Managers or subordinates: how to locate middle-level roles?

 

Who is carrying monkeys"

Bilhouken once proposed an interesting management theory-"monkey on the back" to compare the transfer of responsibility and affairs between managers and subordinates.

"Monkey" is the job assigned to subordinates. It was originally on the back of the subordinates. But when you listen to the reports from the subordinates and make plans for the subordinates, the "monkey" is transferred to your back. So you took over the role of a subordinate, but the subordinate became the supervisor. From time to time, he ran to ask you, "How did you do that ?"

Once you receive the "Monkeys" that your subordinates should watch, they will think that you want them. Therefore, the more you receive, the more they give. As a result, you have been plagued by mountains of problems that can never be solved, and you have no time to take care of your "monkey ".

A common phenomenon for Chinese enterprises is that managers are too busy to do middle-level tasks, while grass-roots personnel have nothing to do, as a result, he began to "give advice to the development of enterprises" and "Give a comment on the work of managers ".

So when you are so busy, please stop and think about whether you have raised a bunch of other people's monkeys. When you get angry because of employee mistakes or ineffective, please restrain yourself from the impulse to go into battle. When you hear complaints and shirking from your subordinates, you must firmly show your attitude and urge them to overcome difficulties and complete their tasks. If you allow employees to raise their own "Monkeys", you can cultivate a team that can fight for good. China entrepreneur.

 

Case

In the eyes of most people, leaders and managers are "administrators". They have the right to supervise and make decisions, so that they spend a lot of time managing and supervising their subordinates, eventually lost myself. Managera holds that from the day when he is promoted to the m level, his work time is like the following ---

Jun A's work time

From one o'clock P.M. AM to the company, read the email and reply to the email; from AM, review the end customer activity cooperation solution submitted by subordinate a last week; from AM, prepare the meeting at, collect information, and sort out the solution; at two o'clock P.M., we held a meeting with the same level and our own leaders. At three o'clock P.M., we communicated with subordinate a about suggestions for modification. At four o'clock P.M., we found a quiet meeting room and focused on reviewing the survey report submitted by subordinate B. At five o'clock P.M, read competitor information and macro market information reports sent by subordinate C. At half past five P.M., read the promotion and design plan of subordinate D. Six o'clock P.M. was very bad. I read the business promotion plans of E and F in Beijing and Guangzhou ......

After working overtime till, the transaction has not been completed yet. Take it home and continue. If it is Friday, work overtime at home on Saturday and Sunday. How to Improve cooperation solutions, how to avoid data errors, and how to make promotion programs more perfect.

 

Subordinate "Supervision and Inspection"

Although managera has allocated 60% or more of the time to do its best to complete these tasks, it still cannot get rid of the following embarrassment:

The website update solution submitted by subordinate A has no time to view and press it. The project promotion solution submitted by subordinate B has no time to think about and provide modification suggestions; the survey questionnaire submitted by subordinate C has not been read in detail and cannot be replied in a timely manner ...... When the business department has a new demand, he needs to think about solutions. On a Friday's work day, managera had to deal with too many things and could not cope with them one by one. He was too busy to be able to stand alone, and his subordinates waited for his decision-making, but do nothing, and from time to time seize the last opportunity to remind him to "make a confirm" as soon as possible ".

Upon hearing these reminders, managera began to force itself to give their subordinates a time to promise, give suggestions to their subordinates a before work, and change suggestions to C tomorrow ...... In this way, in the review and approval of the task, man-Agera voluntarily changes to its subordinates-taking responsibility from the subordinates and committing to the subordinates to report their work progress, even when I got off work, I unconsciously asked my subordinates, "Do I still owe something to you?"

The longer the manager a delays, the more frustrated his subordinates are because the intermediate process is too long and the feedback is not received in a timely manner. managera also affects the progress of the work, and feel more and more guilty. As you can imagine, a project plan will not be reviewed until it is sent to the mailbox of M anagera and finally discussed for several weeks. What kind of complaints will the subordinates complain about. The subordinates in charge of the project have to urge their superiors to complete the project within the expected time. In this case, who checks who works?

 

Cage for "Administrator"

When you wait for a stagnant project, your subordinates will say, "the process of confirmation is always so long, and it is always stuck here to influence the final progress of the project !", "A person who can never make decisions in a timely manner can occupy a management position in the company. This is really confusing !", "Manager A does not trust us at all, and does not authorize us to do anything. Instead, let us do it, and always let us follow his suggestions blindly ."

The worst thing is that managera closes itself in the subordinate task circle, it is impossible to take "next action" against the commands issued by superiors-because he spends almost all his time meeting his leader's desires, and ignores what his superiors Want To Do.

Managera falls into a vicious circle and is completely restrained by "Administrators. At the same time, he also felt more and more tired, and his work became more and more trivial: to help his subordinates write project plans, to help his subordinates proofread survey reports, each task and detail of a subordinate must be reviewed and confirmed one by one. He tries his best to lay out all the ways for his subordinates to go, so that his subordinates can go along the road.

However, this kind of "love" not only does not get the gratitude of the subordinates, but is it in exchange for the subordinates to question his management ability: "Is he suitable for our manager ?" "Under his management, he felt that his stage was getting smaller and smaller, and his development space was getting restrained. He danced alone in the whole department and everyone was enjoying his performances ."

At the same time, managera is also questioning its own management methods, trying to escape from this "Administrator" Cage.

 

Comments

A Jun: How can we escape the fate of "getting killed?

