Posts Tagged ‘manager’

A recent survey by the International Coach Federation identified that the number one reason why people choose to work with a coach is due to a lack of self confidence.  Someone who is self confident can sometimes be viewed by others who are less confident as arrogant.  Yet in truth self confidence is really about having a strong sense of self worth and capabilities.

If you are a manager, your success or otherwise is influenced by factors such as:

• Knowing that that you have the capability or competence (or can acquire it) to take on and deal with the challenges that without doubt will arise.

• Speaking up an airing your views even when they might be slightly controversial.

• Being able to take decisions even when you might not have all of the information at your fingertips that you might need or like.

• Getting other to provide support to get things done or make change.

A manager lacking self confidence is likely to have some traits or develop traits that get in the way, including:

• Being indecisive, procrastinating and failing to move things forward.

• Going with the consensus when deep down you know it is not going to produce results.

• Avoiding taking any risks that could lead to a step change in performance.

•  Being focused on surviving rather than thriving.

Bottom Line – You can have an abundance of self confidence and at the same time still be the manager who delivers great results and has the full support of the team.  So what’s stopping you succeed?

If you are a manager or aspiring manager, sooner or later you will be faced with a member of staff who is not performing.  Here my 10 tips for dealing with this situation effectively and compassionately:

1. Review the individuals objectives and make sure they are clear
2. Identify where performance is falling short
3. Get specific examples to illustrate where performance is falling short
4. Arrange to meet 1 to 1 with the member of staff to discuss the issue
5. Prepare for the meeting
6. Present your case and supporting examples
7. Give the member of staff the opportunity to respond without interrupting
8. Identify clearly the improvements required, timescales, monitoring and consequences if performance does not improve
9. Ask the member of staff what support you or the organisation can provide to help them
10. Confirm everything in writing

If you are a manager you are likely to have to produce reports from time to time.  This might be a report on performance of your function, division, team or project.  Alternatively it might be a case for resources.  So what questions do you need to ask when it comes to preparing a report?

Question 1: Why am I writing the report? 

Seems like an obvious question but one that is often overlooked.  Is you report to inform, provide evidence, get a decision, influence others or something else?  Always start by being clear on the purpose of the report.

Question 2:  What does the recipient want to know?

Step into the shoes of those who are receiving the report.  Ask yourself, if I was sitting in their seat, what would I want to know?  Write down all of the possibilities until you cannot think of any more and then make sure your report answers them.

Question 3: What’s the best way of presenting the report?

Is it best to have a written report, several pages long with an Executive Summary at the start or is it better to have a simple dashboard?  It will depend on the circumstances and the easiest way of finding out is to simply ask those receiving the report what they would prefer and then provide it.

Bottom Line – Reports are often produced with little thought about the purpose or the audience.  You can easily avoid this trap by asking and answering these 3 simple questions.

Ask any manager or leader about some of their key challenges and chances are that motivating staff will be on the list.  We all know that better motivated staff produce better results and are more productive.  So what are my 8 top tips?

Tip 1: Give effective feedback

We all like to know how we are doing.  What we are doing well and what we need to work on.  Without feedback we are in the dark.  Effective feedback will not only praise the results but also highlight the traits or behaviours that are making them happen.  On the flip side, it will let people know what attributes or behaviours are not getting results.

Tip 2: Supportive leadership

Teams follow leaders that they know they can rely on.  Supportive leadership is about being there for people when things are tough and helping them to move forward.  It is about standing up for the team when they are coming under attack.  Like any form of leadership, you need to “walk the talk” or put more simply make sure your actions and words tie up.

Tip 3: Delegate

Yes it is great to hold on to things that we like doing but should not be doing.  It gives a message to staff that you don’t trust them.  Delegating is probably one area that leaders at all levels struggle with.  Yet if you are going to exploit your full potential you need to be ready to delegate both task and responsibility.

