5 Secrets of Great Managers

“Good management is the art of making problems so interesting and their solutions so constructive that everyone wants to get to work and deal with them.”

Paul Hawken

Accept being one of the most competent writers in business, entrepreneurship and environment niches, Paul Hawken is also very successful businessman who made Erewhon Trading Company out of small retail store in Boston. He brought his managerial skills to perfection and was able to motivate his workers and create highly productive environment.

Managers are very important players in the business eco-system. This makes their job hard at times and lot of inexperienced professionals have a tough time to adjust to their position within the company. That’s why we decided to make a short list of 5 secrets of this craft, every manager should know.

1. Work Should Be Fun

Employees always look to their leaders, and if manager treat his work as a necessary evil, it’s wrong to expect from workers anything more than that. As we can see from Paul Hawken’s quote, manager needs to make employer’s job as interesting as possible. That way they will be much more willing to cope with it. Managers should evaluate employees and assign them with tasks that will be interesting and enjoyable for them to do.

2. Every Employee Is Employee of the Month

Patriarchal management is the thing of the past, and employees can’t be treated like they are less worthy or less mature than their bosses. They also shouldn’t be tightly controlled like they’re in school. Any kind of initiative among workers is good and by supporting them in solving work-related problems managers are actually building a strong connection with their team which also makes their job much less stressful.

Managers should expect excellence throughout whole working process, and that’s why they need to treat workers like experts in their own field, no matter how significant their role in the production process is. This way the decision-making will be pushed downward and employees at all levels will take charge of their own managerial part which will leave managers the time to deal with more complicated problems.

3. Never Skip School

Quality education is very important for managers. College courses provide them with all basic managerial skills and a degree earns them employee’s respect. Professional with a MGMT Degree is a proven expert in the field and in most cases has better communication, leadership and inter-personal skills than self-thought managers. In addition to this, business management degree opens doors, creates more opportunities and guarantees higher wages than the ones managers without degrees end up with.

4. Consistent Above All

Consistent behavior is important for managers because people generally like predictability. Employees like to know where they stand and they don’t mind working for strict bosses, but for the ones that act erratic. If manager is constantly changing the criteria employees will lose trust in his/her abilities to lead the team. When making judgments managers should repress their emotions and take their time. Patience is one of the most valued managerial skills and it is very important to avoid all kinds irrational thinking.

5. Never Play Favorites

Playing favorites is a part of human nature. Most people like working with certain colleagues more than others, but managers should suppress these natural tendencies at all costs. There are probably lots of talented and agile workers that are not naturally likable, but they can provide great help to company’s business. Giving them worse treatment just because they lack some charisma is un-fair and very bad for the team relations. Being always fair can sometimes be hard. With this practice first-time managers can easily destroy personal relationships they have with their ex-colleagues. Only way to prevent this is by being completely transparent about not to letting personal relationships influence future business decisions. Playing favorites can severely damage manager’s reputation and employee’s talent and effort should be the only criteria for becoming manager’s pet.