If You’re a New Manager, Get Bossy

Common wisdom is that the best managers are collaborative.  After all, nobody likes to be bossed around.  But that’s not true for rookie managers.  New leaders who are perceived as having low status — because of their age, education, or experience — lead better when they tell subordinates what to do.  If as a new manager you sense that your team doesn’t yet have confidence in you, you’re better off setting the agenda, establishing clear direction, and putting people to work on what you think needs to be done.  Only after you have established your authority should you introduce a more collaborative style.

Adapted from “Why Bossy Is Better for Rookie Managers” by Stephen J. Sauer.

Hire for Passion, Not Just Talent

People are more creative when they feel passionate about their work.  Whether they are driven by interest, enjoyment, satisfaction, or a sense of personal challenge, they are more likely to take risks, look for multiple solutions to a problem, and seek out the best one rather than the easiest.  These are the people you want on your team. Get to know potential hires as thoroughly as possible, even before you have an opening for them.  Ask them why they do what they do, what disappointments they’ve had, what their dream jobs would be.  Look for fire in their eyes as they talk about the work itself, and listen for a deep desire to do something that hasn’t been done before. When you talk to their references, listen for mentions of passion.

Adapted from “Talent, Passion, and the Creativity Maze” by Teresa Amabile and Steve Kramer.

Turn Adversaries into Allies

Anyone who has faced rivals at work — bosses who take all the credit, team members who undermine things — knows how difficult it is to ignore them.  Instead, turn your adversaries into collaborators by following these three steps:  

• Redirect.  Try to channel your rival’s negative emotions away from you by bringing up something you have in common, or talking about the source of the tension in a favorable light. 
• Reciprocate.  Give up something of value to your rival — help complete a project or divulge important information — so you are poised to ask for something in return. 
• Reason.  Explain that not working together cooperatively could mean lost opportunities.  Most people are highly motivated to avoid a loss. 

Adapted from  “Make Your Enemies Your Allies” by Brian Uzzi and Shannon Dunlap. 

Keep Gen-Xers Engaged

Generation X may be a smaller population than Baby Boomers or Millennials, but it wields great influence in today’s organizations.  People in this generation are the all-important bench strength for aging leadership.  To keep them around, here’s how to keep them engaged.  

• Develop corporate chameleons.  Gen-Xers like to continually learn. Rotate promising employees through different functions on a regular schedule.  This will keep things fresh and prep them for leadership roles that require broad experience. 
• Bring them out of the shadows.  Put Xers in charge of high-visibility projects to spotlight their abilities, or partner them with Baby Boomers who can enhance their careers. 
• Test their wings.  Many Xers have an entrepreneurial spirit.  Foster this interest by letting them take responsibility for a company-sponsored venture. 

Adapted from “Don’t Dismiss Your Gen X Talent” by Sylvia Ann Hewlett.  

Three Tips for Creating a Realistic Budget

If you have to put together an annual budget for your department, your compensation may depend on your ability to stick to it. Here are three tips for creating a manageable budget:  

• Stay goal-oriented. If you aim to increase sales, make that your overriding concern. Don’t let other issues sidetrack you. 
• Don’t do it alone.  Include your team members in developing the budget — they may have knowledge about certain line items that you don’t. 
• Question your assumptions.  A budget should take current data, add assumptions, and create projections.  Be careful about the assumptions you make and question how likely they are to come true.  When you present the budget, you’ll need to be prepared to defend them. 

Adapted from the Harvard ManageMentor Online Module: Financial Essentials.  

When Choosing a Job, Culture Matters

Some organizations will excite you.  They’ll stimulate your success and growth.  Others will be stressful. They may lead you to quit before you’ve accomplished much or learned what you hoped to.  With the pressure (or excitement) of finding a new job, it’s all too easy to pursue a job opportunity or to accept an offer with only a hazy view of how the institution really operates.  The path to an institution you’ll like is to investigate the culture you’re thinking of joining before you accept the position. 

Sean (name has been changed) is a master at this.  He pursued a job offer at a Fortune 500 company to be the first Chief Administrative Officer (CAO).  He was well-qualified, presented himself well, and got the offer.  He’d been competing with capable people. He was proud he’d “won the contest.” 

The next step was a return visit, after which he’d decide to accept the offer.  Sean had already learned a lot about the company’s businesses and some things about the organization.  His priority now was culture and how the new position might fit: “I asked people, ‘What are you excited about? What are you proud of?  Who are your close friends in the company?  How does the group function together?’” Sean learned things like who the heroes were, what made them successful, and what his biggest challenges and opportunities would be in the job.  The different people he met with were learning from his questions.  It was almost like he already worked there, and they were jointly determining how to make the new role successful. 