Tip 4: Allow risk taking

Let’s be clear, I am not talking about recklessness, but allowing staff to take some risk.  The benefits you get include:

• Staff feel more creative

• They find new ways of overcoming barriers

• It spurs them on when things go well

• They learn a lot when things do not go as expected

Tip 5: Train and develop

Yes there will always be people who are quite happy doing what they are doing and have no aspirations.  The vast majority of staff however, want to learn new skills, gain new experience, build their personal attributes and take on new challenges.  Make sure this opportunity is not lost.

Tip 6: Generate high expectations

When you set high expectations you inspire people to reach out and meet them.  The challenge is to ensure that your expectations require effort and some discomfort but are not completely out of reach.  Generating high expectations will mean that you will achieve a better result even if it is not the ideal.

Tip 7: Set goals

Goals are outcomes that you and your team want.  Setting goals gives you a clear destination to aim for.  It allows you to plan and set strategies in place to get there.  Think about goals a bit like a car journey.  Where you want to get to is the destination.  The mode of transport, the route and stop off points are the strategies you employ to get there.

Tip 8: Acknowledge achievements

Do you ever find yourself dismissing progress because you have not quite achieved the outcome you wanted?  This is easy to do and a simple technique to use is to remind the team of where you started, the progress that has been made and to celebrate achievements.

Motivating staff is challenging, but by adopting these 8 simple steps, you can start to move forward to greater success.

One of the biggest challenges facing those taking on a management or supervisory role is finding the time to manage.  It can sometimes feel like that you have 100% of your time allocated to doing tasks and the only way to fit in the management part of the job is to do lots of unpaid extra hours.  So how can you start to address this dilemma?

Be clear on what is expected of you

As a new manager you need to get absolute clarity on what is expected of you and how your performance in the job will be measured.  The last thing you want is to get to your appraisal and find out that you have been aiming for the wrong target.

Set aside time for managing

If you do a 40 hour week and you know that management will take up about 40% of your time, block out 16 hours in your calendar each week and set up a schedule of things that you will work on.  It might be appraisals, work planning, recruiting, staff training, customer surveys, management meetings to name a few.

Let go of the jobs you do not need to do

You might love doing that piece of analysis work on excel that you have always done but you know deep down that someone else can do it.  Train them and let go of it.

Be accessible but manage interruptions

Managers love to talk about having an open door policy but make sure that people understand that this does not mean they can interrupt you whenever it suits them.  Have slots when your team can come to you to discuss issues and make sure people know when they are.  With e-mails, set aside times in you day to deal with them.  If it a real emergency someone will call you.  You may also need quiet time to focus on a report or presentation.  Divert your phone to someone else if you can or to voicemail.

Build in some space in your schedule

Things crop up that you did not expect or anticipate, so make provision for these in your schedule so that you can be flexible and responsive.

Ask for help if you are getting overloaded

We all have blind spots.  If you are finding that you are getting overloaded and cannot seem to find a way through, ask for help.  Merely sitting down with someone else and asking them to take a look at the challenges with you and help find solutions can get you back on track and delivering great results.

At the end of the day there is no magic solution but taking control is a powerful first step.

When asked what their biggest challenge is, many managers say that getting everything done is what they struggle with most.  One of the major differences of being a manager is that you are no longer just responsible for one or two things.  You need to manage a varied workload as well as people and resources.  So what are the 5 top mistakes managers make when it comes to managing workload and what should they do instead?

Mistake 1: Failing to focus

The first mistake managers often make when it comes to managing workload is failing to focus on managing.  This is often more of a challenge for those that have been promoted within the same organisation to a management role.  If you are a manager you are no longer measured just on what you do but on the results you deliver through others.

Solution: Make a point of allocating a proportion of your time specifically for managing and get crystal clear on how your performance is measured.

Mistake 2: Not delegating

Delegating tasks and responsibility is often something managers find tough to do.  It might be that they were let down in the past and are reluctant to try again.  It is important to remember that if you avoid delegating you give a message to your staff that you don’t trust them.  How would you feel if your boss gave you a message that he or she did not trust you?

