Management Mastery

We’ve discussed defining the problem a project is meant to address, selecting the team for the project and conducting the initial team meeting.  Ideally, once the project is underway, the manager’s role becomes one of monitoring the team’s progress to ensuring its success.  The project needs to be managed through a clear, efficient, operational structure if it’s to be successful..  That’s the topic for this week’s episode.

After understanding the project and choosing the best staff to achieve success, we now move to the important initial meeting with staff.  This meeting, if handled well, will dramatically increase your odds of having a successful project.

While it’s easy to say, “A project is only as successful as the people behind it,” it also requires time and attention to get the process of selecting the team right.  Finding the right balance between technical skills, social skills, and interpersonal fit are all important considerations.  Selecting the best team for a project is the subject of this week’s episode

Managing a project is a complex process influenced by a range of factors that can make it challenging, both on a personal and an organizational level.  We’ll look at managing and overseeing a project in this episode beginning with defining the problem.  In future episodes we’ll examine setting up a project team, monitoring team progress, making course corrections as a project progresses, ongoing evaluation of team management and the manager’s role before, during, and after the project.

The ability to make decisions Is one of a manager’s most important skills.  Making a good decision involves having a clear focus on your priorities and then choosing between two or more options.  Doing it well shows business acumen, confidence, leadership and, sometimes, even courage.  Doing it poorly creates doubt in the minds of your management, as well as your staff, about your leadership skills and abilities. 

Whether you’re a new, or experienced, manager you’ll face problems at work.  The way that you approach solving them will prove to be an important aspect of your success.  In this week's episode of Management Mastery, we’ll discuss a good process to follow.

As a manager you’re constantly being pulled away from your strategic objectives by everyday tasks that may be important, but aren’t helping you to achieve your primary objectives.  As the manager, you should continuously seek ways you can maximize your group’s overall performance.  In this podcast we’ll discuss how to keep your focus on productivity while, at the same time, managing key relationships and caring for staff.

Most of us believe that we are good listeners.  Research has shown that’s not true.  Listening is demanding both cognitively and emotionally.  It takes focused attention and effort to do it well.  We’ll discuss mistakes that manager’s make and how to avoid them in this episode.

The damage that a bad boss can inflict upon their staff and their organization is substantial.  Multiple studies have found that somewhere between 30-50% of both managers and workers leave their jobs because of a bad boss and a negative work culture.  We’ll look at how to avoid being a bad boss in this episode

Every manager needs the ability to persuade internal and external constituencies to reach consensus to move issues forward.  Sometimes it’s a major issue that needs to be decided on, like an issue with a client, or a change of direction, and other times it’ll be smaller, day-to-day operating decisions, such as moving a product out faster.  As the manager, you’ll be called upon to use your skills of persuasion often: For both internal and external issues.  Persuasion is the focus of this episode.

In the last episode we discussed the importance of understanding your leadership style and how it’ll be important to your success.  Your style was developed over a series of events during your lifetime.  In this episode we’ll discuss how you can use your leadership style to be a more effective leader.

Understanding and improving your leadership style is important to your success as a manager.  They’re a number of ways you can approach this task.  In this podcast we’ll discuss a simple, straightforward way to think about and develop an effective leadership style.

Almost everyone has had the experience of working with a toxic coworker.  How to deal with that situation can be difficult and emotional.  It is not something that most people want to deal with, but it is in your interest, and the other persons, to work out the problem.  We will deal with ways that you can do that in this episode.

Former sales executive Jake Kilrain discusses his experience in dealing with a colleague who felt they should have his position and tried to undermine him at every opportunity.

Executive presence is a critical component of being a successful senior manager. It’s the ability to project an image of confidence, competence, and leadership, inspiring trust and respect in others.  As you continue to grow your career, developing and exhibiting the behaviors that define executive presence will be important for your growth as a manager.  In a previous episode, we discussed the important quality of Gravitas.  In this episode we’ll the other key elements of Executive presence: inclusiveness, communication, and authenticity.

Executive Presence is the ability to project an image of confidence, competence, and leadership that inspires trust and respect in others. Executive presence is a critical component of being a successful senior manager.  As you grow your career, understanding and displaying the behaviors and demeanor that define executive presence will be important for your development.  In this episode, we discuss Gravitas, a critical component of Executive Presence.  In a subsequent episode, we’ll cover the additional qualities of inclusiveness, communication, and authenticity.

In our episode entitled “The Basics of Speechmaking” from February 18, we said that half of the world’s population was terrified of making a speech and we discussed the basics of making a speech.  In this episode we’ll discuss how to think about your presentation and how to share what you’re passionate about with others.

