There is nothing wrong with a finance manager good at just managing finance. Nothing wrong with a Business manager good at just securing business for the company. Well, that’s what they are paid for anyway. But is it enough?

In today’s business world, it is not enough for anyone to be outstanding only at their own area of expertise. For any successful company, they must have managers who can play many roles. Especially if the manager has a team to manage. So how many roles should a manager play?

1) Be the mentor

A company need talents in every department. So it’s either the company hire the talent, which often going to be expensive. Or, the company can train and develop those who deem to have potential. And the company will need the manager to take on the role of a mentor who can guide the employee.

2) Be the voice of the company’s values

Company need manager to be a firm believer of the company’s values. The manager is the bridge of communication between the senior management and the ground people. Therefore, it’s essential to the company that managers are regularly spreading the importance of the values to the employee.

3) Be the cheerleader

Especially in a team-structured environment, when the going get tough, the manager has to play the role of a cheerleader to boost the morale of the team. And usually, team members will put in their best once they see how much the manager cared for them.

I bet there are more roles that a company would like the manager to play. Still, the manager himself has to look at the workload and what’s expected of him from senior management. So that, he will not spread himself too thin and in the end, neglect his core responsibilities.

So what other roles of a manager do you think he/she should also play? Drop your thoughts in the comment section or share with us through my twitter.

“But let’s apply Sutherland’s approach to another irritable mammal: your boss”

In the article, they were saying that you can use the trick of exotic-animal training to manage your boss. And it listed three rules.

Rule 1 - is to ignore bad behavior
Rule 2 - any interaction is training
Rule 3 - reward the behavior you want

As much as I wanted to say that it’s useful, I believe there must be some form of understanding of your boss before you can start using the tricks.

It was mentioned in the article “Managing your boss” from Harvard Business review that you need to understand your boss in terms of:

1) Goals and Objectives
2) Pressure
3) Strength, Weakness and Blind spot
4) Preferred work style

With the outstanding, you will be able to work better with your boss. And by working well with your boss, you will eventually get what you are hoping for.

You might be thinking how the understanding can help you. Here’s an example.

“Peter Drucker divides bosses into “listeners” and “readers.” Some bosses like to get information in report form so they can read and study it. Others work better with information and reports presented in person so they can ask questions. As Drucker points out, the implications are obvious. If your boss is a listener, you brief him or her in person, then follow it up with a memo. If your boss is a reader, you cover important items or proposals in a memo or report, then discuss them.”

John J, Gabarro and John P. Kotter

“Managing Your Boss”

Harvard Business Review, January 2005

On top of that, the understanding of your boss’s goals and objectives can help you in preparing any strategy that you are going to propose. Your proposal will surely be rejected if it goes against your boss’s goals and objectives.

The tricks will have more impact once you have gathered all the understanding of your boss.

Its alway a fine line between sucking up to your boss and be smart in getting what you want. So tread the fine line carefully or you will be the number one public enemy in the company.

Let me know if you have used it and how did it goes through my twitter.

For a smooth and successful career change, it involves not just a change of office or a title. We do also need to change our mindset. A mindset which will enable us to learn as fast as possible and get that promotion earlier then expected.

My first career started in Republic of Singapore Airforce. I was an aircraft senior technician specialized in radar and communication. My contract with them ended after 7 years, and I decided to move to a greener pasture.

So I embarked on a journey in the online world, starting as a project executive in an online advertising agency. It was a totally different environment, and it did freaked me out when I started working.

I would not say that I’m successful now. But after 3.5 years, I could safely say that I’m able to earn a decent income from my second career. Now, I’m exploring a possible third career.

I speak from experience that career change is not easy but with the right attitude and mindset, everyone can craft out a bright future in the new arena. And here are some tips to make your journey a lot easier.

1) Be humble and friendly

Since you are starting from scratch, people are more willing to teach you if you are humble and friendly. And it will never do you harm if you carry a smile while you work.

2) Ask, ask and ask

Always ask when in doubt. Don’t let the ego hinder you when getting things done. It’s better to be teased by something that you don’t know than scolded for the errors in your work.

3) Be an information sponge

Read everything on the company, job, and the industry. Get a RSS reader and subscribe to anything you can find about your job. Information is the king. You do want crucial information to be at your finger tips when you are making a decision.

