Managers: Ask for Bad News

Don't allow bad news to blindside you. If you do, you'll have to shift priorities ina hurry to handle any promlems that arise unexpectedly.

Here are some tips to ensure you get the bad news in time to do something about it:

• Develop Independent sources of information. Cultivate informal contacts elsewhere in your organization. Take customer calls at the call center. Talk to your front-line staff.
  
• Push for depth. Does one element of a report seem a little off? Search for the reason why. That "off" fact or figure could alert you to a major problem.
  
• Create a "truth-telling" culture. Assign a "worse-case scenario" team to every analysis. Get everyone used to "facing the truth." Caution: Truth telling doesn't mean shooting down less than perfect ideas.
  
• Take action. If what your staff tell you just languishes, they won't come forward. Mobilize your resources and tackle the problem immediately.

Adapted from "How to Get Bad News to the Top" by Scott Kirsner

The Value of Mid-Level Management

I define management as the act of getting people to work together to achieve a common goal. In most organizations, the responsibility and roles of management vary by level and in most, the senior level management is responsible for the overall direction or strategy of the company and the middle level management is responsible for the tactical component that implements the plan developed by the senior level.

Strategic business initiatives and desired outcomes are normally focused on the financial results including shareholder satisfaction. Mid-level managers are responsible for the interlocking functions associated with management like organizing, planning, controlling, coordinating, and commanding. This responsibility also includes the utilization of available resources needed to produce the desired results.

Employees Want Good Management

A recent poll of the employees demonstrated that the most important thing to people at work is good management (36%). The employee also found that the respect of colleagues was very important (26%). Money, benefits, learning skills, and having fun in the workplace were far behind.

Our company, Innovative Leadership, focuses the majority of our training and development programs on the front line supervisor or manager. The roles and responsibilities of any supervisor or manager have changed over the years and it is important for companies to realize that the middle management of their organization is the real “glue” that holds the company together.

• Management today must learn to focus on the “bigger picture and translate the company’s goals into meaningful steps or action plans.
• Management must make sure the worker today is both engaged and responsive to change
• Management must also learn the legal do’s and don’ts of supervising to avoid legal mistakes that can cost them and their companies financial losses and embarrassment.
• Management must help elevate morale and retain the high achieving worker
• Management must be good decision-makers and problem solvers to enable them to give the proper direction

Management must also provide a leadership focus. Success must be viewed as a journey and it is the responsibility of management today to demonstrate the skill sets and competencies relating to:

• Talent Management
• Strategic Business Development
• Change Management
• Productivity and Performance
• Implementation with measured results
• Leadership Development

It is important to realize that in today’s workplace, 85% of employees are giving a less than average performance. Management’s primary role in the workplace is the development of people by helping them reach their potential. The most important factor in the workplace today is to engage the worker by providing a better understanding and clear definition of the direction of the company and future strategy.

We need to finally realize that strategy plus people equals success and your middle management team is the one that can ensure that the summation of the two is achieved. Our courses and workshops teach mangers the skill-sets and competencies that compliment the foundation elements to leadership and produce the desired results. We do things differently and the outcome is defined upfront. Call now for more information on our Leadership and Management Development Process at 609.390.2830.

Is anyone still listening?

The confidence from the C-suite to the employee is down in most companies. The conversation is focused on cost containment and expense reductions. Budgets again are being slashed and people are being asked to “do more with less”.

Many companies are discarding the talent that took them to the top. Experts today note that Talent Management is more important than ever but it appears to be falling on deaf ears.

Are you listening?

Changes in the economy are often precursors to changes in the ways we do business. Why are we still focused on everything except what we need to do? We need to retain top talent and develop the future talent for our company needs. The ASTD just published a major report titled, “Mission Critical – Keep Learning. This publication demonstrates “How to Communicate the Value of Learning in Difficult Economic Times”. Their publication is calling for all learning professionals to get in involved and make sure they contribute to a successful talent management strategy. The author feels that the ability to get the right people with the right skills into the right jobs in a cost-effective way makes it possible for a company to respond strategically. The publication also goes on to say that the entire organization must make the learning function support the organizations goals. The key decision makers in the organization must see a meaningful relationship between learning initiatives and results. Now there is a thought! Be more effective than just focusing of efficiencies. Isn’t it time to make sure that all programs focused on people development are directly linked to business goals?

Are you still listening?

The next thing is for everyone to realize that our middle management is the “glue that holds the company together”. I just recently read an article in HR Daily Advisor titled, “Top Five Mistakes Leaders Make in Tough Times”. In her opinion, Ellen McDargh,CSP, CPAE, felt that in tough times, leaders become reactive and reactionary, huddle with only the corporate folks, subscribe to the “cut…cut…cut” philosophy, target new clients and customers, and subscribe to the “do more with less”. Middle management is the leader of the majority of the staff. They must focus on being effective and producing the desired results in areas that have been bludgeoned to death by cost containment measures and layoffs.

A recent survey of the American workers demonstrated that “Good Management” is the most important thing that employees want in the workplace. Things that finished far behind “Good Management” included respect of colleagues, money and benefits, learning new skills, and having a fun environment.

Is anyone listening?

We need to make leaders out of every employee but the most important ingredient for business success is the development of the middle manager. Middle management must elevate morale in poor economic times, retain and motivate the high achieving employee, their team is expected to comprehend the “bigger picture” in terms of strategy and recommended plans of action. It is more important for the middle manager to break down the strategy into goals that can be comprehended and implemented by the action of the staff. They need to give direction, monitor performance, discipline the staff, and demonstrate organizational effectiveness by getting results. In addition to all of this, they have to understand that their actions may put them in the same legal liability position as that of their company. That’s quite the responsibility! Shouldn’t they continue to learn how to manage their employees as well as themselves?

I have read article after article on the Benchmarks involved with Human Resources Departments and have not found Mid-level management development as one of the major benchmarks for success. I have heard about the metrics associated with organizational performance, HR service and delivery, employee engagement, voluntary turnover, HR practices, budget management, technology assessment, and more. What is HR and the C-Level doing to continue their company’s success??

Here at Innovative Leadership, we have focused our company on the development of middle level managers and our programs compliment all of the metrics ever associated with a strategically oriented HR Department:

1. Tools that qualify potential management candidates from the date of hire.
2. Training and Development Courses that highlight goal-orientation and business results
3. Provides an organization with the ROI prior to the start of the program
4. Offers a variety of cost effective platforms including online application.
5. Course evaluation processes measure the changes in the behaviors and skill-sets associated with high achieving mid-level managers

We do things differently and our results demonstrate just that. Please tell me just one thing . . . Is anybody still listening?