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Management Tips.How are you managing?

You're going to have to be prepared to get your hands dirty. If you cancel the free coffee machine for the team, what's your hardship? You must be part of the tough time you are asking others to endure. Here's how.

1. A lot of it is psychology

This doesn't mean it's not important. When times are tough, we all need to make sacrifices. The emphasis your people want to hear is on all . You'll be asking a lot of people to make sacrifices, especially if you run a larger organisation. No bonuses, perhaps. Salary increases on hold, possibly. Some redundancies, maybe. Certainly a definite loss of security. What about you? Are you making sacrifices? Of course you are. The buck stops with you. You may still drive a BMW, but it's meaningless if the whole business collapses. But not everyone will see it that way: they still see the smart cars and the ability to manage one's own time. You must communicate the contributions that everybody is being asked to make and is making. You do want to avoid the perception that 'it's all right for them in their fancy suits and office, we'll be the first to go when times get really tough'. And how do you do that? Read on.

2. Pack boxes, but.

Create an accurate perception of what's going on by being around, by getting close, by avoiding being or being seen to be remote. Talk to the 'troops', get onto the shop floor, spend some time in the call centre, go out on a call with a rep, get close, talk and show that you are human. Of course you could pack those boxes but that isn't (or certainly shouldn't be) a good use of your time. It is worth finding out if they have all they need to pack boxes, if they have any particular challenges or even if they have any ideas for making the processes simpler or faster.

3. Remove barriers between people

Maybe this is a great time to break down some of those unnecessary barriers caused by issues such as the rows of (often unused) reserved car-parking spaces, the separate canteens and the different grading systems. What if a few key changes in that area of the business were announced at the monthly meeting to show you are for real? Such changes should also be great in aiding communication, improving idea transfer and boosting morale.

4. Leadership

Your people need leading. Leadership is about providing them with a vision beyond this painful year. All good leadership is about hope. That hope will come from a great strategy which sounds real and practical for this year and beyond. Great leadership is about energizing people. They enjoy you being around and they enjoy your talks at the monthly meeting. Great leaders communicate, so tell it as it is.

5. Management

Management is concerned with day-to-day implementation of the plan. It is about getting things done and making stuff happen. Make sure your managers and team leaders are:

Having regular team meetings to motivate, tackle issues and blockers and keep their people on track;
Coaching their people one-to-one to develop the best skills possible;
Ensuring their people are absolutely focused on what needs to be done to turn the business around;
Catching people doings things right;
Running mini-training sessions;
Keeping close to all the necessary processes to identify how things might be improved.

6. Empower

Give your people SMART ( s pecific, m easurable, a chievable, r ealistic and t ime-bound) objectives. Train them, coach them and motivate them. Then, and this is the hard part, let go. Why don't you want to do that? Three suggestions:

1. They make mistakes. No, they learn . If they make a mistake, treat it as a learning experience and make sure it doesn't happen again. If reviewed properly, it won't.

2. They may become as good as or better than you. Excellent, that's known as succession planning, and how can you be promoted postrecession if you don't have someone to do your job?

3. Ego. We like to feel in control. But if you let go you will become even more effective.

7. Grow your people

There are a lot of carrots you will not be able to dangle this year: salary increases, bonuses, staff parties, generous expenses. Perhaps there will be fewer training courses. But you can provide one thing which motivates everyone: growth and challenge. It needs to be appropriate for the individual: one person's growth opportunity is starting her own business, another's is turning around the accounts department, another's is getting 100% accurate order fulfillment statistics after months of running at around 87%. But give the responsibility to them. You are low on resources. Fewer people need to do more work. Managers are expensive so empower. Ask people to be better at self-managing and they will be. And they will enjoy it.


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