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7 Tips for First Time Managers

7 Tips for First Time Managers

by | Mar 22, 2017 | Career, Communication, Management, Motivation

This is a shout out to all you first time managers out there! You are bound to be attacked by butterflies in your tummy, and the symptoms of having cold feet whenever you set out to do something you’ve never done before. While these voyages might appear terrifying, they are a sure sign of the fact that you are growing – in your experiences, and hence as an individual. Applying this general strand of thought to the topic at hand today, this post is dedicated to all you folks out there in the world of work, ready to take on the brand new role of being a manager – for the first time ever.
Before you begin reading this though, we’d like to emphasize that this in no way is a “tutorial”. A change in perspective before you begin to read this will help you understand your new role better. Know that you have risen up in the corporate ladder to be a manager solely because you have it in you to lead, manage and have teams deliver. That said, there are things one knows about, and there are always things one can do better. This post is simply an effort to bolster the latter. Happy reading!

1. Wrap your head around your role and responsibilities

The only way you’ll be able to lead and manage a team well is if you know your own role and responsibilities well enough. Work on yourself before you begin to work on / with your team. Do you own research to have a very thorough sense of the goals you are going to be working on. Ask yourself how you imagine yourself achieving them. Then ask yourself if that process can be applied to the rest of your team as well. While your approach will, of course, depend on the specific situation you might be dealing with at the given moment, having a general sense of direction is a great way to begin this new role.

2. Be Decisive

Making decisions, when you are aware that they no longer affect only yourself, can be tough in the stead of your new role. That however, shouldn’t stop you from making them altogether. Well, you definitely cannot “stop”, making decisions, but as a result of being indecisive you may end up delaying those decisions which will hamper the progress of your entire team. This will not only put the objectives and goals at stake, it will also be a reflection on you as a leader, and manager. The fact is, one can’t ever be sure enough about the consequences of any decision – which is what lies at the root of indecisiveness. All you can do is, weigh the pros and cons to the best of your knowledge and ability, and go ahead and implement the decision you make.

3. Delegate

One of the vices most managers contract is fear of delegation, stemming from the fear that things may not be done as “perfectly” as you imagine yourself doing them. Apart from being immensely time-consuming, this fear is going to unsettle the team dynamics. Understand that you are no longer an employee, working more or less in isolation responsible for delegating that tasks assigned to you. Your role has now expanded to that of a manager, which entails you assigning goals and tasks to the team as a whole, and helping them achieve these goals.
If you do feel like you can relate to being a manager who find it hard to delegate, odds are you also find it hard to not micromanage, once you do succeed in delegating. That too, can be detrimental to the progress (and spirit) of your team. Give your team the credit they deserve, and once you have delegated the task, give them the independence (and assistance) they need to be able to accomplish it.

4. Invest time “in” your team

Time management would probably figure as the prime skill for managers. And while you’re teaching yourself how to manage time, ensure that you figure out time slots for one to one interaction with your team members on a fortnightly/ monthly basis. Even if it is a fifteen / twenty-minute long interaction, it is enough for you to take stalk about progress and challenges with regard to individual team members. This helps not only you in solving problems more efficiently, it also makes your employees feel valued, and importantly, anchored. Being a manager and being a mentor should ideally go hand in hand.

Apart from individual meetings, hosting team lunches, dinners once every two or three months just to build team cohesiveness is not a bad idea either.

5. Work on your interpersonal and communication skills

How you communicate, and put your thoughts across as a manager is pivotal to how much work you are able to motivate your team to do. “Interpersonal skills and communication skills lie at the center of human-based managerial considerations. Good managers understand not only what they are trying to say but also the broader context and implications of saying it. Empathy, self-reflection, situational awareness, and charisma all play integral roles in communicating effectively and positively.”
[Source: Boundless. “Interpersonal Skills of Successful Managers.” ]

While you will most certainly have to make unpopular choices as well, you don’t necessarily have to end up being disliked by team for having implemented these tough choices. What is tougher than making those choices is communicating them ‘effectively’, and ‘positively’, as the excerpt above puts it.