How better can you learn about being an effective manager than listening to one of the masters in the subject.  One is Peter Drucker whose writings are the subject of today’s podcast.Overview:  Leaders are all over the map in terms of their personalities, attitudes, values, strengths and weaknesses.  They range from extroverted to nearly reclusive, from easy going to controlling, from open to closed behavior.  Effectiveness is a discipline; it can be learned; it must be earned.

In previous episodes we’ve spoken about “Designing Jobs” and “Assessing Staff Wellbeing.”  Now we want to  talk about you and some issues related to managing your own career.  It’s important to remember that you’re both a manager as well as an employee of your company.  So, not only are you a boss, you also have a boss. In this episode we’ll discuss how to deal with your own manager in ways that’ll, hopefully, make you both more successful.

In almost any company of any size, managers do performance reviews.  And, as with anything, some managers are better at it than others.  Some have biases that they can’t get away from such as giving better reviews to people they hired, or that they know socially outside of the office.  Nevertheless, almost everyone agrees there is a valid place for performance reviews when they’re done fairly and objectively.  In this episode we discuss what goes into a good review.

In a previous podcast on one-on-one meetings with your staff, from December 17 of 2024, we discussed how to manage and conduct one-on-one meetings with the members of your staff.  Unfortunately, many managers either downplay the importance of one-on-one meetings or focus only on discussing what the staff member needs to do to successfully complete their jobs.  In this episode we expand on what outstanding managers do in discussing other areas that are also important to members of their staff.

In addition to the job performance of their staff members, a wise manager is also concerned with the general and emotional wellbeing of their staff.  This may require watching for signs of problems that’re outside of just job performance.  By being sensitive to general issues of staff wellbeing, a good manager can often head off performance problems down the road.  We discuss how in this episode.

Your relationship with your boss is critical, and the first meeting is among the most important you will have. In this encore episode, we will cover how to plan for and behave in this all important meeting.

Usually,  when a new manager is hired, the jobs of the current staff are already in place.  Nevertheless, it’s the manager’s responsibility to make sure that their staff members’ jobs are structured to fit the abilities of each staff member as well as best fulfill the department’s needs.  This may seem easy and straightforward, but it can be complicated.  In this episode we’ll discuss some of the challenges that you may face. 

All too often, people misjudge the impression they make on others, especially in initial conversations. Frequently, their anxieties and self-critical thoughts lead them to assume the worst.  Feeling one has made a bad initial impression on a new colleague can lead to poor outcomes in the workplace.  In this episode, we’ll explore ways to avoid this “liking gap”.

The traditional concept of authority is simply exercising control over others because of one’s position in an organization.  In today’s world that may not be the best strategy.  Indeed. it may not even be an option.  A more realistic and, indeed, effective approach on the use of authority is to lead by motivating staff members’ energy and commitment.  How to effectively do that is the subject of this episode.

A difficult problem requires a manager, and their team, to take the time to break it down into individual steps, thinking through potential solutions, considering alternatives from all sides of the problem, and providing follow-up.  In each step formulating and asking effective questions is critical.  In this podcast we’ll suggest ways to successfully do this

In any job market it’s difficult to attract and retain top talent, the kind that add valuable skills and abilities to your department.  In the past, a major component was pay, but more recently there are other factors that come into play.  In this episode we’ll explore what top talent seeks and what the manager should do to ensure that talent remains.

We discuss what senior sales executive called, in an earlier episode, "Sales Content" and "Sales Style" and why they are important in effective and efficient selling.

This week we discuss how our guest, Senior Sales Executive Jake Kilrain successfully started as a new manager in a new company in a new city.

Senior sales executive Jake Kilrain is our guest to discuss how he successfully moved into a management position in a company new to him, in a city new to him and to lead a department where an incumbent felt they should have been given his position. He also talks about what he calls the key elements of selling: Sales Content and Sales Style

Having successful teams involves a clear, agreed upon approach as to how the members of the team work together to achieve their goals as well as a clear understanding of what those objectives are.  It’s also important to have both individual and group accountability for the team’s performance.  Team success also requires a strong, positive working relationship between the Department Manager and the Team Leader.  We cover why these are all important in this week’s episode.

In the first episode on working with teams, we discussed the importance of trying to keep working teams smaller than 10 to 12 staff people. We also talked about the importance of establishing the mission for each team as that will impact how the team is comprised. In this episode, we will talk about how to assign staff to each of the teams based on its “mission” and to maximize efficiency and probability of success.

In our last episode, we talked about the importance of talented staff to the success of a manager and how leaders should effectively manage them.  In this week’s encore episode, we explore, in greater depth, what talented staff look for in a position – the kind of working environment they want and how they want to be treated.  By understanding what they are looking for in a job, the good manager is better able to keep talented staff motivated and productive – as well as on the team.

