Management Information |
Tales from the Corporate Frontlines: A New Managers Tale
This article relates to the Manager/Supervisor competency, commonly evaluated in employee satisfaction surveys. This competency evaluates an employee's feelings regarding their direct manager or supervisor. The manager/supervisor competency covers topics like clarity of goals, manager support, coaching and feedback, and regular reviews of performance. The old adage that "people leave their managers, not organizations" is often true. Of all the workplace stressors, a bad immediate manager is one of the worst and will directly impact the emotional health, productivity, and retention of an employee. This competency can be especially insightful if your organization is losing quality employees while your compensation and benefit packages are equivalent with industry standards. This article, A New Manager's Tale, is part of AlphaMeasure's compilation, Tales from the Corporate Frontlines. It tells the story of a new manager's search for wise advice that will lead him to a successful career with a new company. Anonymous Submission As a recent college graduate, I'd just landed my first management position and was eager to begin. My start date was a few weeks away, and I decided to read up on the management techniques and principles I learned in college. I wanted to be successful with my new company, but more than that, I wanted to be successful and popular with the people I would supervise. As I sat in my local bookstore coffee shop one afternoon, poring over books and magazine articles, an old friend wandered by. Joe and I had worked together at one of my college jobs for two summers, and when he saw me, he stopped by to chat for a few minutes. He saw what I was reading and asked if he could offer a few hints from his own experience. A middle-aged worker, Joe was an employee with a great work ethic and sense of company loyalty. He also had experience working for many different managers over the years. I trusted him and wanted his input. "Go ahead," I said, and settled back with my coffee to listen. " First of all, Joe began, when you give instructions, be as clear as you can. Don't expect your people to read your mind. Let them know what you need, how and when you need it - with regard to workload. Don't make them guess, they hate it and it wastes time and results in unnecessary extra work and inferior quality." "Secondly, if you have a problem with someone's performance or conduct - take it to the back room. Discuss it, one on one, in private and come to an agreement. I've seen managers berate their employees publicly and come to regret it. In fact, I once saw that practice clear out an entire department - person by person." "Perhaps most importantly, don't hold back on praising your workers for a job well done. It doesn't cost anything and lets them know that their hard work is appreciated." "You are their boss, and they want to please you. It's the reason they come to work - other than a paycheck. The company I'm with now actually rewarded managers who scored highly on giving praise and recognition on their recent employee satisfaction survey. Many of them received hefty bonuses." Joe stopped to sip his coffee. "Is that it?" I asked."No, he smiled, but those three ought to give you a great start. Good luck, I know you'll do just fine". I said goodbye to my friend, and a week later started my new job. I've tried to follow his advice and be clear, tactful, and forthcoming with positive recognition. So far---so good! © 2005 AlphaMeasure, Inc. - All Rights Reserved This article may be reprinted, provided it is published in its entirety, includes the author bio information, and all links remain active. Measure. Report. Improve your organization with AlphaMeasure employee satisfaction surveys. Josh Greenberg is President of AlphaMeasure, Inc. AlphaMeasure provides organizations of all sizes a powerful web based method for measuring employee satisfaction, determining employee engagement, and increasing employee retention. Launch your employee satisfaction surveys with AlphaMeasure.