6. Find yourself a mentor

Irrespective of what stage you are in your career, you will always need a mentor. More so when you find yourself stepping into the shoes of a role that needs you to do a lot of mentoring. Odds are, you already do have a mentor, if you don’t, now is the perfect time to find yourself one. When we say “find yourself one”, we do not mean it in the casual language that it implies.

A mentor needn’t necessarily be very hard to find. Think of all the people whose advice and support has helped you grow in your career. It could be one of them, or a few of them you look towards as your mentors. It need not be a very formal process, but resuming communication with them (if you’ve fallen out of touch), and keeping at it, so that you may reach out to them when you need help with tricky situations. You know that in all probability they’ve been there before you, and would know intuitively the dynamics of most situations you might find yourself in.

7. Lead by example

Be a leader, not a boss. Being a boss and being a leader could mean two wholly different things. The plan is, to show your team that you are very much a part of the team and at the helm of affairs. The best way to manage your people and motivate them to be their best is by being more of a leader and less of a boss. No to imposing yourself, stating through overt and covert ways, “who the boss is”, yes to communication, negotiation, trust and motivation. If you’ve ever been bossed by your boss, you know exactly what not to do. But, even the best of us need to be reminded at times.
The best way to get the best out of your team is to lead by example. Inspire your team by being everything you expect from them!

Don’t be too hard on yourself and try not to self-impose any pressure. Like everything else, this too is a learning process and you will learn as you grow in your new role. Don’t forget to remind yourself you’ve been chosen for this role because you CAN do it!
Have tips for the first time managers who might be reading this? Let us know!

Five Ways to Build and Sustain Organizational Culture

Five Ways to Build and Sustain Organizational Culture

by | Jul 30, 2014 | Business, Leadership, Management, Office Etiquette, Performance, World of Work

That mysterious thing called organizational culture – everyone loves discussing this topic. A company is doing well – credit goes to the culture. A company is not doing so well – blame goes to the culture. And it is perhaps true. Culture is critically important to business success, according to 84 percent of the more than 2,200 global participants in the last Booz & Company Survey (Infographic). But what is more surprising is that 96 percent said some form of culture change is needed within their organization with 51 percent believing that their organization is in need of a major culture overhaul. If organization culture is so widely accepted as a critical factor for a company’s success, and people believe the culture needs to change, why is this not happening? I think the problem lies in treating the whole culture thing as a mystery (that is here, there and everywhere, can be sensed but cannot be grasped – you get the drift) or as something that lies in the HR department’s purview (along with other mysterious things like employee engagement, succession planning, etc.).

Wiki defines Organizational culture as “the behavior of humans within an organization and the meaning that people attach to those behaviors. Culture includes the organization’s vision values, norms, systems, symbols, language, assumptions, beliefs, and habits.”

I would interpret this as the “how” in the company. How do we work on a daily basis – how do we interact with each other and with the external world, how do we react or respond to situations, how are our actions guided. I recommend you read “What Is Organizational Culture? And Why Should We Care? by Michael Watkins” – the post and the comments to see how many different interpretations there are of culture (no wonder it is a mystery).

For all my readers out there who want to delve into this mystery a little more and add to the already high discussion levels on this topic and perhaps bring about culture changes in their own organizations, this post is about building and sustaining company culture from my experiences in two stages of my career – as a team leader in mid-size and large companies and as a small business owner in the third year of leading my company.

Company Culture Builder #1 – Have a clear Vision, Mission and Values statement: This is where you define the culture of the company. It is critical that every employee knows and understands the vision of the organization and the values that it stands for. It needs to be simple enough or made simple enough that everyone in the company can understand them and get aligned to them. The idea here is to get people really involved and committed to the culture – logic and reason have their place, but in initiatives like this the emotions of people have to be tapped – and a clear mission, vision and values statement serves as a great way to bring everyone on the same page.

