No matter what field or industry you work in, we’ve all had the experience of working for someone who was clearly not fit for the leadership role. In some cases, this was manifested in their inability to make key decisions and in the worst-case scenarios, it was like working with the boss from hell. Under these situations, it’s typical to wonder why someone who can’t effectively lead others would be given such a position. Now, thanks to two recent studies, some light has been cast on why these situations are more the rule than the exception.

In a recent survey conducted by CareerBuilder among over 2 000 US employers and almost 4 000 US employees, it was revealed that 58% of managers hadn’t received any form of management training. This finding most likely explains why 26% of these same managers admitted that they weren’t ready to become a leader when they took on these management roles.

Looking at the relationship between these managers and their employees, the survey authors found that managers cited motivating their employees and managing interpersonal conflicts between co-workers as the top challenges that they have to face as leaders in their organization.

As for the employees surveyed for this study, some of the top concerns they had about their manager were a lack of regular feedback, not listening to the concerns of the employees, and a failure to follow through on what their manager said they would do.

In another study, Bradford Thomas and Scott Erker from Development Dimensions International (DDI) conducted a survey of 1 130 supervisors and first-level managers to understand how they’re overcoming the challenges they face as leaders, and what obstacles might be preventing them from succeeding in these roles.

Like the CareerBuilder study, Thomas and Ecker also found that Click here to continue reading »”Becoming A Leader For All The Wrong Reasons”

Opportunity.

It’s one of a handful of words which on its own can inspire hope and the sense that we might be one step closer to reaching those personal goals we set out for ourselves.

Opportunities also serve as the driving force that pushes organizations into pursuing new territory, in the hopes of discovering potential new markets for their products/services to boost stagnant or declining revenue shares.

It’s no doubt the reason why we find it so hard to say “No” to new opportunities because of the inherent belief that any opportunity which crosses our path is an open door leading us one step closer to our objectives.

Although we spend so much time talking about seeking opportunities, we rarely consider the importance or value of the quality of the opportunities we’re offered. That’s why most of us approach opportunities from the vantage point of “if we don’t accept it or if we pass this up, what will we lose?”

Perhaps a better question we should ask ourselves when such opportunities arise is Click here to continue reading »”Do You Have A Healthy Relationship With Opportunity?”

One of the new features I will be adding to my blog this year is what I’m calling the “Coffee House Book Review”, which will feature reviews on books from the fields of leadership, management, marketing, and other areas of interest to those who are running or managing a business or organization. To start off this new series, I’d like to share my review of the book “
The Drucker Lectures: Essential Lessons on Management, Society, and Economy” which I received as a review copy courtesy of the publisher.

Often referred to as the “father of modern management”, Peter Drucker was a writer and management consultant who wrote numerous books and spoke extensively on the field of management and the way organizations operated. Although this book at times offers a glimpse of the origins for the concepts he later shared in some of his more well-known works, what is more interesting is the fact that several of these lectures – most of which date to over two decades ago – could have easily been written to address some of the challenges businesses and society face today.

Of course, having coined the term “knowledge worker”, many of the lectures featured in this book touch on the realities of today’s information age. In his 1981 lecture “Managing the Increasing Complexity of Large Organizations”, Drucker makes a very strong argument against leaders who think their job is simply to tell their employees what to do. As he points out, it’s the employees who now hold an organization’s specialized knowledge and as such, leaders should work with their employees to determine how to best apply this information toward their goals.

In another lecture he gave in 1987, Drucker draws the analogy of organizations becoming more like a symphony orchestra, “in which you will have fewer layers of management and many more specialists”. In this talk, he shares the story of how Click here to continue reading »”Coffee House Book Review – “The Drucker Lectures” by Peter F. Drucker”

Around our house, nothing signals the end of summer more than helping our kids prepare for their return to the daily school routine. The arrival of the end of summer also means that companies are now returning to full strength with most of their employees having finished their vacation time away from work.

While taking a vacation break can provide us with the benefit of recharging ourselves and allowing us to clear our focus, there can be some feelings of ambivalence surrounding those first few days back on the job over what we may find awaiting us upon our return. This is especially true for employees who return to work after a prolonged absence from taking a maternity, paternity or sick leave.

Of course, returning to work after a prolonged absence can provide its own share of challenges to employees, issues which may not be obvious to the organization’s leadership or their fellow team members. Indeed, unlike employees returning from a holiday break, these employees have to contend with concerns over unexpected additions to their workloads or changes made to their role within the organization while they were away. Such issues can have a dramatic impact not only on their productivity, but also on their ability to ease back into their role as a member of your team.

With this in mind, here are three steps leaders can take to help their employees with the transition of returning back to work after a prolonged break. Click here to continue reading »”Helping Employees Regain Their Productivity After A Prolonged Absence”