One of the biggest disasters is to take a skilled team member and make her or him a manager. Not only is the skilled worker lost but they will probably make a lousy manager.
Many, many, years ago, (around the time of dinosaurs), I worked for a company that promoted their top salesperson to manager. He was so good…he could sell farming pitchforks to a city dweller! I was in awe of his ability to sell.
I was also in awe of his ability to manage – almost nonexistent. He could not fill out forms correctly or on time. The branch office he was in charge of was a shambles and he had to go out and make sales to keep the numbers looking good. There was another person in the office that could not sell ice cubes to a man dying of thirst in the desert, But he was good at managing the paperwork. If these guys had swapped their roles and all would have been well.
The same goes for managers these days. Becoming a manager of a remote team can bring on additional stresses if the manager is not used to remote workers. A new manager that cannot physically see their employees can have a hard time managing.
Here are some of the key attributes a manager needs to have:
- Clear activities – This sounds stupid but the manager needs to have a list of tasks or goals that must be accomplished and are easy to understand by the team. Does not always happen.
- Priorities – I am astounded over the last 30 years of work how many groups don’t have a clear priority on the projects or activities. ’nuff said.
- Clear vision – There must be communication to the team on why they are doing the work – to make the company money is not acceptable – a customer service center might have a vision of helping their customers through a complex process for insurance
- People person – Let me say it again…the manager MUST be an
OK,fine,good, fantastic people person – great people skills - Know their team members – The manager should never be friends with the team she or he supervises but the manager should know about their people – are they married, their background, their interests outside of work, how many children they have, where their extended family lives, etc.
- Coaching – At times the manager needs to be a cheerleader for each team member (daily). Other times, this manager needs to be tough and grind down on a team member (rarely).
- Not a micromanager – In this day and age, can we get away from micromanagers? What a stupid trait for a manager! Unless you have hired dunderheads, your employees can figure out how to get the work done. Micromanagement screams “I don’t trust you.” If you micromanage them, then you will guarantee their failure.
- Results measurement – This is especially important for remote workers. There must be a method of measuring results otherwise you will not use the employee successfully.
- Promotes team members – It is easy to get attached to your team members and not want to promote them. However, a manager that holds team members back will engender great resentment and in the long run lose them anyway.
There are so many attributes a manager needs and I will discuss additional ones tomorrow.