Company Culture Builder #2 – Hire people who embody these Values: No matter how talented a person is, if you don’t think that the person would be a cultural fit in the organization, resist the temptation and don’t make an offer. The people you hire are your ambassadors for culture, they will be the examples for the next set of hires. As they say, one bad apple spoils the basket – not only do you need to ensure that you hire, promote and reward people not just for skills or performance but for attitude and behaviour that aligns with the culture that you want to foster but also help people who are not aligned to be aligned or move them quickly out of the organization. When valued behaviours are not demonstrated, no matter where he/she is in the hierarchy, there should be consequences that show that such behaviour is no longer acceptable in the organization. This is important to establish accountability.

Company Culture Builder #3 – Understand Culture is not just Top-down: It is side-wise too. Yes, it does start at the top but it happens together – built through everyone’s behaviour and interactions in the team or company. Culture is everyone’s responsibility. Every person in the company should be walking the talk, walking it together, and knowing enough to course correct if some action in the day-to-day operations of the organization does not fit the culture.

Company Culture Builder #4 – Bring Culture in when solving Business Problems: I think this is the best way to bringing the theories to practice, to reducing the whole mystery about culture. When you have an irate customer or a profitability issue or a collaboration issue, that’s the time to do a root cause analysis that also assesses the problem based on what value was or was not used. Did we follow our culture? Were any of our values ignored? Based on what we stand for, what is the right thing to do now? Do we need to change anything in our culture so that this problem does not appear again? These discussions really help in reinforcing the message (and solving the business problem).

Company Culture Builder #5 – Focus less on Perks and more on building Trust and Respect: A cool office, a world-class gym, free food are all good but not at all the main factors that will make a company an employer of choice or build a culture that makes both customers and employees happy. These are short-term motivators only. Enough studies have been done to show that people want to work in an environment where they feel valued, respected and are making a significant contribution to a purpose larger than themselves (meaning). Therefore, creating a strong and healthy organizational culture is more than providing a few services that give a nice shiny surface gloss. Build trust and respect so that when one digs below the surface, one finds a strong and healthy foundation for a great culture.

Taking the digging analogy further, I want to end with these wise words from Edgar Schein, Professor Emeritus with MIT Sloan School of Management, and author of many best sellers including the Corporate Culture Survival Guide :

“Culture operates at many levels and certainly how we do things around here is the surface level. I like to think of culture to be like the lily pond. On the surface you’ve got leaves and flowers and things that are very visible; a visitor would see them. That’s the ‘how we do things around here;’ but the explanation of why we do things in that way forces you to look at the root system, what’s feeding it and the history of the pond, who planted what. If you don’t dig down into the reasons for why we do things this way you’ve only looked at the culture at a very superficial level and you haven’t really understood it.”

How would you define company culture? What do you think are the key factors to build and sustain a great company culture? I would love to hear back and learn from you.

Five Ways to Survive and Thrive during Organisation Structure Changes

Five Ways to Survive and Thrive during Organisation Structure Changes

by | Nov 24, 2013 | Business, Career, Management, Managing Yourself, Performance, Productivity

It starts with tremors and before you realise what is happening, the ground starts shaking violently under your feet and there you are in the middle of a major seismic activity hanging on for dear life to your seat. Hold on – I am not talking about cyclones, tsunamis or earthquakes of the natural kind. I am referring to the ground-shaking encountered during organizational structure changes. If you have ever worked in the corporate world, you know the kind I mean…. A quarter or two of underperformance and you can almost guarantee that the phrase “need for change” starts appearing in management communication. Unfortunately, this drive for the need for change usually does not focus on looking at the customer value creation, the business strategy or the execution gaps. The target is usually a few leaders and some shuffling of positions and responsibilities here and there at the top levels and maybe an acquisition – all under the banner “organizing for success”.