In today's workplace, there are indeed not a few managers like a Jun. There are many advantages for them-they both have a dedication and a sense of responsibility. They never lower their requirements and cannot tolerate losing themselves to their peers. However, just like a Jun, they are busy all day long, but they are getting farther and farther away from their ideal goals. They are very careful, but they are often laborious and thankless-they make their subordinates unhappy at the company and return home to discover the fire in the back yard. In this case, I am afraid that the most likely results of June a are also the most appropriate conclusions for them.

Just like the rural TV series singing "you can no longer live like this, you can no longer live like this "! As you can imagine, June a will surely make a similar sigh and call when they are deeply troubled and depressed. However, what's the problem with June? They are often confused.

Use the sentenceFamous saying: Successful managers have similarities, while unsuccessful managers are different. In the case of a Jun, I am afraid that the main cause of his work is that his misunderstanding of the manager role and his daily leadership style are too simple.

 

Administrator role: What is "Leadership"

First of all, a's cognition and understanding of his role has some one-sided and limited aspects, which also leads to his behavioral bias at work. As a matter of fact, many junior managers who have just been promoted and assumed the management role cannot grasp the new role requirements accurately. They simply think that being a manager requires "Administrator ", the manager means that the power is under control, and the subordinates have to ask for instructions and reports, while the manager is ready to handle everything. Control and supervision are indeed the responsibilities of managers, and this seemingly reasonable "traditional wisdom" was once prevalent in history. However, with the advent of the knowledge economy and the refinement of social division of labor, in the face of increasingly professional "knowledge workers", managers have no need nor are likely to know more about everything than their subordinates. The value of their managers is no longer a good choice in every field, it is more reflected in how to effectively set reasonable objectives for the Organization and team members; communicate effectively with all parties and establish a collaboration system; and create a good organizational atmosphere; motivate, coach, and support subordinates to accomplish the set challenging goals. To achieve this, we can't do it by controlling and supervising our subordinates.

 

Can the "Instruction + lead" style last long?

Second, in terms of daily leadership behavior, a Jun is mainly characterized by the release of instructions and affinity. Perhaps he believes that this can ensure high-quality completion of the work, and then gain the consent and support of his subordinates. However, this not only consumes too much time but does not take care of other important tasks, at the same time, subordinates do not buy funds, especially those employees who have the ability and are good at self-motivation, because they will feel that they are bound by their hands and feet and cannot start their competent jobs relatively independently, as a result, his work enthusiasm was frustrated.

Although the Daily Management Behaviors of managers are diverse or even ever-changing, they can be summarized into six modes: Directive, vision, democracy, affinity, leading, and counseling. These leadership styles have a significant impact on organizational performance and are also an important factor in distinguishing outstanding leaders from mediocre people. The leadership style is not good or bad. The key is whether the manager can be flexibly and comprehensively applied from person to person, according to local conditions, so as to create a good working atmosphere in the Organization under his or her leadership, make subordinates happy to make extra efforts at work and ultimately improve organizational performance.

Compared with these six leadership styles, I am afraid that a's only a concentrated reflection of the Directive and the leading type, and these two management styles can only reflect the short-term effectiveness, long-term use will negatively affect the organizational atmosphere and affect organizational performance. Studies show that focus on presenting an exciting and desirable development vision to subordinates at work, and more on the management of participation, authorization, and coaching, it can effectively improve the subordinate's competence, quality, and engagement and improve organizational performance.

For Mr. A, if you want to reverse the current unfavorable situation, you must learn to use a variety of leadership styles based on a correct understanding of the requirements of management roles. This is both imperative and necessary.

 

Tang Yiqing, consulting director of Hay Group

Missing time management: Where can I slide when I step on the watermelon skin?

How does a department manager manage their work time? If you still use the method of work of independent contributors in the past, it will put yourself into a transactional work rather than a new height.

By analyzing managera's work list for one day, it is not difficult to find that he does not prioritize his work or have an action plan in advance. He couldn't see what he wanted to achieve on the day, and he was always in a passive situation of "pig, where is it.

Important. This requires managers to learn how to develop work plans: They should know what needs to be done every day beforehand, and then prioritize what needs to be done, starting from the most important and urgent tasks. From the two dimensions of the importance and closeness of time management, work can be divided into four quadrants: Important and Urgent, important and not urgent, not important but urgent, neither important nor urgent. Classifying all the work that needs to be done beforehand will greatly improve work efficiency. Man-Agera, however, is "scratching his nose and eyebrows", and eventually the man-Agera is out of time and energy.

Managers at the basic level should play a crucial role within the Organization. However, from the perspective of the role that managera should assume, 20% of his work day is assigned to superiors and colleagues at the same level, and 80% to subordinates. The time distribution is unbalanced, leading to the loss of the role it undertakes. Managera needs to re-weigh the schedule and content of the work, and promptly and effectively draw the time from the subordinate Affairs to improve the communication between superiors and the tasks assigned by the Organization. Strengthen two-way communication and communication with superiors, truly understand the Strategic Thinking of the senior leadership, and then grasp the direction of work with this goal. Taking a broader perspective as a value-added space for your career development.

learn to grant permissions in addition to the principles and habits of time management. As a team manager, you must clearly understand that although human potential is almost unlimited, personal energy is limited. As a manager, the most important thing is to find the person who is good at solving different things and authorize and motivate them. It inspires the potential and creativity of its subordinates, reduces the reporting window to itself, and returns the initiative to its subordinates.