Great managers bring a lot of gifts to the business table but their most outstanding talents focus around four indispensable tasks. Without these four traits, any manager will simply be average. Here is a quick rundown:
Conventional wisdom in the business world demands that the hiring process be based on education, intelligence
and experience. While these are good indicators of a new hire's potential, the best managers go beyond these basics and identify certain personality traits that define a superior employee.
In particular, they look for candidates who exhibit a desire – a drive, even! – for achievement, embody an innate personal responsibility, have focus and discipline with an ability to intuitively take charge and cogently persuade their coworkers. Each of these abilities marks the superior employee as one who will go above and beyond the normal job description.
One of the defining talents of a great manager is taking the – admittedly sometimes vague – company vision, and delineating it into a set of more recognizable steps that the average employee can understand and accomplish. In short, they “break the rules” to establish individual goals for their subordinates and then get out of the way. The best managers identify the target, aim the employee at it, then give them the tools to succeed on their own.
It is a remarkably efficient mechanism but requires that step one – hiring the best talent – is done well. One last point, the best managers don't completely forget about their charges. Instead, they establish checkpoints and mile
markers so that everyone is aware of the progress being made and can be held accountable.
By focusing on and encouraging individual strengths, the best managers bring out the best in their subordinates. Not only does this mean better results for the company at large but the process also provides replacement value. That is, the manager is a better candidate for promotion because they have already developed a person to take their place – not a small consideration in an organization of any size.
On a contrary note, emphasizing the strengths of an employee doesn't mean that managers shouldn't encourage their subordinates to expand their skill sets. In fact, it should be a synergistic effort. To get the best out of your people, work should be challenging. That fact means that you can give routine duties to the average coworker and you will get average results but giving tough problems to the best of the best will reward you in spades.
Sometimes a manager's best hiring and training efforts don't always result in exactly what a company needs. Still, there is never a need to eliminate an obviously valuable employee. The manager – and the company - must shift their priorities to some degree and capitalize on the strengths of the employee. In reality, it is an unparalleled way to grow the business.
To explain a little further, this process may mean expanding the current job, moving the employee laterally or simply creating an entirely new position that takes advantage of this employee's skills. In any event, it is essential to recognize the value of the employee's talents and tailor a positon within the company to fully realize that value. Admittedly, not the easiest of things but an HR person needs their own challenges to be fulfilled at work, don't they?
Being a superior manager means juggling a whole host of sometimes conflicting responsibilities and, many times, the human resources aspect of the job gets short shrift. One of the most paramount ways a company can support its best managers is to provide the executive team with well designed HR management software. It aids in the data management and HR processes that can eat up even the best manager’s time, effort and attention. Attention better spent on developing his team of all-star talent for your business.
Support your managers now by comparing the latest HR Software Systems on the market and discover which one is the best fit for your business using our HR Software Selector Tool.