Developing Expert Managers

The lowest level of contribution in which the manager’s capacity is largely taken up by meeting short-term targets, dealing with immediate problems and addressing quality issues.

Many managers never get beyond contributing at this level, usually because this is what has been established as normal and is what is expected. There are times when managing at this level is necessary but it should be for as short a time as possible and is absolutely not a place to stay – it’s exhausting and frustrating.

The biggest challenge facing most managers is how to get beyond the level of Reacting. By definition you have almost no capacity to change anything.  We will help you identify the opportunities to create some capacity for yourself and how to use them to make some changes that will make an immediate impact.

It’s called Aligning because this is the stage where you have to create a Vision of success for your team that is itself aligned with what the business needs it to do, get the team’s buy-in and together work out how you will make it into reality. It means getting everyone’s heads out of the weeds and making changes together.  It means changing relationships with and within the team, making changes to the team so that it can function effectively and working on relationships with your team’s customers and its suppliers – whether they are internal or external.

It is the steepest part of the Managers’ Contribution Curve^TM and it is the hardest, but most transformational even though it takes some time to get through.  Once the team is aligned to a clear Vision and Mission, is itself functional and there are good relationships with its customers and suppliers, life starts getting much easier.

A manager who can successfully Align their team will find they have the capacity to start developing the team through the strengths of its members and hand off more and more responsibility to team members. Done intelligently, this is about Enabling through development, trust and providing opportunities so that individuals can play to their strengths by taking on roles and responsibilities that enhance what the team is collectively capable of. This is more rewarding for them and allows the manager to delegate confidently.

This creates more capacity that allows the manager to start looking at the processes the team uses and how they connect with the wider organisation, and start longer term planning of resources, succession, talent development and so on – all things that will ensure the business’ long term success.

At this level we see peer managers working together to support each other in achieving a shared purpose, making the best of the totality of the resources available to them and making changes that resolve problems for the wider organisation.  This is typically the level at which most managers can make a contribution for a while and then may need to drop back to support changes in the team until they can create the capacity to focus on Collaborating again.

The whole point of Collaborating is that the whole group of peer managers understands and accepts the inevitability that some will have to attend to other things for a while and willingly support and accommodate it.

A manager who has successfully created the capacity to operate consistently at the Collaborating level will have achieved considerable experience and standing within the organisation. Their reputation will carry the weight that allows them to influence their seniors, customers and represent the organisation publicly. They are able to contribute more to the organisation by coaching their peers, coaching upwards and creating new possibilities for customers that will lead to ongoing and increased business.

They also become role models for managers below them and may become mentors for junior managers.