You can’t be successful unless your talented people are successful. In this encore episode, we discuss some key aspects of managing your most talented staff.

A team is a small group of people with complementary skills who work with a common purpose, goals and approach for which they are mutually accountable.  Teams hold greater long-term potential than staff working individually because greater incremental value is achieved when team members work together. Two critical aspects of putting together effective teams are their size and their staffing.  In this episode, we discuss optimizing both.

In its January 24th issue this year,  Inc. Magazine published an article entitled “The 7 Skills That Will Define the Next Generation of Leaders”.  The article was based on data from the National Association of Colleges and Employers and from other research organizations that have done studies on leadership for a number of years.  In a past episode we discussed the first skill, emotional quotient or “Social Intelligence”.  In this episode, we’ll discuss the other six skills they identified along with some of our own thoughts on leadership.

In its, January 24th 2025 issue,  Inc. Magazine published an article titled “The 7 Skills That Will Define the Next Generation of Leaders”.  Using data from studies on leadership by the National Association of Colleges and Employers and other research organizations, the article described seven skills that the authors say will be key to the success of managers in the coming years. In this episode, we’ll discuss what the authors identified as the most important skill – that of social intelligence – sometimes called EQ or one’s “Emotional Quotient”.  In this episode, we’ll discuss EQ, what it is, why it's important and how to strengthen it in yourself.

Continuation of our interview with Jim Carlough, author of "Six Pillars of Effective Leadership"

Jim Carlough is the author of "Six Pillars of Effective Leadership" Part 1

Many companies and departments don’t get maximum effectiveness and efficiency from their staffs because managers don’t address the issue of how people with diverse work styles and perspectives will mesh with each other.  Knowing how to approach the issues of different – and in some cases, conflicting -- work styles allows a manager to understand how best to optimize staff working together as a team

Every manager faces the problem of underperforming staff members from time to time.  In a recent episode, we discussed how low employee engagement can lead to low staff performance.  In their studies of employee engagement, the Gallup Organization found that it was a major cause of low performance and that full employee engagement was declining to the point that only 31% -- fewer than one in three employees -- were currently fully engaged in their occupations.  This is important to managers because Gallup also found that 70% of employee engagement was determined solely by the team manager.  In this episode, we’ll examine some of the causes of underperformance and disengagement, and talk about the steps you can take to manage both.

The first step in hiring the best candidate for a job is the screening process. This begins with a review of the resumes of interested candidates -- either by the HR Department and/or by the hiring manager. This process removes from consideration candidates who clearly do not meet the requirements for the position, based on their resume. This is followed by a "screening conversation" between remaining candidates and the hiring manager to further reduce the number of applicants to only those worth serious consideration.

Preparation for hiring top talent has to begin even before there is an opening to fill.

Many times new, and, even experienced managers, are overly focused on how much work is being done rather than what their team actually achieves.  This can sometimes get you wrapped up in some of the wrong directions.  A better approach is to focus on what is actually accomplished.  This requires establishing a performance-based climate that is based on strong team commitment.  We’ll discuss how to do this in this episode.

Once a decision’s made on the candidate that you want to hire, it now falls to you, the hiring manager, to close the deal.  Since this involves a number of skills and abilities this’ll be a challenging time for any manager, especially with candidates who may have other offers.  Among the skills needed, are the need to be totally prepared, a strong people orientation, knowing how to negotiate, and the ability to resolve conflicts.  And then, understanding that the recruiting process is not complete until the new hire is at work. 

Dealing with intelligent but aggressive staff members, sometimes given the label “alpha” for “leader of the pack” is one of the challenges a manager often faces.  On the one hand, they can provide leadership and productivity for your team but on the other hand, they can be hard to manage and disruptive to building collegial staff relationships.  In this episode, we’ll discuss ways of dealing with these staff members.

Once you, the hiring manager and your team, have met the final candidates you need to make the best choice for your department.  Once you have received feedback from each member of your hiring team, both in a meeting and with their individual ratings, then you’ll be able to make your final decision.  Once that is accomplished, and the references verified, it will be time to move on to landing the candidate.  This podcast deals with deciding on the top candidate.

The Gallup Organization has been measuring Employee Engagement among thousands of employees since 2000 using questions that measure 12 factors of engagement. The level of enthusiasm employees feel toward their work and workplace is a powerful predictor of numerous important  business outcomes, including the quality of the work, level of productivity, safety, and profitability, among other things.  In this episode we’ll talk about some of the components of engagement and what managers can to increase it among their staffs.

In our last two episodes, we spoke with Vance Morris, a former senior executive with the Disney Organization, about the benefits to consumer-facing businesses of creating what he calls “Experiences” for their clients.  In this episode, we discuss how managers can apply those same techniques to the benefit of their in-house departments even if they don’t have outside customers.