Solution: Identify tasks that can only be done by you and those that can be delegated.  Once you have identified those tasks that can be delegated, find the best person in your team to do the task and delegate it to them.

Mistake 3: Not being willing to say no

You want to be seen as someone who is helpful – don’t you?  The real question to ask yourself is whether you want to be regarded as the person who always offers to help but rarely delivers.  As a manager you need to know when you can commit and when you cannot commit to something.  It is better to say and explain your reasons than to say yes and not deliver.

Solution: Always be clear on what you have to deliver in the weeks ahead and how long it will take so that you can clearly identify what capacity you have to take on additional work or projects.

Mistake 4: Not planning

Failing to plan is planning to fail.  You would not go travelling without a plan or try to make something without a plan.  So why would you leave your productivity and effectiveness to chance by not planning?

Solution: Plan your workload for the month, week and day and ensure that you focus on your priorities.

Mistake 5: Being too accessible

Many managers talk about having an open door policy.  At the same time, you need to be careful that your open door policy does not become a constant interruption policy.  When this happens you start to lose huge chunks of your time, put the delivery of results at risk and put yourself under real pressure.

Solution:  Have designated times when you are available to deal with problem issues and people issues and schedule this time in your calendar.  When issues arise outside of this, make sure that the issues really do require your immediate attention.

Bottom Line – Mastering workload management will set you apart from many managers and help you deliver results.  So what action do you need to take to better manage your workload?

If you are reading this blog, I am guessing that you are probably someone who wants to achieve success as a manager or leader and have a successful career.  When it comes to our career and setting goals , very few have a clear idea of what they want and why they want it.

Think about your career 10 years from now and ask yourself the following:

What level do I want to be at 10 years from now?

If I was in my perfect job I would be ……?

I want to be known as a manager and leader who……?

Now think about why you want it.  The obvious answer is the financial rewards that come with success.  Yet in truth, money alone is not the long term driver. 

So what is it that makes you want to achieve career success?

If you are a manager you are probably trying to keep a whole host of tasks and projects moving forward at the same time.  You probably know that you could achieve more if you were to delegate more.  In my experience managers often come up with a whole host of reasons for not delegating.  I wonder if you recognise any of the following:

 

“I don’t have time to delegate”

 

“If you want a job done right do it yourself”

 

“It takes too long to delegate, I could do it quicker myself”

 

“I tried delegating once and I was let down by someone else”

 

Chances are you have heard one or more of the above, many times.  By not delegating, you are probably experiencing some specific costs or consequences.  It might be:

 

1.                  Continually staying late at work

 

Maybe you find that you are the person who is always first to arrive and last to leave.  If that’s you, chances are that you could benefit from delegating more.

 

2.                  Missing key deadlines

 

If you are finding yourself always delivering things at the last minute or even worse missing deadlines completely, it might be time to take stock of what you are doing that you really should pass to others.

 

3.                  Feeling stressed or under constant pressure

 

When we start to feel stressed or just constantly under pressure it impacts on our ability to take decisions, solve problems or focus on the bigger picture.

 

4.                  Poor performance rating

 

If you are in a management role, a large part of how your performance will be assessed will be on how well you manage.  If you are focusing all of your time and energy on doing rather than managing, chances are you will be poorly rated.  This might mean no pay increase or your job being in jeopardy.

 

So what steps would you take to improve your delegation skills?

One of the key roles of anyone who is managing is to get results through others.  To get others to deliver results for you, it is vital that you motivate them.  Managers often believe that pay and rewards are the key things that motivate people.  Without doubt pay and rewards play a part of motivating people you manage but contrary to common belief, they are not the primary motivators of the majority of staff. 

The truth is that is often things that cost little or nothing which motivate.  For example:

• Saying thank you when people have put in extra effort
• Praising people when they have done a good job
• Offering opportunities to acquire new skills or experience

What do you find is most powerful when it comes to motivating others?