Surprisingly, Sean turned down the offer. The new role was a misfit in the company’s culture. 

As he learned more about the company, Sean questioned how he’d be viewed as the first CAO in a company where everyone else focused on bottom-line results.  It was a highly performance-driven environment with lots of business units. Corporate staffs were secondary. 

“I asked how they’d keep score on me, how they’d really know I was making a difference,” he said.  “We never got to satisfactory answers to that question.  They weren’t hiding anything. This CAO position was a new one, and they didn’t really know.” 

Sean was concerned that this new position wouldn’t fit in the company’s culture, that he wouldn’t really be accepted, and that it wouldn’t be a springboard to the line job that he really wanted after two or three years as CAO.  He might have made it work, but why take the risk? 

It’s not uncommon for job seekers to enter organizations without understanding the culture and come away disappointed.  When considering a new job, be sure to investigate the institution’s culture. Consider these questions to guide you: 

1. What should I learn?  Understand the organization’s purpose — not just what they say they’re doing, but also how their purpose leads to decisions and what makes them proud.  Learn how the organization operates.  For example, consider the importance of performance, how the organization gets things done, the level of teamwork, the quality of the people, how people communicate, and any ethical issues. 

Except for ethical issues, there’s no absolute standard of what’s best in organizational culture.  Different purposes and different organizational features can be more or less appealing to different people.  When you understand how the potential employer operates, you’ll need to consider how well that matches your goals.  Your target organizational culture is an important part of your aspirations. 

2. How should I learn?  Read everything you can find about the institution, but read with a critical eye. Institutions have formal vision statements, and they often mention cultural topics in other public reports, but these documents are written with a purpose in mind.  Independent writers take an independent perspective. They can be more critical, but they can miss details and get things wrong. 

Discuss culture with people in the organization.  You’ll talk to people in the interviewing process, of course.  But you may learn different things if you meet others there who aren’t involved in your recruiting process.  Also talk to people outside the organization who know it — customers, suppliers, partners, and ex-employees.  Their different experiences with the institution will affect their views, so ask about situations where they’ve seen the culture in action.  

3. When should I learn?  It’s hard to learn about culture at an early stage in your search.  But your impressions can guide you to target some institutions and avoid others.  

Culture may come up in job interviews, although it may be complicated to do much investigation when you’re trying to sell yourself.  People sometimes worry that discussing culture might make people uncomfortable and put a job offer at risk.  The culture topic is certainly not off-base, and it is necessary to know for future growth in the company.  Hiring managers should expect it.  Whether it’s in interviews or after you have an offer, you’ll do best if your questions show you’re learning rapidly about the organization, taking the employer’s perspective, and beginning to figure out how to succeed there.  Culture questions can cast you in a positive light. Sean’s line of questioning confirmed the CEO’s judgment to hire him, even if Sean didn’t like the answers. 

What’s your view of how culture affects the job search? Has culture played a part in how you choose your future employer?   

Adapted from Bill Barnett who led the Strategy Practice at McKinsey & Company

How to Reach Your Enemy

Having enemies in the workplace is often destructive. Ideally you should try to work with your rival instead of against him. But if your collaborative efforts fail, try one of these strategies instead: 

• Find a common ally.  Seek a third party whom your enemy trusts. A common ally may convince him of the benefits of working with you. 
• Wait for the right time.  Sometimes people need time and space before they can see your side. Put off communication until the right opportunity presents itself. 
• Recognize when to go elsewhere.  The effort of converting a rival is sometimes so great that you’re better off focusing your energy on another relationship. 

Today’s Management Tip was adapted from “Make Your Enemies Your Allies” by Brian Uzzi and Shannon Dunlap. 

 

 

Trust Your Gut

Most of us are taught to defer to authority. As a result, we tend to disregard our internal compasses.  But your instincts are often right.  Here is how to counter your conditioning and question authority: 

• Listen to your inner voice.  Take a moment to breathe and consider what is going on. Ask yourself, “Are there other ways to approach this assignment?”
• Constructively question.  Ask your boss, customer, or client: Why do we do it this way? Would you be open to different ways? Can we experiment?
• Reflect.  Whether you’ve followed along or pushed for an alternative, think about what happened. Remember what it felt like to go against authority and think about how you might handle it differently in the future.  