That’s all good (actually not, this is shifting the problem elsewhere and maybe creating a new set of problems but it’s a topic for another day) but in a hierarchical organization which majority of orgs are still – this is very unsettling for all the layers of people below. And given that org changes are the norm and hiding under your seat or the blanket at home till the dust settles down in the hope that things will turn out ok in the end could be an option, there is a better option as well and that is – to Be Prepared.

I consider myself a veteran at this org change business having gone through some 25 odd organization transitions in my career – some of which I just about survived and some in which I thrived. So here is my checklist of tips on coming out a winner in such transitions:

Tip #1 – Be an Intrapreneur: No matter which layer or function you are in the structure, always be a leader.  The security of a good job in a big company often brings in a sense of complacency.  In today’s scenarios, this complacency is very very risky for your career. If you were an entrepreneur or working in a startup, what would you be doing? Hustling everyday, that’s what – because what exists today might not exist tomorrow. So bring in that hustle factor into your job everyday – work for today. As Jim Rohn said – work harder on yourself than you do on your job or business.  Be an intrapreneur – an entrepreneur within your organisation. My mentor, Entrepreneur David K Williams, shared the four essential traits of an intrapreneur – read here. Do your best work and keep yourself relevant and you become sure of yourself and the fear of changing bosses, changing teams, changes at workplace will not be a fear anymore.

Tip#2 – Be Visible:  Doing great work and no one other than your immediate boss and your team knowing about it is not going to help you when your boss changes or your team changes. Much as you may hate the idea of it, you have to promote yourself. As I have written in one of my earlier posts, this was a hard-earned lesson for me. I had always believed that my work will speak for itself and rewards may be delayed but will never be denied. But then, who knows what tomorrow may bring? You cannot afford to be shy if you want your work to be recognized.  Be aware of your worth and don’t settle for less. You have to be your own marketing manager and actively market the value that you bring in to your manager, department and organization. Make sure people know who you are and what you do. Make your achievements and contributions visible as and when they happen and not just list them at appraisal time.

Tip #3 – Help Others: The single most important thing that you can do for your career is to help others in their careers. Read that line again – it is true. In life or in work, what you give is what you get. Its extra work I admit but the benefits far outweigh the efforts. I have always held the belief that real assets that we build at work are the relationships – you don’t lose these when you switch jobs or lose jobs. All the career advice about having a strong network around you is right – but it starts with an attitude of helping, of giving. Be the go-to person – be the first person that people around you think of when there is an issue to be resolved or a problem to be solved. You become an asset for your boss, your team and you company. And being an asset gives you plenty of leverage during an organizational transition – it gives you the negotiating power to tap the opportunities that the transition may bring.,

Tip #4 – Collect Mentors: A good mentor is invaluable for your career success. A mentor can be someone in your corner when you need some additional support. And if you have one within the company, she can protect you when things go wrong, propose you for great assignments and be your own internal reference. Look around you to find people who you admire and are role models for where you want to be. Don’t limit yourself to one mentor. You might look to one for domain expertise, to another for industry expertise, and yet another for personal scenarios when you need practical and helpful advice or brainstorming. And if you are lucky to find a great mentor, invest in that relationship and make sure that you too offer support when your mentor needs it.

Tip #5 – Be Aware: Of the work that you do, of your worth, of the games around you and of what is right. This Career Manifesto by Michael Wade says it all:

1. Unless you’re working in a coal mine, an emergency ward, or their equivalent, spare us the sad stories about your tough job. The biggest risk most of us face in the course of a day is a paper cut.

2. Yes, your boss is an idiot at times. So what? (Do you think your associates sit around and marvel at your deep thoughts?) If you cannot give your boss basic loyalty, either report the weasel to the proper authorities or be gone.

3. You are paid to take meaningful actions, not superficial ones. Don’t brag about that memo you sent out or how hard you work. Tell us what you achieved.

