1. Illuminations
The Full Management
The Management Skills Pyramid shows all the skills a manager must master to be
successful and shows how these management skills build on each other toward
success.
Level 1
Skills Pyramid
Basic Management Skills for Beginning Managers
It is the foundation of the management skills pyramid, which
shows the skills a manager must master to be successful
and shows how these management skills build on each other
toward success.
There are four basic management skills anyone must master
to have any success in a management job. These four basic
skills are plan, organize, direct, and control and are dis-cussed
separately in detail below.
Ø Plan
Planning is the first and most important step in any manage-ment
task. It also is the most often overlooked or purposely
skipped step. While the amount of planning and the detail
required will vary from task to task, to skip this task is to invite
sure disaster except by sure blind luck.
Although most people associate the term planning with gen-eral
business planning, there are also different levels of plan-ning:
• Strategic Planning,
• Tactical Planning,
• Operational Planning
And there are different kinds of planning:
• Disaster Planning
• Succession Planning
• Crisis Planning
• Compensation Planning
Ø Organize
A manager must be able to organize teams, tasks, and proj-ects
in order to get the team’s work done in the most efficient
and effective manner. As a beginning manager, you may be
organizing a small work team or a project team. These same
skills will be required later in your career when you have to
organize a department or a new division of the company.
Clearly, there is a lot of overlap between planning the work
and in organizing it. Where planning focuses on what needs
to be done, organization is more operational and is more fo-cused
on how to get the work done best.
When you organize the work, you need to:
• determine the roles needed,
• assign tasks to the roles,
• determine the best resources (people or equipment) for
the role,
• obtain the resources and allocate them to the roles,
and
• assign resources to the roles and delegate authority
and responsibility to them.
Whether you have been assigned a small team or a project
to manage, beginning managers must also be able to orga-nize
offices and data systems.
You may not be able to physically move people around in or-der
to get your team together, but you should consider it. On
the other hand, you may need to move several people into a
small space and you will have to organize things so the team
can work effectively within that space. Later in your career,
you may need to organize an office to accommodate teams
from several different departments and their specific needs.
You will also need to be able to organize all the systems that
will handle the data your team needs to collect or distribute.
91 THE CERTIFIED ACCOUNTANT 4th Quarter ــــــــ 2009 Issuse # 40
2. Illuminations
These days, those are probably computer systems. You must
decide whether, for example, you need to set up shared web
pages on the company’s intranet or just a shared folder on
the file server. How are you going to organize the systems so
everyone who needs information has access to it (and that it
is not available to those who should not see it, like your com-petitors)?
If your team needs or produces something other
than information, you must organize so that your team gets
what they need, when they need it, and can get out to others
what your team produces at the right time.
Finally, remember, that it is seldom enough to organize
things once. With constant changes in resources, goals, and
external factors you will usually need to reorganize to adjust
for them.
Ø Direct
Directing is the action step. You have planned and organized
the work. Now you have to direct your team to get the work
done. Start by making sure the goal is clear to everyone on
the team. Do they all know what the goal is? Do they all know
what their role is in getting the team to the goal? Do they
have everything they need (resources, authority, time, etc.)
to do their part?
Pull, Don’t Push
You will be more effective at directing the team toward your
goal if you pull (lead them) rather than push (sit back and
give orders). You want to motivate the people on your team
and assist and inspire them toward the team goals.
Ø Control
Some writers try to “soften” this skill by calling it “coordinate”
or similar terms. I prefer the stronger term, “control”, because
it is essential that the manager be able to control the team’s
activities.
In the steps above, you have planned the work, organized the
resources to make it happen most efficiently, and directed the
team to start work. In the control step, you monitor the work
being done. You compare the actual progress to the plan. You
verify that the organization is working as you designed it.
If everything is going well, you do not need to do anything but
monitor. However, that seldom happens. Someone gets sick,
the database sort takes longer each iteration than projected,
a key competitor drops their prices, a fire destroys the building
next door and you have to evacuate for several days, or some
other factor impacts your plan. The control step now dictates
that you have to take action to minimize the impact and brings
things back to the desired goal as quickly as possible.
