Five simple habits that will make you a better manager
A decade into my professional career, I’ve managed and been managed by an array of folks — MBAs, PhDs, doctors, nurses, engineers, and many people in between.
There is no question that different people require different management styles, but throughout all of these experiences, there have been common threads that have led to managers getting the most out of me, or me getting the most out of people that I’ve managed.
The good news: it isn’t rocket science.
Although much has been written and researched about how to manage, what I’ve found is that what we want out of managers is simply what we want out of anyone we spend time with in our lives: honesty, respect, empathy, and kindness.
The bad news: sometimes these things are the easiest to forget.
I remember when I became a manager at a previous job, all of the new managers from across the country were flown in for a three-day management conference/boot camp where we learned about a bunch of sexy management stuff, like toolkits, proprietary methodologies, and the latest personality tests to better “understand” the people we would be managing. Although there were some learnings to be had, these are all secondary (or tertiary…or quaternary) considerations when it comes to managing people.
