How to Do Something.” That last one is designed to counter a common fear among new officers that it is not safe to show they don’t know everything.
Our work is complex, and no one was born knowing how to do it. Asking for help is a sign of courage and good judgment, while failing to do so can waste time and create the need for unproductive re-work.
Delegate Effectively to Develop Your Employees’ Skills
Managers often fall into the trap of not delegating because they believe it is easier to complete a task than to delegate it. That may be true sometimes in the short run, but if we persist in doing things that others would benefit from learning, we will be ridiculously busy while our teams are frustrated and underdeveloped.
Delegating effectively does take some time up front, but making that investment enables our team members to improve their job skills and motivation — and gives managers more time to think strategically and develop their direct reports. Two helpful (and short) books about delegation are The One Minute Manager Meets the Monkey and If You Want It Done Right, You Don’t Have to Do It Yourself!
It’s important to remember that delegation involves a conversation, and the employee needs to leave that conversation with a clear understanding of the desired outcome, how the task ranks with other priorities, when it is due, and how to get help if they become stuck.
Invite Innovation
My first supervisor in the Foreign Service put in my work requirements that he wanted me to take a hard look at the whole operation and make recommendations for improvement. I took him literally was motivated to put a great deal of discretionary energy into process improvement efforts.
I proposed many ways to make the operation more efficient and/or improve service. Not all my ideas were ready for prime time, but it was incredibly motivating to know that my supervisor was open to my ideas—and exciting to see some of them make a difference.
I found that practice so motivating that, when I became a manager, I wanted my officers to have that same feeling. I put that mandate to look for better ways of doing things in the work requirements of all the officers working for me and continued that practice throughout my career.
When I started managing frontline supervisors, I added a line in their work requirements saying that I expected them to elicit innovative ideas from their teams. That helped ensure they wouldn’t quash good ideas from the front lines.
This practice is also a great way to grow leaders. Effective leaders take ownership of their sphere of influence and work with the team to make things better. Getting more junior employees in the habit of identifying problems and owning them prepares them to do the same when they rise to positions of leadership.
The experience of implementing their innovative ideas also gives them valuable practice working across organizational boundaries, influencing others, and obtaining resources.
Give People Feedback to Help Them Succeed
Giving feedback is a fundamental part of every supervisor’s job – and it’s worth learning to do it well. When preparing to deliver corrective feedback, it’s important to approach the conversation with the intention of helping the employee be successful. Be curious about what led to the behavior requiring correction. It’s important to remember that we do not know what is going on in the lives—or heads—of other people. (Curiosity is another leadership superpower.)
Deliver clear feedback and then let them talk. If you start with anger or a punitive mindset, the conversation is likely to harm the relationship and/or cause performance to deteriorate further.
Avoid making the feedback feel like a personal attack. Adjectives like “unprofessional” or “lazy” will simply make the person defensive and resentful. Pare the message down to its essence: the specific behavior you observed and the impact that behavior had.
"Investing in the development of the organization’s next generation is the most sustainable way to accomplish our mission."
It’s also important to make the feedback future-focused (i.e., explain what behaviors you want to see going forward). If you only focus the conversation on what the employee did wrong, it may feel like you are punishing or blaming them.
Also, don’t forget to give positive feedback – and make it as specific as possible. Even the best employees may become unsettled if they aren’t sure where they stand with the boss. Gallup’s research indicates that employees benefit from having positive interactions with their supervisor at least weekly.
Host Professional Development Days
For most of my career as a manager, I set aside one day per month for professional development for my teams. These professional development days can include brainstorming sessions, formal training sessions, guest speakers, team activities, and time for special projects. I found that the busiest offices often need this time the most—and productivity typically increases the rest of the month because this practice creates space for process improvement and upskilling.
If you start carving out time for professional development each month, it is helpful to delegate the planning to a nonmanager. Managers tend to be very busy, and this can be a great developmental opportunity for members of the team. If a full day of professional development sounds like a luxury, start with half a day each month and assess the impact over time.
And, yes, it’s also important to send people to training. Formal training is a critical part of every employee’s development. However, it’s only one piece of the puzzle—and one that fewer people can access when budgets are tight.
Use Individual Development Plans
An IDP is a nonbinding agreement between the employee and their supervisor that outlines the employee’s learning goals and planned developmental activities for the next year or two. It can include many kinds of developmental activities even if funding for formal training is not in the cards.
The employee should create the first draft and then discuss it with their supervisor. The supervisor’s role is to ensure that the activities on the IDP align with both the needs of the organization and the developmental needs and goals of the employee. The key is to be strategic and thoughtful about each employee’s professional growth.
Learn Constantly
It's also important for managers to model a commitment to continuous learning. One way to do that is to establish a disciplined habit of professional reading. Read about leadership and become a devoted student of the issues your office handles.
Another great source of learning is to reflect on—and derive lessons from—the biggest challenges you have faced, whether it was a major crisis, a huge management challenge, or a bad boss. Bad bosses can be phenomenal sources of learning. The lessons are painful, but they can be transformational if you reflect on them and commit to creating a positive climate for the people working for you.
It is important for managers to model a commitment to continuous learning."
Sometimes it will be useful to seek outside leadership opportunities through volunteer work or hobbies. The first time I served in Washington I was in a nonsupervisory role. I missed leading teams, so I sought leadership opportunities outside of work.
Leading in a volunteer context provides a whole different set of challenges, because you have no leverage over the other volunteers. I learned a lot about engaging people and the importance of asking them directly to contribute in specific ways.
Finally, ask for feedback. We all have blind spots. As leaders we can have the best of intentions, but there is inevitably a gap between our intentions and our impact. Feedback is the only way to find out what that gap involves so we can address it.
What About Results?
Ultimately, of course, our goal as leaders is to accomplish our organization’s mission. In the State Department that was “To protect and promote U.S. security, prosperity, and democratic values and shape an international environment in which all Americans can thrive.”
While it's tempting to take shortcuts in the interest of getting short-term results, investing in the development of the next generation is the most sustainable way to accomplish our mission and creates an environment in which our own employees can thrive. Managers and supervisors at all levels have the power to do that within their sphere of influence.
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