Latest / Enhance.training / Understanding The Purpose Of A Manager – What Should A Manager Do

Transcript

Understanding The Purpose Of A Manager – What Should A Manager Do · Enhance.training

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_00: What is the purpose of a manager?
• 0:02
  SPEAKER_00: What should a manager do to be viewed as really successful by the company that employs them?
• 0:07
  SPEAKER_00: What do great managers do that is so different from terrible managers?
• 0:12
  SPEAKER_00: Most know that both good and bad managers make decisions, organise work, manage communications and look after teams.
• 0:20
  SPEAKER_00: And yes, of course, how well managers do each of these activities is a factor.
• 0:25
  SPEAKER_00: Fundamentally, a company needs to be better than its competition just to survive, let alone thrive.
• 0:31
  SPEAKER_00: The burden of achieving this falls on managers.
• 0:35
  SPEAKER_00: There are two results or outcomes that any manager or leader needs to deliver to be viewed as valuable to the company that pays the manager's salary.
• 0:44
  SPEAKER_00: These fundamental outcomes are, firstly, to improve the performance of the team they lead, and secondly, increase how successful the business is.
• 0:53
  SPEAKER_00: Achieving both are essential to the manager's and the company's success.
• 0:58
  SPEAKER_00: The greater the manager's positive impact on both of these results, the more valuable that manager is to the business.
• 1:05
  SPEAKER_00: To have a great positive impact on the success of the business and the performance of their teams, the manager has to have a great positive impact on people.
• 1:16
  SPEAKER_00: People are at the heart of any business and team.
• 1:19
  SPEAKER_00: People make the decisions.
• 1:20
  SPEAKER_00: They create and produce what customers buy.
• 1:23
  SPEAKER_00: People create and maintain the processes and systems that run a company.
• 1:28
  SPEAKER_00: People are at the heart of everything that makes a business valuable.
• 1:32
  SPEAKER_00: Great managers have a very positive impact on their team members and the employees they work with.
• 1:39
  SPEAKER_00: They inspire, care, motivate, help, support, develop, build trust, respect and value team members, and so on.
• 1:47
  SPEAKER_00: Terrible managers annoy, upset, hurt, demotivate, damage trust, don't care, treat people like robots.
• 1:56
  SPEAKER_00: The activities and tasks undertaken by good and bad managers are similar, their approach and intentions very different.
• 2:04
  SPEAKER_00: Great managers serve their team, terrible managers serve themselves.
• 2:10
  SPEAKER_00: The easiest, quickest, and most reliable way to have a very positive impact on your team members is to help them, to support them and to serve the interests of the team.
• 2:20
  SPEAKER_00: Developing good management skills allows you to be a lot more effective in providing that service.
• 2:26
  SPEAKER_00: At the end of the podcast, I share the best ways for managers at any level to influence improved business performance.
• 2:34
  SPEAKER_00: So, firstly, improving the performance of the team is a fundamental purpose of a manager.
• 2:39
  SPEAKER_00: The manager holds a huge amount of influence over the success of the team they lead.
• 2:45
  SPEAKER_00: To be able to use that influence to improve the success of your team, I think you need to be aware of and pay attention to human psychology.
• 2:54
  SPEAKER_00: Setting really clear direction is a great example.
• 2:57
  SPEAKER_00: When the manager sets really clear direction by telling the team what they want, why they want it, and then reinforce what they have said by aligning their own decisions, actions and behaviours with the team direction that they have set out, then team members feel psychologically a lot safer.
• 3:15
  SPEAKER_00: This increased psychological safety means team members are happy to put as much of their time and effort as possible into tasks and activities that move the team in the direction the leader has set out.
• 3:25
  SPEAKER_00: They know that by doing this they are going to be rewarded by the leader and they know everyone else will be doing the same.
• 3:32
  SPEAKER_00: The result is much better team performance.
• 3:36
  SPEAKER_00: Contrast this with a direction set verbally, but with decisions and actions taken by the manager that conflict with this direction.
• 3:44
  SPEAKER_00: Team members are confused and so hedge their bets, put some of their effort into the direction verbally set out, and then some of it into the direction their managers' actions and decisions to suggest is important.
• 3:57
  SPEAKER_00: By splitting their time and effort across multiple different directions, the team does not progress as far in any direction, and team performance is significantly lower as a result.
• 4:08
  SPEAKER_00: Setting really clear direction and maintaining it is super important to team success.
• 4:14
  SPEAKER_00: Four other really important areas for managers to focus on to increase team performance are the second area, work on creating a positive work environment that enables and celebrates great decisions, actions, behaviours, and ultimately results across the team.
• 4:30
  SPEAKER_00: Understanding human psychology plays an important role in achieving this.
• 4:34
  SPEAKER_00: Your working and management style, the behaviour you display and the actions you take or don't take are all huge influences on the working environment.
• 4:44
  SPEAKER_00: When you are open and honest, your team is likely to follow.
• 4:47