Today’s Management Tip was adapted from “Learn to Trust Your Gut” by Ron Ashkenas. 

 

8 Core Beliefs of Extraordinary Bosses

The best managers have a fundamentally different understanding of workplace, company, and team dynamics.  See what they get right.  

A few years back, I interviewed some of the most successful CEOs in the world in order to discover their management secrets.  I learned that the “best of the best” tend to share the following eight core beliefs.

1. Business is an ecosystem, not a battlefield. 

Average bosses see business as a conflict between companies, departments and groups.  They build huge armies of “troops” to order about, demonize competitors as “enemies,” and treat customers as “territory” to be conquered. 

Extraordinary bosses see business as a symbiosis where the most diverse firm is most likely to survive and thrive.  They naturally create teams that adapt easily to new markets and can quickly form partnerships with other companies, customers … and even competitors. 

2. A company is a community, not a machine. 

Average bosses consider their company to be a machine with employees as cogs.  They create rigid structures with rigid rules and then try to maintain control by “pulling levers” and “steering the ship.” 

Extraordinary bosses see their company as a collection of individual hopes and dreams, all connected to a higher purpose.  They inspire employees to dedicate themselves to the success of their peers and therefore to the community–and company–at large. 

3. Management is service, not control. 

Average bosses want employees to do exactly what they’re told.  They’re hyper-aware of anything that smacks of insubordination and create environments where individual initiative is squelched by the “wait and see what the boss says” mentality. 

Extraordinary bosses set a general direction and then commit themselves to obtaining the resources that their employees need to get the job done.  They push decision making downward, allowing teams form their own rules and intervening only in emergencies. 

4. My employees are my peers, not my children.

Average bosses see employees as inferior, immature beings who simply can’t be trusted if not overseen by a patriarchal management. Employees take their cues from this attitude, expend energy on looking busy and covering their behinds.

Extraordinary bosses treat every employee as if he or she were the most important person in the firm. Excellence is expected everywhere, from the loading dock to the boardroom. As a result, employees at all levels take charge of their own destinies.

5. Motivation comes from vision, not from fear.

Average bosses see fear–of getting fired, of ridicule, of loss of privilege–as a crucial way to motivate people.  As a result, employees and managers alike become paralyzed and unable to make risky decisions.

Extraordinary bosses inspire people to see a better future and how they’ll be a part of it.  As a result, employees work harder because they believe in the organization’s goals, truly enjoy what they’re doing and (of course) know they’ll share in the rewards.

6. Change equals growth, not pain.

Average bosses see change as both complicated and threatening, something to be endured only when a firm is in desperate shape.  They subconsciously torpedo change … until it’s too late.

Extraordinary bosses see change as an inevitable part of life.  While they don’t value change for its own sake, they know that success is only possible if employees and organization embrace new ideas and new ways of doing business. 

7. Technology offers empowerment, not automation. 

Average bosses adhere to the old IT-centric view that technology is primarily a way to strengthen management control and increase predictability.  They install centralized computer systems that dehumanize and antagonize employees. 

Extraordinary bosses see technology as a way to free human beings to be creative and to build better relationships.  They adapt their back-office systems to the tools, like smartphones and tablets, that people actually want to use. 

8. Work should be fun, not mere toil.

Average bosses buy into the notion that work is, at best, a necessary evil.  They fully expect employees to resent having to work, and therefore tend to subconsciously define themselves as oppressors and their employees as victims. Everyone then behaves accordingly. 

Extraordinary bosses see work as something that should be inherently enjoyable–and believe therefore that the most important job of manager is, as far as possible, to put people in jobs that can and will make them truly happy.  

 

Adapteed from:  Geoffrey James‘ “Sales Source” (formerly “Sales Machine” on CBS) is the world’s most-visited sales-oriented blog.  His best posts, with many extras, are in his new book:  How to Say It: Business to Business Selling. 

End a Mentoring Relationship Before It Dies

It’s easy for a mentoring relationship to outlive its worth. You get into a groove, you enjoy the stimulating conversations, and you’re learning.  But sometimes you have to move on to move up.  Set goals and assess whether you have achieved them.  Once you have, it might be time to find a new mentor to help you with your next set of challenges.  Thank your mentor for all her help and ask permission to use her as a reference when you’re scouting for the next one.  Keep in touch with your past mentors even after the relationships officially end. 

Adapted from Guide to Getting the Mentoring You Need.