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The face of leadership is changing as corporations prepare to confront the competitive challenges of the next century. Corporations still need to look for the business and technical visionary and for the "natural" or charismatic leader. But in the next period of time it will be more important to have managers at every level who can align with the business vision, implement the organization’s technological strategy and mobilize their people quickly. Every part of the organization will need to stay focused on their customers, streamline their processes to maximize efficiency and maintain the web of communication that enables the organization to flourish in a changing market.
Transitions: So You Think You Want to Manage
In most organizations the transition period from individual contributor to team lead, supervisor or manager is short. New managers are expected to adjust quickly without benefit of formal training, mentoring, or sometimes, without knowing what awaits them on the "other side". Often, we don’t know how a new manager will perform until well after he/she has taken the role.
This workshop is designed to fill that gap. It is for high potential technical professionals of all kinds who are considering moving to management, who are "being moved" to management or who have made the transition recently. This program is relevant for any "technical" person, IT, engineering or business professional, who is good at his/her core discipline but new to the people, administrative and political sides of management.
Coaching for Success
Effective managers have always coached their employees and teams. Although it may not have been conscious, systematic or planned, it often made the difference. The pressures facing today’s managers, however, are dramatically different from those of a short decade ago. Today’s manager often has a span of control twice what it was before, is expected to achieve goals that are sometimes ten times historical levels, and must sometimes "lead" employees who possess far greater technical expertise. Often they are expected to motivate and inspire employees without the enticement of job security, pay or promotional incentives.
Today’s manager must be able to manage employees who work remotely, be skillful integrating contractors and employees into productive teams and battle effects of poor morale resulting from frequent realignment. At a very minimum, today’s manager must get more work from fewer people and, at the same time, give up hand’s on control. This workshop builds a baseline of competency in coaching skills that will support a changing organizational culture, value system and employee population.
Practical Empowerment
Businesses are currently undergoing changes that necessitate less centralized control while requiring increased productivity and quality. These increases in competitive pressures have steadily led to fundamental changes in how business is managed and, ultimately, to a redefinition of the relationship between manager and their employees.
Technical managers often approach the management of people with the same logic as they manage technology, that is in a hands-on manner. Many never let go of their first love the skills and competencies related to solving complex technical problems. As a result, technical managers often work one or two levels below their position, busily engaged in the tasks of others, denying their employees the growth opportunities of their own jobs.
Empowerment is a different way of managing people. It is not only about getting more work from people, but about getting a different kind of work. It is an approach that holds great potential if managed well and great peril if misapplied. This workshop is about "letting go," raising the bar and creating new "contracts" with employees for greater responsibility, authority and accountability.
Sponsoring Technological Change
One of the biggest challenges facing upper and middle management today is leading and managing the multitude of technological and business changes which constantly cascade down the corporation. Although many of these changes such as quality improvement or system renewal begin at the top, they often lose momentum as they trickle down the organization.
And while there is always enthusiasm at the top, the change effort frequently hits a bottleneck because middle management seems unable or reluctant to translate strategic vision into tactical action steps for the people who work for them.
This workshop explores the components of what it means to successfully sponsor, lead and manage technological and business change. Most importantly it produces a tailored and practical action plan with doable strategies for massaging the actual change into the specific business units of the organization.
Managing Remote Employees
Armed with computers, voice mail, teleconferencing, beepers and the Internet, the number of remote employees is increasing at a startling pace. Today’s manager often has staff who work out of their homes, far from a branch office or headquarters, or who telecommute, working at least part time away from the control of the corporate office.
As we move to a more global economy, doing business today means doing business remotely, managing employees who we rarely see or perhaps haven’t met face to face. It means launching and building teams of individual contributors with different cultural experiences and expertise who rarely, if ever, convene as a group. It means monitoring performance and productivity from a distance and still being accountable for results as a manager.
This workshop is designed to provide the manager of remote employees with the awareness, tools and skills necessary to understand and function comfortably in this changing environment.
Mentoring: Developing Leaders for the Future
As we race into the next millenium, it is no surprise that the managerial practice of mentoring has survived over 2,000 years. And today it is still as relevant and valuable as it was in the time of Homer’s Greek Odyssey.
Mentoring fills a number of gaps in developing strong leadership in today’s organizations. It provides a model of leadership for high potential employees. It delivers an objective avenue of feedback and coaching on employee weaknesses. It conveys a personal form of recognition and reinforcement for valued performance. It provides a way of connecting and integrating new employees into the organization’s culture. It can compensate for the rapid changes that often unsettle and isolate valued employees. And it can provide an open arena for discussions about integrating corporate goals with personal ambitions.
This program can have two outcomes. It can provide 1) the road map on how to structure and rollout a mentoring program and 2) the actual skills and approaches which managers and executives can use to successfully mentor others.
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