But do not be overloaded with information. You do not need to know all the things but do know where to get it. And usually, by knowing where to get the information, you can establish yourself as the go-to guy. And this will help you in your working relationship with your colleagues.

4) Join the Red Cross. Be a Volunteer

Not to ask you to donate blood but if there is any new internal project coming up, do volunteer for it. By doing so, you can learn more and you might work for people from different department, thus making your presence felt.

But before you put up your hand, do consider your current workload. You do not want to divide your attention and energy too thin that you can’t perform in your daily work.

5) Relate from past experience and contribute

Your experience in your past career are not wasted. Although the industry might be different but soft skills like managing people, managing team, etc are still useful.

Other than soft skills, process used in your last job might be applicable with some modification. Most successful organizations are looking for best practice used in other industry and implement it on themselves.

So do look around in your job and see whether there is anything that can be improved with your experience from your last job.

6) Goal setting with manager

In order to get what you want in your career, you will also need to let your manager know of your goals. Check with him on what’s required for you to achieve what you want (e.g promotion, pay increment e.t.c) And with the understanding of your requirement, set goals and decide the timeline to achieve it.

This will be useful during your performance evaluation. You will be able to prove to your manager that you deserve the promotion or pay increment once you have fulfilled your goals.

You can learn more on getting your deserve promotion with my other post, “How to Get Your Next Promotion in Your Career?“.

7) Put in more hours

Go to office 1 hour earlier and leave office 1 hour later.

Use the 1 hour in the morning to read on the latest happening and plan for your day. List your to-do list. And use the 1 hour in the evening to reflect on yourself. Look through the day and see what you have done right and what you have done wrong. And also anything that you feel that you can do better. Make a mental note on it and do it when you encounter the same situation.

For the first 6 months, you need to understand that you will need to put in more time to understand what you need to know about your job, your company, and the industry.

Summary

There is always an emotional fear that you will not make it in your new career. But do understand that you are not starting from a piece of blank paper. You have working experience and by that, it means that you have gained the basic skill in communication, learning and situational analysis through your last job. And what you need is only time to learn everything relating to your job.

So have some confidence in yourself and claim your next blue sky. All the best to you.

Basketball is once my passion. I would play basketball everyday and not get tired of it. But, I have to give up since basketball will not be my bread and butter.

Now that I think of the good old times, playing all day long while working on my blog. I realized there are actually similarities between organization and team sport. And there are things that we can learn from it.

So what can we learn?

1) Goals vs Objectives

The big picture for any team sport is to win the championship or top the table in the league. Drill down a little bit. The coach and the player’s focus are to win every game that they played.

On the player themselves, they understand their roles in the team. And they are expected to achieve their best in whatever they are expected to do. For example, a shooting guard is expected to score every time that they shoot at the basket.

For any company, do all the employees understand the mission statement or the objectives of the company? At department level, do the employees understand what do they need to achieve to contribute to the department?

Employees would like to feel a sense of achievement after a long day of hard work. Without objectives. Without goals. The employees will not know whether they are moving towards the right direction.

2) The coach vs The manager

The coach play a big part in the team. Not only do they understand the tactics to play the game, they also understand how to motivate the team.

Usually at crunch time, the things that make or break the team are not entirely the team’s skill level. It’s how bad do they want to win. And here’s where the coach comes in. A great coach will inspire the team to rise to the challenge and perform to their best.

A manager does not need to go to such extent and give inspiration speech every day to motivate his/her staffs. But, he/she will need to know his/her staffs well enough when to step in and give his/her staffs a push to strive for the best.

3) Top scorer vs Top performer

There are always specific training program designed for any talent that the coach spot. The training program will improve the player’s strength and target his/her weak area. Through the program, the player will be able to perform to his/her best.

Same thing for any company, there should be training programs for any employees to improve their skills. So that, they can perform to their best and propel the company to excellence.

4) Team spirit vs Employee bonding

When the team loses, players console each other. When the team win, they celebrate together. It’s the team spirit that bond them together, and they need the bond to connect with each other. So that, they can form a formidable partnership on the playing field.

In a company’s environment that foster bonding, it will be easier for anyone to work with each other. And employees will stay longer in that company.

