new thinking about management

When I worked full time as a management consultant and management trainer, the field was clogged with theories, attitudes, approaches, and there was a big industry there. Good money too for people like me. Since I've reduced (and widened!)what I do, focussing more on personal development and life-story work, my distance from the earlier field of work has made me more cynical.Certainly more in touch with the everyday realities of middle management. This is something I plan to look into more.

Another long gap. And times are tougher still. So what does it take to manage effectively and successfully these days? How do you learn to manage? There is much less training around and you may have to do more learning under your own steam. As I see it, the ability to see things clearly and to be ready for basic assumptions to change is one of the most important aids to learning and survival as a manager these days. This means taking responsibility for your own ideas, looking for evidence, checking things out. I'd say that the time for following the mantras of management, or even the assumptions within your organisation, is over or is certainly going. Increasingly we have to run our working lives as our own business, even when we're in a big organisation. This kind of approach to your work, whether employed or self-employed, can give you a kind of inner security - but it's hard work. I'll develop thee ideas in my next post and will welcome comments.

2011 will be different

Back to the blog after something of a gap. I'm really interested to see how managing and management will be changing (if they do) in response to the economic changes and the prevalent job cuts.

I guess that we'll all need to be paying attention to managing our own lives as well as managing in our jobs. The principles of managing well can apply to everyday life as well as to succeeding in an organisation. "What are my desired outcomes for this year?" is a question worth asking, as well as paying attention to what the organisation expects from you.

I'm seeing changing views about the expectations of the for-profit sector. Michael Porter, the guru himself, is talking about social value as well as return to shareholders. I wonder how (or whether) that will play out in practice.

http://fsg.org/tabid/191/ArticleId/241/Default.aspx?srpush=true
Creating Shared ValueMichael Porter, Mark Kramer.

Creating shared value involves value creation for business that simultaneously yields more profit and greater social impact, resulting in powerful transformations and opportunities for growth and innovation in both business and society. The concept of creating shared value focuses on the connections between societal and economic progress, and has the potential to unleash the next wave of global growth and competitive advantage.

Harvard Business Review, January/February 2011.

courage in management

I'm thinking at the moment about courage in management, reflecting that managing well takes a lot of nerve, especially for someone new to the role.
I remember feeling, with great anxiety and surprise, "You mean this is going to be up to me? That I'll be judged by other people's results?" when I first took a management role. I'd been so keen to get there, and yet managing the transition from effective practitioner to manager took all the courage I had.

I was lucky to have a good mentor, who mainly said, "You need to learn to take a deep kind of responsibility for yourself."
I'd thought I was a pretty responsible person, but she meant something much deeper. She went on to say, "If you're comfortable with yourself in a genuine way, you'll have the courage to accept the responsibility of managing a team."

new starts

I read somewhere that "September is the new January" meaning that this is the time for new starts and new resolutions. Certainly here in the UK we are having an energising September, where it feels like time to clear up, plan,  and Just Get It Done.

So what are you going to make happen this month? 

I'm working on improving newmanagersonline.net, checking links, uploading more scenarios and cartoons, and spreading the word. I have some good contacts who have used the site and liked it, so word of mouth seems like my best bet.

What do you need other people to know about you or your work? Consider how to publicise yourself in a subtle way. It will make a difference. Even an interview where you weren't offered the post gives you the chance to leave a good impression with some people; I have often seen this  benefit colleagues in a surprising way.

Being effective in a new organisation or setting

Getting into a new organisation, or role, or department, is much like the process of going to live in another country. You need to learn the language and customs, "the way we do things around here,"  if you want to be taken seriously and have some influence. 

Treat the first few weeks as a learning process, with or without a formal induction. Get a sense of who gets listened too, where the power lines are. 

Figure out what matters to people. If you know what matters to them, what their priorities are, then you can explain what you want or bring in new ideas in a way that will get heard.  Connect with the language and style that you see around you - not by imitating, but by matching in a subtle way. This helps people to feel comfortable with you and able to trust what you say.

what is strategy, really?

Strategic thinking helps us take positions in a world that is confusing and uncertain. You can’t get rid of ambiguity and uncertainty—they are the flip side of opportunity. I liked this comment from an interview with Richard Rumelt 

He goes on to say that we should distinguish what he calls "rolling plans" from strategy. For him, strategy is about exploiting some change in the environment:  in technology for example, or consumer tastes. Strategic planning, he says is opportunity-driven. Our annual 'strategic planning' efforts should be called 'long term resource planning, he says, and separated from the strategic thinking activities that need to respond to change, and respond early.

How does this affect a new manager? Personally, it implies that you should have two distinct ways of thinking about  your future - one 'resource planning' which is your plan for what you'll learn in your new role and how you'll learn it:

 and the other a more 'strategic' approach where you look out for subtle changes in what's taken for granted, for the emerging work  or career opportunities, any straws in the wind that indicate what you need to be ready for.

At work, where does strategic planning and strategy fit in for the new manager? It's the kind of thinking you need  to do as you look around your organisation, think about your team and staff development. Where is the organisation going? where is your part of it going? and most importantly, what are the changes that you need to be aware of? What are your customers saying, for example?  What do the people in your network at work complain or worry about? How is this all changing? If you think in this way from time to time, you can pick up the subtle changes that may affect your team and that you need to be ready for.

As Rumfelt says, Strategic thinking helps us take positions in a world that is confusing and uncertain. 

That applies to most of us these days.

getting started as a manager

When people join the New Managers members group, they are asked what their challenges are. (This is to help us tailor the site to meet what people are dealing with right now.)

When I read them I often feel daunted, and am impressed by their determination and, yes, their courage. It's a big change, moving up to making things happen through other people rather than doing it yourself. Many of us have done it through our lives in small ways, and it's useful to reflect on how we deal with these kinds of shifts: moving from one way of valuing yourself and "getting things right" to a place where thise are less valid and there are a new set of assumptions, standards, guidelines.

membership of newmanagersonline

New Managers Online is moving forward. 

There is more material on the open area of the site which we add to regularly. As well as this, there are the members pages with more information, different ways of learning and new ideas.

You can join now for free and won't be charged ever again!

At the end of this month we'll be charging (a very small amount) for membership.  

Ask a question about your work as a manager and get a reply within 2 days. Join the forum and see what others have to say. Look up subjects like team meetings, conflict, delegating, and many more, to get down to earth advice that really works.

http://www.newmanagersonline.net