Often this means going back to the planning stage and ad-justing
plans. Sometimes it may require a change in the or-ganization.
And you will have to re-direct everyone toward
the new goals and inspire them. Then, of course, you control
the new plan and adjust if needed. This cycle continues until
you complete the task.
Level 2
Management Skills for Developing Your Team
It is the team building skills any developing manager must
master. It shows the skills a manager must master to be suc-cessful
and shows how these management skills build on
each other toward success.
There are three categories of team management skills anyone
must master to have any success in a management job. These
are motivation, training and coaching, and employee in-volvement
and are discussed separately in detail below.
Ø Motivation
The most fundamental team management skill you must
master is motivation of your team and of the individual mem-bers
of the team. You can’t accomplish your goals as a man-ager
unless your team is motivated to perform, to produce, to
deliver the results you need. Motivating each of the individu-als
on your team requires recognition on your part as each
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3. Illuminations
team member’s motivation needs are different. And motivat-ing
the team requires a different approach from motivating
the team members.
Ø Training and Coaching
It is unlikely that you will ever manage a team where every-one
is adequately trained. It is even more unlikely that you
will have a team that never needs coaching. You need to be
able to identify the training needs of your team members and
be able to get that training for them. And you need to coach
all the members of your team, even the well trained ones, to
help them achieve their best levels of performance.
Ø Employee Involvement
All the training we do as managers, all the motivation we
attempt, all that positive feedback and morale building are
all aimed at one thing. Increasing employee involvement. If
your employees are not involved, if they just come to work
to warm a seat, you won’t get their best performance. If you
don’t get their best, everything they do will cost you more
than it should have. It might be in a high error or rework rate.
It might be in an innovative new idea that they didn’t share
with you. Whatever the issue, it will cost you.
So how do you get your employees engaged and com-mitted?
Here are the basics: Inspire and Admire
One of the biggest mistakes a manager can make is to ig-nore
their employees. The same attention you paid to their
work assignments, to their satisfaction levels, to their sense
of being part of a great team needs to continue for as long as
they are in your group. As soon as you start to slack off, their
satisfaction and motivation decreases and you lose them.
Level 3
Personal Management Skills
It is the next level of the management skills pyramid, which
shows the skills a manager must master to be successful
and shows how these management skills build on each other
toward success.
There are two areas of personal management skills you must
master to be successful as a manager. These are self man-agement
and time management.
Ø Self management
By this point in your development as a manager, you are
good at assigning work to your employees and coaching
them through the difficulties so they can produce their best
work. You know how to motivate them and discipline them.
You have built them into a team. But are you as good at man-aging
yourself as you are at managing others? Do you stay
focused on the tasks that are truly important and not just ur-gent?
Do you do your job the best you are able?
Ø Time Management
If you have learned nothing else in your management career,
you have learned that there is never enough time to do all the
things you feel need to get done. That is why it is critical to your
success as a manager that you be skilled at managing time.
Level 4
Leadership Skills
Ask anyone and they’ll tell you. There’s a difference between
managers and leaders.
Ask them what that difference is and they may have a bit
more difficulty. Suddenly the words become amorphous and
undefined. Somehow leadership is an intangible - a charis-matic
component that some people have and others simply
don’t. That’s why, according to the ubiquitous “they”, it is
such a rarity.
The difference between being a manager and being a leader
is simple. Management is a career. Leadership is a calling.
You don’t have to be tall, well-spoken and good looking to
be a successful leader. You don’t have to have that “special
something” to fulfill the leadership role.
What you have to have is clearly defined convictions - and,
more importantly, the courage of your convictions to see
them manifest into reality. Only when you understand your
89 THE CERTIFIED ACCOUNTANT 4th Quarter ــــــــ 2009 Issuse # 40
4. Illuminations
role as guide and steward based on your own most deeply
held truths can you move from manager to leader.