How does company create that kind of environment? Organize activities that foster teamwork. Activities like sport event, online gaming (in groups), group competition (where prizes will be won), etc.

Summary

In the world of team sport, there are times where little-known team can beat a famous team unexpectedly. And I can tell you that it’s possible because of the teamwork, their strong desire to win and the player’s commitment to the team.

For every company, it will be great to have that kind of team who will go all out to win. And it’s not easy to create the environment to nurture that kind of team. It needs full support from everyone including the top management. And it needs to be constantly reinforced through action by manager and activities organized by the company.

So gather your people and let the game start.

Do you need to attend a weekly meeting which you think it’s a total waste of time? Why don’t you put some number to it and propose to the chair person to reconsider the format of the meeting or even cancel it?

Here’s how you can put numbers to the meeting

1) First calculate the combined salaries of all the participants

2) Add to this the annual cost of your respective organization’s overheads

3) Divide the sum by the number of workings hours there are in a year (working hours per week multiplied by working weeks per year)

4) Add any sundry hourly costs, such as room hire.

And this will be the cost per hour of the meeting. So does it worth it? Present this to chairperson so that you will have a stronger case to escape the meeting.

Good luck!

I’m sure productive meeting exist. And I’m also pretty sure that you want every meeting, that you chaired, to be productive as well.

Here are 10 questions that you can ask yourself to ensure your meeting, a productive one.

1 ) What’s the specific purpose of the meeting? What do you want everyone who attended your meeting to gain from it?

Is it for:

- sharing information?
- issuing instructions?
- training?
- brainstorming for new ideas?
- solving problems?
- evaluating proposals?
- making or implementing decisions?
- addressing grievances or arbitrating?
- promoting team spirit?
- consulting vested interests?

2 ) What kind of meeting it should be?

Considering the following and once you decide on the format, sticks to it.

Frequency—A daily meeting is different from a weekly one, and a weekly meeting from a monthly one. Irregular, ad hoc, quarterly, and annual meetings are different again. On the whole, the frequency of meetings defines—or perhaps even determines—the degree of unity of the group.

Composition—Do the members work together on the same project, such as the nursing and ancillary staff on the same ward of a hospital? Do they work on different but parallel tasks, like a meeting of the company’s plant managers or regional sales managers? Or are they a diverse group—strangers to each other, perhaps—united only by the meeting itself and by a common interest in realizing its objectives?

Motivation—Do the members have a common objective in their work, like a football team? Or do they to some extent have a competitive working relationship, like managers of subsidiary companies at a meeting with the chief executive, or the heads of research, production, and marketing discussing finance allocation for the coming year? Or does the desire for success through the meeting itself unify them, like a neighborhood action group or a new product design committee?

Decision process—How does the meeting group ultimately reach its decisions? By a general consensus, “the feeling of the meeting”? By a majority vote? Or are the decisions left entirely to the chairman himself, after he has listened to the facts and opinions.

Mr. Jay, “How To Run a Meeting”
Harvard Business Review, March-April 1976

3 ) Who should attend the meeting?

Make sure there is a reason for everyone to be in the meeting.

4 ) How long should the meeting be?

With your specific purpose of your meeting in mind, decide how long your meeting should be and stick to it.

Respect your attendees’ time. And they will respect yours.

5 ) Have you send out the agenda to whoever are attending your meeting?

If you want people to contribute in the meeting, make sure that they know what’s the meeting all about.

6 ) Before the meeting, have you read all the background papers?

One of the worst things that can happen in your meeting is to be unprepared for it. Your attendees will lose confidence in you once they know about it.

7 ) Have you consider how attendees are likely to respond to whatever you have to say in the meeting?

Always consider your attendees’ response, especially so if you are getting an approval or consensus from them on certain issues. The last thing that you want is to be caught off-guard by their response.

8 ) Have you decide how you might need to handle your attendees in order to get most appropriate outcomes from the meeting?

By understanding how your attendees behave in a meeting, you can act according to it and get the outcomes that you want.

For example, you know that some of the attendees are shy. Therefore, it will be good to chat with them encouragingly just before the meeting to put them at their ease.

9 ) Just before the end, have you sum up the meetings and actions to be taken?

