Category Archives: Management

Managers Need to Be Leaders, Not Managers

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One does not “manage” people. The task is to lead people.

-Peter Drucker

How many times have we seen comparisons between “management” and “leadership”? Warren Bennis, one of my favorite leadership authors, tells us that “management is doing things right; leadership is doing the right thing.” But are “doings things right”, and “doing the right thing” mutually exclusive? Can’t we have both? Of course we can. More importantly, we need both in order for our “service and knowledge” based economy to be successful. Research already shows organizations will flounder under management, but will thrive under leadership.

Many of the concepts of modern management were first created back during the Industrial Revolution, when we first developed industry and manufacturing and factories. Foremen were in charge of managing those factories, including the machines, equipment, resources, schedules, and the factory laborers. The foremen would soon find out that the factory workers did not like being managed as if they were machines, and so the workers resisted. The results were labor strikes and the creation of labor unions. Well that is no surprise. And it’s no surprise that unions still exist today.

It’s now the year 2011, almost 200 years after the Industrial Revolution, and far too many managers still have an Industrial Revolution mentality in carrying out their duties. Yet our economy no longer depends on machines and manual labor for production. Service and knowledge is what our economy produces, with 80% of our Gross Domestic Product coming from people. Production comes from workers who provide services and expertise, as opposed to machines and factories. But our management mentality has not progressed with the times. Instead of adapting to a different economy, management behaviors reflect the thinking of the 19th century. We have not made the leap towards leadership.

Here are some simple realities:

- Machines and operations are managed.

- Projects and resources are managed.

- Objectives and goals are managed.

- Tasks and deadlines are managed.

- Time is managed.

- Finances are managed.

- A business is managed.

- Things are managed.

But people? People must be led.

Leadership is what we respond to. People do not want to be managed. This is especially so with the modern-day workforce. We are not wired to respond to management. People are far more complicated than a factory machine, and require much more maintenance. People have needs, as Abraham Maslow articulated way back in 1943. People need job satisfaction, challenge, belief in a mission and an opportunity to contribute to that mission. We want continuous training, development and mentoring. We want opportunity to grow and advance. We want to be inspired and motivated. We want to trust our manager and be led by them. Salary and benefits are secondary priorities to us. There are enough HR surveys that tell us the same thing. In these surveys, workers indicate that work environment and job satisfaction are just as important, if not more important, than salary.

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Great Team Building Creates Competitive Advantage

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I am asked constantly what it takes to create competitive advantage, and not just from clients. Just about everyone I come into contact with is looking for the elusive answer. “How can I set myself apart from my competitors? How can I take business away from them?” The answer is easy: competitive advantage is created by people. Capable people put into strong teams. The internal behaviors of your organization are how companies set themselves apart from the competition. The attitudes, the level of commitment and motivation, and the resulting culture are what create competitive advantage.

I sometimes get blank stares when I give inquirers that answer. It’s not the answer people expect, and often not the answer they want. The “people” answer involves culture, and rah-rah, and touchy-feely, and that makes many managers and business owners uncomfortable. They would rather hear that the answer is buying into new technology, or re-arranging their office or store, or changing vendors. But consider that your competitors all have the same access to technology, the same access to vendors, and the same access to facilities as you do. The only difference-maker is your people, and the team culture, and how well that culture is able to innovate and think creatively. It’s how deeply the teams are committed to push the product envelope, the quality envelope, and the customer-service envelope. It’s how well your teams are positioned to connect with the customers and the markets you compete in.

Great teams create products and services that connect to customers at an emotional level. They create products and services that exceed the expectations of the customers. Great teams will take a customer transaction and turn it into a pleasing buying experience. A customer experience that is positive in every aspect is how the organization develops a relationship with the customer, a relationship based on credibility and trust. That relationship results in a loyal customer, one that recommends your products and services to friends and family. The organization then sees customer growth, revenue growth, and long-term success.

The notion that team cultures provide competitive advantage is not new by any means. Many organizations have created exceptional success this way, such as Johnson & Johnson, Toyota, Disney, Google, McDonald’s, and General Electric. These companies have achieved success by creating teams that performed at levels far beyond what is typical. This is also how small companies outgrow their competitors and become world class market leading companies. Every large Fortune 500 organization started out a small business, and created great teams that were committed to the vision and focused on creating excellence.

