“The Power of Leadership”

We’ve been talking much lately about “senior” management issues. Let’s step back and focus some attention on “new” supervisors and managers. Many of our readers, especially those newly out of the university may be entering their first real supervisory or management challenge. It may be as a assistant project manager or as a first time supervisor of a small team. Regardless of the size of the project or the number of team members, this may actually be the most important point in your management career. It is at the earliest points of your management career that you form the habits you will continue to develop and refine throughout your career. If you start with bad habits, you will find your career development will be a rough road.

It is not unusual when you receive your first assignment with responsibility over others to project on the outside a “Can do!” attitude while on the inside your may be saying, “What have I gotten myself into?” Those of you who have heard me speak on leadership to university classes, and a few companies as well, know that one of my pet-peeves with many HR and training managers is that they wait until “after” a person has been promoted or given more responsibility before they provide them with the necessary training to handle their new responsibilities. This practice has never made sense to me!

You provide the appropriate training to an individual “prior” to a promotion or increase in responsibility, not afterwards. You tie the successful completion of the training to the promotion. If the individual does not successfully complete the training necessary to the new role, they do not receive the promotion. This puts the responsibility of preparation on the individual, providing their company actually makes appropriate training available.

I mentioned at the opening of this Thought that you as a leader have a choice of starting those under your scope of responsibility with “good” work habits or “bad” work habits. One of the best development programs I’ve found to start a person off with “good” habits that will last them throughout their career is the Effective Personal Productivity (EPP) program by our alliance partner, Leadership Management International, Inc. (LMI). This six step program focuses on:

* The Nature of Productivity
* Goals Achievement through Time Management
* Increasing Productivity through Controlling Priorities
* Improving Productivity through Communication
* Empowering The Team
* Increasing Productivity of the Team

These six steps are important basic skills necessary to building solid “good” habits needed for the foundation of a successful management career. Don’t hesitate to contact Shawn Miller, Sunny Zhang or myself for additional information on the EPP program.

“Wisdom consists not so much in knowing what to do in the ultimate as knowing what to do next.” … Herbert Hoover

Have A Good Day!

Russ

Russ M. Miller, LLIF – Chairman & CEO
Performance Institute (Human Capital Development)
Global CEO Academy (Management Training)
Sunny Hong Zhang – Managing Partner (China)
Shawn M. Miller – Managing Partner (USA)

P.S.  Please share your thoughts on our Thoughts in the Reply box below each post…