MORE RESOURCES: Unable to open RSS Feed $XMLfilename with error HTTP ERROR: 404, exiting |
RELATED ARTICLES
Selective Job Cuts Often Benefits Firm More Than Broad Layoffs Over Long Term It is difficult to pick up a newspaper or listen to a business news broadcast without being greeted with the announcement of another massive corporate layoff or cutback. The economy catches a chill and, as a result, the corporate world catches a profits "cold. Strategic Outsourcing: Testing the Outsourcing Waters and Staying Afloat Before Gertrude Ederle began her historic swim off of Cape Griz-Nez, France, she underwent extensive training for endurance and technique-even though she was already an accomplished record-breaking swimmer with Olympic medals to her name. Outsourcing IT may not garner the same attention as being the first woman to swim the English Channel, but it is no less important to gather as much experience and knowledge as possible on a small scale before diving in for the big swim. Auditing Improves Effective Planning Speak of operations assessment, and we'll hear its significant value. Speak of an audit, and we'll run for the nearest emergency exit. Can Your Business Run Without You? If you are a business owner or a business owner to be, let's examine this scenario.Like other people, you are so excited when you first started your own business. How To Get What You Really Want As a small business owner, entrepreneur or independentprofessional, it's important to make plans. It's also important to have the time to let things happen. 7 Tips for Growing Your Business You Do Not Want to Ignore: Business Strategies To Easily Implement Growing companies must always be ready for the next challenge. If you fail in meeting critical business challenges you will not grow. Managing Group Meetings MANAGING SMALL MEETINGS: Keep the size of the meeting as small as possible. The larger the group, the more complicated communication becomes and the more garbled the purpose may get. Effective Meetings Begin With a Real Agenda Everyone knows that an agenda is the key to an effective meeting. But an agenda that consists of a list of nouns, such as budget, software, and picnic, is useless. Classifying Motivational Needs While there exist several useful definitions of motivation, for our purposes we will define it as an individual's desire to do something based upon a need. When a person is confronted with a need (either perceived or actual), he or she usually is motivated to perform specific actions for some sort of gratification. Building Shareholder Value Through Your People Increasing shareholder value is the most important driver for organisations in the modern business world. Shareholder value is built through growing profit and building confidence in the organisation, which moves share prices upwards. Which ITIL Process Should We Implement First? The following question is usually debated a lot amongst IT managers. "With which process should we start when implementing ITIL?" Everybody has their own views, but here are my takes on it. Make It Easy to Reply - Voice Mail That Works If you are like most business people, voice mail has both simplified and complicated your life. On the good side, it helps you exchange information. Managing People - No One Shows You What To Do Imagine the following scenario - you pay a visit to yourdoctor one day and in the course of the conversation he orshe lets it slip that they have no formal medicalqualification. However, everything's okay because they'vebeen involved in the "doctoring" business for years, hadlots of experience and have read several books on thesubject; I bet you'd be out of there like a shot. Hiring for Success Hiring someone new to work in your business is one of the most critical decisions a business owner makes, although it is not always given the justice it deserves. If a position is vacant, or additional staff are needed, recruitment decisions are often driven by the pressure to get someone in quickly, rather than waiting for the best person to fill the job. 5 Steps to Identify Core Processes Part Two of Creating Well-Defined Processes SeriesNext Week: ImplementationLast week, we raised the question: how do you know where to begin? How can you identify a gap in one of your company's core processes?The answer: follow the money trail?But how do you follow the money trail, and what will that mean for your business? To answer this, let's look at five steps to identify your core processes and any needs for change.Step 1: Define Your Business ModelThe following question might sound very basic, but you should first ask yourself: what business am I in? You'll ask this because you want to follow the money trail: to identify how exactly you earn revenue and from where that revenue comes. Teaching Large Companies To Think Like The Little Guys Q: I am an executive at a large company and in our industry we are seeing a trend wherein smaller companies are gaining market share at an alarming rate. Our CEO believes the reason for this is that smaller companies are more prone to innovation and more entrepreneurial than larger companies. Too Much Time Treating Symptoms A man drives down the highway each day on his way to work. On Monday he gets a flat tire. Hire People For What They Do Best I recently flew from Seattle to Atlanta, I realized, just as we began our taxi, that it takes hundreds of support personnel to maintain a flight. I saw the woman at the check-in desk, security, pilots, luggage handlers, flight crews, air controllers, and the various staff physically on the tarmac doing whatever people do on an airport tarmac. The Three-category Approach to Performance Management: Effort, Ability, or Environment Performance Management is the act of managing personal or organizational performance. What can complicate this process are all the factors that can arise where a textbook process meets the situations and people that exist in your world. Interviewing: How to Stay Out of legal Hot Water Some interviewers ask great questions; others ask dumb questions; and, worst of all, some ask questions that can get them into legal hot water.Every recruiter, hiring manager, executive, and department manager must realize that asking the wrong questions or making improper inquiries can lead to discrimination or wrongful-discharge lawsuits. |
home | site map | contact us |