Get it Done / Work hard

Rule 35

“ Genius is 1 per cent inspiration, and 99 per cent perspiration”
Thomas Edison

The fundamental Rule of Management, I’m afraid, is get the basic job done, get it done well and work bloody hard at it. No good being a fantastic people manager if you let the basic job slip. You may have to get into the office earlier than anyone else, earlier than you’ve ever got there before, but get in early you must.

Once you have cleared your work out of the way you can concentrate on managing your team. Paperwork has to be done efficiently and on time. This isn’t the place to go into lengthy training sessions on time management and the like, but basically you will have to be :

* organized
* dedicated
* ruthlessly efficient
* focused

No choice I’m afraid. You have to knuckle down and get on with it. Management isn’t swanning around issuing orders and looking cool. It’s actually about what goes on in the background – the work being done where no one sees it.

And if you want to know if you are being a good manager now – take a look at your desk. Go on. Right now. What do you see? Clear space and order? Paper everywhere and piles of unsorted stuff? Do the same with your briefcase, files, computer even. Order or disorder?

You have to use whatever tools you have to hand to make sure the work is done, done well, and done on time. Make lists, use pop-up calendars on your computer, delegate, seek help, stay up late, get up early, get up earlier – obviously you still need to refer to Rule 71 : Go Home, you have to have a life. But get that work done and learn to be ruthlessly efficient.

“Managing Yourself
The Rules of Management by Richard Templar"

Photos by Microsoft Office

LEARN from YOUR MISTAKES

Rule 46

“A career setback can be like a romance gone bad. If you don’t learn from your mistakes, you’re doomed to repeat them, most likely in your next job. Many professionals are so eager to flee a bad job or fearful of being jobless, they jump from one job mismatch to the next, just like some people do in their personal relation-ships. If you’ve been knocked down but haven’t looked at what caused your stumble, you’re setting yourself up to fall again.

Bradley G. Richardson.
‘To Move Ahead Again, Learn From Career Setbacks’

We all make mistakes-we wouldn’t be the wonderfully creative, innovative managers we are if we didn’t. But some managers gloss over any mistakes they make. They cover them, bury them, forget about them. You, as a brilliant manager, won’t do that. You won’t beat yourself up over them, nor sit in a pit of misery over them but you will analyze what went wrong, discuss with colleagues why it went wrong and make a plan to prevent it from going wrong again.

Our mistakes could be anything from a badly handled appraisal, a lost sale, a badly thought our report, a poor use of time or resources, a failure to meet a deadline – when you start to write down how many failure there could be the list endless.

Once you have made your mistake the important thing to do as well as all the above is to find out the right way to do it next time. Being the manager is an ongoing learning experience. You never stand still and you never think know it all – you don’t and can’t. But you can have trusted people to ask and good reference books to hand to guide you – especially if they are short, sharp, snappy, and practical.
(See, for example, Roy Jay, Fast Thinking Manager’s Manual, Prentice Hall, 2001)

Mistakes are brilliant because they not only teach us where we went wrong but also how to fix it. You are a better manager, more experienced, have a wider spectrum to call on when you’ve made a few errors. We all make mistakes- admit them, learn from them and move on.

“The Rules of Management (Managing your self) by RICHARD TEMPLAR”

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Rule 10

Let them make MISTAKES

“A boss fixes blame, a manager fixes mistakes” (Anonymous)

There is an old Chinese saying that goes something like this: ‘Tell me and I’ll remember for an hour; show me and I’ll remember for a day, but let me do it and I’ll remember for ever.’ Fair enough. And if you are going to let people do it then they are going to do badly at first. They are going to make mistakes. And you are going to let them.

If you are parent you know the agonizing thing you go through with a two-years-old who insists they can pour their own drink – and then proceeds to spill most of it on the table. You stand by with a cloth behind your back because you know that :

- they are going to spill it
- it is you who is going to have mop it up
- the spilling process is important and you have to let them do it and they will progress to not

spilling but only once they have got the spilling out of the way first.

As parent you do that wonderful hovering thing, ready to grab the juice if it is going to spill too much, or grab the cup if it is going over, or even grab the child if it is going to fall off the chair due to such intense concentration.

I’m not saying members of your team are like small children – well, I am actually but don’t tell them – but it is imperative you learn to let them do the spilling if they are to progress. Make sure you have your cloth behind your back ready to mop up after them.

And after each spilling you don’t tell them off. Instead you offer praise – ‘Well done, brilliant job, incredible progress.’ Try not to let them see the cloth or the mopping up.

“The Rules of Management (Managing your team) by RICHARD TEMPLAR”

Photo by Microsoft