This is to make sure everyone understand what need to be done.

10 ) After the meeting, have you follow up with minutes to make sure the action agreed upon is taken?

Again, this is to make sure everyone is on the same page and hold everyone accountable to what have been discussed in the meeting.

The questions are easy, and straight-forward yet most people do not ask themselves to ensure a productive meeting. More will be discussed on productive meeting in future post.

I have listed 4 sites where you can learn almost everything on LinkedIN.

1) Linked Intelligence

2) LinkedIN’s blog

3) I’m On LinkedIN - Now What???

4) Job Machine

And if you still can’t get what you want, try the LinkedIN Answer and fire your questions. You will surely get some answers from it.

5) LinkedIN Answer

If you have other resources, do share it by leaving a comment on this post.

What’s missing? That’s the question that puzzles senior management when a team of super-star does not provide the expected result.

There can be lots of reason but here are some of the crucial one.

1) Lack of purpose

For any team without purpose is like a human being without a direction.

Employees would like to know that they are contributing to a greater purpose in the organization. Not just some workers working non-stop, day in, day out. They would like to feel a sense of accomplishment after a day of hard work.

Same with the members in a team. With a purpose in mind, they know that they are working hard for something. The purpose provides them a direction and motivates them to put in the extra efforts required.

2) Lack of specific team-performance goals

For any team to perform to its best, it’s essential to have specific team-performance goals.

I believe you must be thinking with the tons of workload. It will be more stressful for the team to worry about achieving goals.

No doubt, there will be pressure to achieve those goals. But it’s only when you set the goals too high, then the stress will set in.

Here are some of the benefits for setting specific team-performance goals

The goals can act as yardstick to measure the progress of the team.

With the goals, every member understands what need to be done. Therefore, every communication and constructive conflict are geared towards achieving the goals.

~ It allow the team to achieve small wins as it pursues its broader purpose
Motivation is the key to make them to put in the extra efforts required. And with achievement of every single goal, they are motivated to continue to finish the project.

When team works hard together and taste the sweet success from the achievement of the goals, it will no doubt bond them closely together.

The goals are set by the team. And with each goal achieved, it will motivate the team to set higher goals and achieve them with their full potential.

3) Lack of commitment

This is one of the most important element for a team to work together.

It’s always advisable to leave out a member if he/she doesn’t have the commitment to contribute to the team. Even, if he/she is the most talented individual you can find.

4) Lack of accountability

Don’t assume that when the tasks are assigned to anyone on the team, they will naturally hold themselves accountable to the tasks.

When the team does not understand the importance of accountability, finger-pointing usually happens. And it will be worse if things go wrong.

5) Lack of shared leadership

Officially, there is only one leader in the team. But for a dynamic team to work to its full potential, the leadership is shared.

Each of the member chosen for the team has his/her own set of skills which are beneficial to the team. When his/her skills are required, he/she will need to step up as a leader to guide and advice the team.

And it is important that the official leader understands the shared leadership and step down temporarily. But having said that, the official leader will still have a role to play even when he/she is sidelined. He/she will need to make sure that the team progress towards the right direction under the leadership of the other team members.

6) Lack of clear rules of behavior

This will not break or make the team. But without it, efficiency will suffer and frustration will grow.

Simple rules like attending the meeting on time, no disturbance (i.e phone call or laptop) during brainstorm session, finish the work on schedule e.t.c

Summary

The first meeting when the team meet up is the most important. The team leader will need to set the record right. He/she will need to explain the importance of the commitment required, accountability and shared leadership. And what are the rules of behavior required to ensure the team work well without frustration.

A team of super-star will not guarantee super result. Only with combination of common purpose and commitment, performance goals and mutual accountability, will then ensure result from the team.

I will discuss more in upcoming articles on managing teams so do subscribe to Gerald Heralds.

Here’s how you can get what you want in your career.

1) Performance evaluation happen the moment you step into the office

When the HR department sends out the form for everyone to fill for their performance evaluation, most people will start panic. And they will just look at the form with a blank mind.

Not that you need to perform to your best when you step into your office. You just need to regularly remind yourself of your goals (i.e promotion or increment) and what you need to do to achieve your goals.