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New Ways For IT Managers To Keep The Staff That You Have

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First the bad news: it turns out that 25% of the best workers in the IT department are planning on leaving within the next 12 months. Do I have your attention now? Not to depress you even more, but it turns out that those internal job change programs that are intended to develop the next generation of IT leaders don’t work – 40% of the internal rotations that are made by IT “high-pots” (high potential) employees end up in failure. Let’s take a look at what problems you need to solve…

Problem: You Aren’t Engaging Your Best IT Workers

Jean Martin and Conrad Schmidt are researchers who have been looking into what makes leadership transitions successful. What they have discovered is basically bad news for IT managers.

Among the companies that they studied, what they found is that way too many of your IT rising stars are planning on becoming leaders at other firms! Specifically, 25% are currently planning on leaving your company within one year, 33% are not fully committed to their job (slackers), 20% have different career goals than they think the company has planned for them, and 40% have little confidence in their coworkers or the company’s senior management.

Clearly you have a problem here – your best & brightest are feeling disengaged. As an IT manager you need to find ways to get them to reengage with the company and with their careers at your company.

The researchers say that you can get them to both reengage and remain at your company. However, it’s going to take both time and effort on your part. What you are going to need to do is to provide them with the one thing that they crave above all others – public recognition for the work that they are doing. On top of this, you need to find ways to integrate their actions more closely with the company. This means that the company’s goals need to become their goals and you need to find ways to allow them to help tackle the company’s biggest challenges.

Problem: High-Pot Doesn’t Necessarily Mean Good Leader

Every IT worker wants to be classified as being a high-potential worker. What does this really mean? Researchers point out that what a company really wants from its high potential workers are leaders who will be able to grow into larger jobs and then deliver results in those jobs.

Studies have shown that more than 70% of the IT workers who are classified as being “high potential” still lack critical skills that will be needed in order be successful in future bigger jobs. What this means for you as an IT manager is that you may be wasting your precious limited talent development budget and resources on the wrong people.

The researchers say that there are three characteristics that an IT manager should be looking for when trying to determine if it would be worthwhile to make further investments in a high-potential team members: ability, engagement, and aspiration.

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How To Manage A Conference

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If you have been put in charge of conference management, then you must be prepared for what you are getting yourself into because it is a much more complex job than just booking hotel rooms and buying airline tickets. The timing, organization, and actual conference are huge jobs in themselves that can require many people if the conference is big enough, but if it is manageable for just one person then there is still a lot of work to be done.

The travel arrangements can be a tough aspect to deal with because you need to find out everyone’s schedule and find a good set of dates that aren’t conflicting with major holidays or other events. Flying tens or hundreds of people into one city can be a daunting task on its own so if you think you may need to hire someone to focus solely on the travel arrangements then be sure to do so because it is a full-time job.

Getting people to the hotel and then situated in their rooms can be another huge task that can require days of planning only to execute what needs to be done in about 2-8 hours. Making sure all the attendees have the correct rooms and all their baggage has been delivered can be quite a hassle so you need to think on your feet and make quick decisions. If even one attendee has lost their luggage for just a day, that can ruin the entire conference for them. It may be wise to get an assistant to handle this aspect of the conference because like planning the travel arrangements, this is also a full-time job.

After getting all the travel plans arranged, there is the very important decision of choosing where to host the actual meetings because there can be many things that can throw off the plan. Be sure to know how many people you are accommodating so you can determine the right size room. Find out about meals during the day, possibly if and where you can feed your guests. Think of chairs, tables, and other materials such as projectors that you may need, but normally if the hotel is nice they can take care of all this.

Finally, one of the most important parts of the whole conference are the costs. From the flights to the hotel and other expenses, hosting a conference can be a very costly event. You need to make sure that what you will gain will be more than you are willing to spend. Negotiate group rates and find out about special discounts for just hosting a large conference.

Hosting a conference can create a new and large customer base, fresh ideas, and great camaraderie between the guests. A meeting which is any size can be a great event to attend and manage, but you must make sure you know what you are doing. After reading this article, there is no doubt that you will know exactly what to do when it comes to conference management.

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