Whether the group you oversee is called employees, associ-ates,
co-workers, teammates or anything else, what they are
looking for is someone in whom they can place their trust.
Someone they know is working for the greater good - for
them and for the organization. They’re looking for someone
not only that they can - but that they want to - follow.
Because it is only when you have followers -people who have
placed their trust in you - that you know you have moved
into that leadership role. And the way you see it is that your
organization is transcending all previous quality, productivity,
innovation and revenue achievements. You’re operating at
such a high level of efficiency that you’re giving budget back
to the corporation - and you’re still beating your goals.
You’re achieving what you always dreamed could be
achieved. And not only that, but it’s actually easier than you
thought.
Because you’re a leader. Because the classic command and
control management model - which, contrary to popular be-lief
still applies even in our most progressive 21st century
companies - is no longer in play. Sure, controls are in place.
Sure, you’re solving problems that arise.
But it’s not just you alone. You have the people in whom
you’ve put your trust - and who have happily and safely re-ciprocated
- to help you create organizational success.
Where to start? Begin by discovering exactly what your con-victions
are. Clarify and codify for yourself what you believe
in. Then, take a nice step back and see how those beliefs are
playing out in the organization as it stands today.
Don’t start with an organizational assessment based on the
numbers or your opinions about others. This is not about
“them.” This is all about you.
Realistically, you’ll go through this process not once, but
many, many times. This is a periodic reality and cross-check
to see how you’re doing in your own context and, as you be-gin
making changes, in the larger context.
Because, while you can and should expect yourself and your
immediate organization to make changes, you cannot - and
should not - expect the larger organization to immediately
respond or follow suit. This is a personal journey designed to
assist you in being more - and helping those whose lives you
touch to be more. Give the organization time. It’ll get there.
It’s just a little bit slow.
Leaders aren’t made or born. Leadership is a choice - a be-lief
in and commitment to everything that is good and noble
within you. Be a leader.
www.Management.about.com
Brainstorming
Generating many radical, creative ideas
Brainstorming is a popular tool that helps you generate
creative solutions to a problem. Used with your team, it helps
you bring the diverse experience of all team members into
play during problem solving. This increases the richness of
ideas explored, meaning that you can find better solutions
to the problems you face. Ideas should only be evaluated at
the end of the brainstorming session – this is the time to
explore solutions further using conventional approaches.
Where possible, participants in the brainstorming process
should come from as wide a range of disciplines as possible.
However, don’t make the group too big, groups of 5 to 7
people are often most effective.
To run a group brainstorming session effectively, do
the following:
• Find a comfortable meeting environment, and set
it up ready for the session.
• Appoint one person to record the ideas that
come from the session. These should be noted
in a format than everyone can see and refer to.
Depending on the approach you want to use,
you may want to record ideas on flip charts,
whiteboards, or computers with data projectors.
• If people aren’t already used to working together,
consider using an appropriate warm-up exercise
or ice-breaker.
• Define the problem you want solved clearly, and
lay out any criteria to be met. Make it clear that
that the objective of the meeting is to generate as
many ideas as possible.
• Give people plenty of time on their own at the
start of the session to generate as many ideas as
possible.
• Ask people to give their ideas, making sure
that you give everyone a fair opportunity to
contribute.
• Encourage people to develop other people's
ideas, or to use other ideas to create new ones.
• Encourage an enthusiastic, uncritical attitude
among members of the group. Try to get everyone
to contribute and develop ideas, including the
quietest members of the group.
• Ensure that no one criticizes or evaluates ideas
during the session. Criticism introduces an
element of risk for group members when putting
forward an idea. This stifles creativity and cripples
the free running nature of a good brainstorming
session.
• Let people have fun brainstorming. Encourage
them to come up with as many ideas as possible,
from solidly practical ones to wildly impractical
ones. Welcome creativity!
• Ensure that no train of thought is followed for
too long. Make sure that you generate a sufficient
number of different ideas, as well as exploring
individual ideas in detail.
• In a long session, take plenty of breaks so that
people can continue to concentrate.
www.mindtools.com
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