  SPEAKER_00: When you show your team the behaviours you want and when you praise great behaviour and correct poor behaviour, your team behaviours will improve.
• 4:55
  SPEAKER_00: Focus on how you personally influence team environment and the team will follow your lead.
• 5:01
  SPEAKER_00: Thirdly, work hard at facilitating communication.
• 5:05
  SPEAKER_00: Your knowledge is power, the power to do a better job.
• 5:09
  SPEAKER_00: The more knowledge and information you can communicate to your team and get them to share amongst themselves, the better the teamwork, the higher the trust, the better the coordination of activities, the better the problem solving, the collaboration, etc.
• 5:23
  SPEAKER_00: Communicate openly and honestly and your team will do too.
• 5:27
  SPEAKER_00: Fourth, work hard to publicly solve problems that stop the team doing their best.
• 5:33
  SPEAKER_00: Problems come in all shapes and sizes.
• 5:36
  SPEAKER_00: Proactively look for problems with people, processes, systems, and through organisational conflict.
• 5:41
  SPEAKER_00: The more you can remove or reduce problems that stop your team members doing a great job, the more they will respect and appreciate you, plus you'll get increased team performance.
• 5:52
  SPEAKER_00: Fifth, commit time and effort to coach and mentor your team members.
• 5:56
  SPEAKER_00: You have a ton of skills and experience and knowledge that your team members don't, yet would benefit from gaining.
• 6:03
  SPEAKER_00: Development and career progression that comes with it is one of the most valuable ways to reward staff.
• 6:10
  SPEAKER_00: Make the time to improve their skills, and you'll get a lot of appreciation, motivation and increased output back from your team.
• 6:18
  SPEAKER_00: The purpose of a manager is to increase team performance.
• 6:22
  SPEAKER_00: With increasing team performance or maintaining current good team performance, the manager is adding significant value to a company.
• 6:30
  SPEAKER_00: If team performance is dropping or if the manager starts destroying team performance, the manager becomes a liability and a large cost to the company.
• 6:39
  SPEAKER_00: Increasing team performance starts with the manager providing a great service to their team to enable and encourage team members to deliver more.
• 6:47
  SPEAKER_00: Management skills play a part in this.
• 6:50
  SPEAKER_00: A much bigger part of improving team performance is determined by the approach and self-management skills of the manager.
• 6:58
  SPEAKER_00: Look after the interests of your team.
• 7:02
  SPEAKER_00: The second fundamental purpose of a manager is to increase how successful the business is.
• 7:08
  SPEAKER_00: Managers in general have a lot more influence on the success of a business than workers.
• 7:13
  SPEAKER_00: The biggest manager influences on business success, in my opinion, come through in firstly making good decisions that increase the sales, profit, and cash of a business over the short term and the long term.
• 7:26
  SPEAKER_00: This includes setting better strategies than the competition, taking advantage of good opportunities, avoiding mistakes and reducing business risks.
• 7:35
  SPEAKER_00: Second, making the best use of the resources the business has.
• 7:38
  SPEAKER_00: Third, increasing teamwork and coordination between teams and across the business.
• 7:43
  SPEAKER_00: And fourth, increasing the performance of the team that you look after by helping and supporting the success of the team as a whole.
• 7:51
  SPEAKER_00: Managers at every level are responsible for and able to influence all four of these areas.
• 7:57
  SPEAKER_00: The extent and breadth of that influence is different depending on your seniority and role.
• 8:03
  SPEAKER_00: Managers make better decisions and make better use of resources when they use data to measure, understand and gain insights on the cause and effect of actions, activities and projects within the business.
• 8:15
  SPEAKER_00: Being able to read and understand financial information is a huge help in understanding how to increase your business's performance.
• 8:22
  SPEAKER_00: Better understanding of the cause and effect of actions taken will help you make better decisions and use resources more effectively.
• 8:30
  SPEAKER_00: Make the time to understand the data available to you.
• 8:34
  SPEAKER_00: Increasing teamwork and coordination between teams and across the business is helped by managers building good working relationships and good communication channels with their peers and colleagues.
• 8:45
  SPEAKER_00: Anticipating and jointly solving problems, joining the dots to create opportunities, increasing communication and helping others out where you can all help to improve teamwork and coordination across the business, which in turn helps improve business performance.
• 9:01
  SPEAKER_00: Helping to improve business performance is a fundamental purpose of a manager.
• 9:06
  SPEAKER_00: If the business does well, so can everyone who works in that business.
• 9:12
  SPEAKER_00: So in summary, the purpose of a manager is to increase team performance and help increase business performance.
• 9:18
  SPEAKER_00: I've shared some of the best ways I know and have seen used in top companies for how to achieve better performance in any business for any level of manager.
• 9:27
  SPEAKER_00: Learn more about developing the mindset, behaviours, and skills needed to build high performing teams by visiting Enhanced.training and take a look at the performance improvement our Management Skills Accelerator course offers you and managers in your team.
• 9:42
  SPEAKER_00: Thanks very much for listening, and I look forward to speaking to you again soon.