4. Although your title may be the same, the job that you were hired to do three years ago is probably not the job you have now. When you are just coasting and not thinking several steps ahead of your responsibilities, you are in dinosaur territory and a meteor is coming.

5. If you suspect that you’re working in a madhouse, you probably are. Even sociopaths have jobs. Don’t delude yourself by thinking you’ll change what the organization regards as a “turkey farm.” Flee.

6. Your technical skills may impress the other geeks, but if you can’t get along with your co-workers, you’re a litigation breeder. Don’t be surprised if management regards you as an expensive risk.

7. If you have a problem with co-workers, have the guts to tell them, preferably in words of one syllable.

8. Don’t believe what the organization says it does. Its practices are its real policies. Study what is rewarded and what is punished and you’ll have a better clue as to what’s going on.

9. Don’t expect to be perfect. Focus on doing right instead of being right. It will simplify the world enormously.

10. If you plan on showing them what you’re capable of only after you get promoted, you need to reverse your thinking.

 So what do you think? What tip did I miss? Tell me your story – I would love to hear and learn from you.

Pic Courtesy:  Scott Adams – http://dilbert.com/strips/comic/1997-11-22/

Five Steps to turn your Strategic Initiative into Execution Success

Five Steps to turn your Strategic Initiative into Execution Success

by | Jun 10, 2012 | Business, Business Operations, Leadership, Management, Performance, Productivity

However beautiful the strategy, you should occasionally look at the results – this famous quote by Sir Winston Churchill often comes to my mind when I participate in strategy presentations. Beautiful slideware beautifully presented for maximum impact – but hey! Wasn’t this the vision a quarter back, a year back or two years back and essentially the same strategy couched in the latest business buzz words? You may have discovered the same yourself and experienced a sense of déjà-vu – and we are not alone. Multiple business surveys have revealed that more than 60% of corporate strategies never end up getting executed.  The best thinkers and strategists could come together and create a superb vision for an organization but it remains just that – a recurring dream – if not followed by flawless execution. But that is no easy job especially in the current turbulent business environment, globally spread and diverse employees and non-hierarchical organization structures. All the different threads that make up an organization has to be woven together to create an environment where every initiative achieves its objective and on time.

So, how do you take a single line objective or goal in a strategy (say, develop talent in niche areas or target accelerated growth in emerging markets or create a culture of innovation) and convert that into a reality? I have worked on or observed quite a few of these initiatives and the results have varied – some died a quick death, some petered out and a few gathered momentum and achieved the desired objectives successfully. Here are five steps that I believe contribute immensely to operational agility and are critical to turn your strategic initiative into execution success:

Step # 1: Get organized –

Building an execution plan is the very first step. The plan has to be doable, well-defined, and realistic with clear objectives and time lines. Break up the strategy into four or five tactical goals (too many leads to dilution of efforts) and define the tasks, accountability and workflow for each of them. A structure and the process within the structure helps answer the how, what, who and where behind the high level strategy and goes a long way into making the strategy actionable.

Step # 2: Get Executive Sponsorship –

Most often, implementing a strategy involves working across different functions in an organization and you may or may not have control over their actions. Office politics, inter-personal dynamics, conflicting priorities could ruin your plan even before it gets off the drawing board. So get the full support of the heavy weights behind you – you will definitely need it to enforce discipline and collaboration. Get the full buy-in of your top management to make sure that they support not only the strategy, but also the specific plan you have prepared to execute it. Don’t even bother to start without this – you will get nowhere.

Step #3: Get the Right Talent –

Build cross-functional teams around each initiative selecting each team member very judiciously based on ability, personal interest and the special skills needed for the particular initiative. Through this, not only do you get the right talent but also create a shared sense of ownership and responsibility thus spreading the commitment with the organization. This will help in building momentum to sustain the initiative from the planning to execution phase.

