Management is such a vast field that it becomes very difficult to summarize across time and space a few fact-based, critical and useful insights, but Julian Birkinshaw (Professor of Strategy and Entrepreneurship at London Business School) gives an excellent short talk with some key tips that all managers should listen to.
The problem with good management is not that we ignore its atributes. What does good management looks like? Some key ideas could be:
- Giving your team sense and direction
- Giving space and freedom for them to work
- Giving support and resources when they need them
- Recognizing and rewarding achievement
It is not rocket-science. You don’t need to be a genious to manage people. Then, why are so few managers doing this?
He says that although we already know these attributes, the challenge however is that we don’t do what we know we should.
That makes me think that in leadership training we often tell managers to do this and that. A long list which makes perfect sense but causes little actual change in manager’s behaviours. The same way that you don’t lose weight by reading books about it.
Why? Well, acting them out is somehow unnatural for normal human beings:
- We have lots of bias and personal flaws, we are selfish, narcisistic, unrealistic, etc.
- We have aquired individual and collective habits that may have been useful as an employee but which are counterproductive as a manager
- Some of these behaviours (like giving power to other people and trusting them) have risks and prices to pay in the short term
- The organization may not encourage these behaviours
- Etc.
Anyway, I strongly encourage you to learn from this talk. There’s a lot of value and wisdom condensed into 10 minutes.
You may also like his book on the subject.