For every achievement or completed project, you will need to note it down. Most important, note down your contribution to the successful project. Do it the moment when the project is completed. Not at the time of the evaluation since most evaluation happens once a year. And you might forget everything when your evaluation comes.

2) Set the expectation right. Goal setting with your boss

You put in 110% in your work and you know that you deserve a promotion. But, your manager might have a different thoughts on it. Furthermore, your expectation of your own performance and your manager’s expectation might be different.

Two things might happen when you discuss with your manager about the promotion that you deserve.

a) Your manager agrees with you that you deserve the promotion and you will get it. Hurray!

b) Your manager disagrees with you. But don’t jump on him yet. You have to understand from him the reason why you don’t deserve the promotion.

In addition, you have to ask him what do you need to do in order to be promoted. And here’s where the goal-setting come in. Once you understand what you need to do, and together with your manager, set goals and timeline to achieve it.

Once you achieved it and showed to our manager that you can perform up to the expectation, you will get the promotion that you deserve.

One important thing to take note, the discussion on your promotion has to take place at least 3 months before your performance evaluation. You will have more time to prove to your manager if he/she disagrees with your promotion.

3) Get feedback from your direct report, colleague and even your client or vendor

It’s called the 360 degree performance evaluation. And most of the time, organization will only do it for managerial position. But don’t let that deter you from doing it. Getting feedback will benefit you in the long run.

To make it easy, you can do it like a survey. Decide on the questions that you would like to ask (preferably not more than 15 questions) and fire it away.

Do let your manager know that you are getting feedback on your performance especially if you are going to ask your client or vendor as well.

And be prepared as there might be some nasty feedback. Deal with it with a calm mind and decide if it’s something that you can improve on. If not, just leave it alone.

Summary

Performance evaluation is not just the time to evaluate your performance for the past 6 to 12 months, it’s also the time to set the stage right for your next evaluation. And together with goal-setting, you will get what you want in your next evaluation.

Remember, your manager is not a mind reader so do let him/her know what do you like to achieve in your career and what you prepare to do for it. It’s only when your manager know what you want. He will then recommend you if any opportunities arise.

From the Latin, it means “whether unwilling or willing”.

In everyone’s career life, there will be times when your immediate supervisor had quit unexpectedly or going to take 3 months leave. And you will need to step up and lead, nolens volens. This can be a chance to excel as well as a chance to fail.

Here are five things that you can take note when the heat is on you to lead your team.

1) Don’t panic and don’t let fear take over

Don’t collapse and fake death when your boss informed you that you need to take over and lead. Be calm and tell yourself that you can do it just by taking one step at a time.

If you need further convincing, list down what’s working for you and what’s against you. And you will discover that most of your fears and worries are just a fragment of your imagination.

2) Ask and clarify

Your expectation of your new role might not be the same as your boss’s expectation.

So talk to your boss and ask him/her what’s his/her expectation of you in the new role. Understand their expectation and translate them to your objective/goals.

And don’t forget about the expectation of your team. Whether you succeed in your new role, it depends largely on your team’s performance. So clarify with your boss on the team’s performance goals as well.

3) Plan, plan and plan………. and plan again

It may seem a daunting task. But, once you understand what’s expected of you and the team and identify th challenges involved, it will be a lot easier.

List down the goals, next step to achieve the goals and the challenges involved. Keep referring to the list to make sure everything is on track.

4) Communication…….but listen first

It’s a tendency to start giving orders and expect everyone to behave like bees and start working without thinking.

They are equally confused like you when there are changes in the management. So communicate the team’s goals and your plan to them. Once done, stop talking and start listening for feedback.

To succeed, you will need the whole team’s efforts. So do involve the whole team in your planning.

5) Leadership style. Your own or stay as it is

You may not like how the last manager run the whole show. And you are eager to change everything since you firmly believe that a certain leadership style will work for the team.

Don’t do it within the first 2 months of your new role. People are generally resistant to changes. Too many changes will only confuse your team, and any plan will backfired.

Use the 2 months to observe and listen. There is a different view now that you are at the top.

Most importantly, gain the trust of your team first.

Summary

Always remember, there are reasons why you are chosen to take over. You must have some talent or do something right for your boss to make that decision.

So stop saying you can’t do it and starts doing it.