Step #4: Communicate, Communicate and Communicate –

Communication is the life-giving oxygen at every step of the process. The rationale behind the strategic initiative and the implementation plan, the benefits that are expected as outcomes from the initiative and the impact of failure of the plan all need to be made transparent to the teams. Provide information, invite feedback and conduct training sessions to increase engagement and improve collaboration. Turn passive detractors into active and enthusiastic drivers of the process by using this powerful tool.

Step #5: Track and Measure –

Set up a steady state tracking mechanism and a schedule for review with the key stakeholders. Choose the performance metrics that best measure the progress (or regress) of the goals of your initiative. It is important to track and measure so that you know if you are winning to celebrate (publicly) or not winning to do course corrections on the execution plan (again publicly). This underlines the seriousness of the initiative and helps overcome the “this too shall pass” mentality in organizations. And of course, what gets measured gets improved, so you end up increasing your chances of execution success.

Transforming a dream into a reality in business or in life is not easy nor is it guaranteed. But then who said business operations was easy? I have seen initiatives succeed using the above steps (and all of them are important for successful execution) and as Marcel Telles said – A company can seize extra-ordinary opportunities only if it is very good at the ordinary operations. So the journey may be tough but the rewards would definitely be worth it – at the very least, you would not have to sit through the same strategy being presented for the umpteenth time in a new shape.

Tell me what I have missed out and where I might be wrong. How do you turn your strategic initiative into execution success? I would love to learn from you and get better.

Five Practices to Get People to Work Together – Entering the Collaboration Zone

Five Practices to Get People to Work Together – Entering the Collaboration Zone

by | Feb 18, 2012 | Business, Business Operations, Career, Communication, Leadership, Management, Managing Yourself, Mentoring, Performance, Productivity, World of Work

It is tough times for businesses today. Never has it been as important as now to do more with less, share resources and leverage each other’s strengths and get people to work TOGETHER as a single unit to beat the odds. Collaboration is the key to accelerating performance improvements and transformation. Different cultures, working styles and views make any project or initiative that needs collaboration a nightmare.

It does not have to be that way, though.  With a little bit of respect, give-and-take and clear communication, collaboration can become a reality.  Here are five behaviors to get people to work together that if put into practice will align individual performers into a high performance cohesive team ready to take on any challenge:

Get People to Work Together #1: Have One Shared Purpose –

Everyone on the team needs to have a shared purpose or goal leaving individual ambitions or personal agendas aside. Before starting on a project or mission, decide what the primary motive for collaboration is and what needs to be achieved when. Pull your weight, give it your best effort and be mindful about deadlines and commitments.

Get People to Work Together #2: Treat Each Other With Respect –

Treat each other with respect. Allow different views to come on the table giving each view equal consideration before collectively agreeing on the best course of action. Listen, participate and contribute. Give value to get value.

Get People to Work Together #3: Share Credit –

Don’t be an appreciation hog and shy away from giving appreciation where it is due. Be quick to praise and slow to blame. Aim for visibility of the group efforts and not just of your own. As Harry Truman said – It is amazing how much you can accomplish when it doesn’t matter who gets the credit.

Get People to Work Together #4: Let go of the “I” –

You may be an expert and know just the right way to get things done but that’s not what is wanted here. Let go of your ego and consider what the right way is to proceed as a team. Focus your energies and abilities in competing “outside” rather than “inside”. In-fighting is a sure recipe for failure.

Get People to Work Together #5: Leverage Strengths and Manage Weaknesses –

Leverage strengths and make up for each other’s weaknesses to take your group to levels of success that would not have been possible individually. Spend some time knowing each other’s strengths and weakness – ask questions, share ideas, learn new information, and bounce suggestions off one another. Then, divide responsibilities and set accountabilities so that the right people are on the right jobs and the goal becomes manageable.

What other behaviors have worked to get people to work together and improve collaboration in your organization? What irritates you when you are part of a team? I would love to get your insights.

Pic Courtesy : Tim Fishburne, the Marketoonist.