Being a manager

Why is it that so many people are promoted to the role of ‘manager’ without the least experience in managing? Just because you may be a good salesman (or woman) does not necessarily mean you will be a good manager.

Just think about it, being a ‘manager’ requires someone to manage people. This is not easy and requires many skills not the least of which are communications and empathy. A technician ‘manages’ technical matters – equipment and such like; an accountant ‘manages’ the finances and assets of an organization; a chemist may be involved in the chemical constituents of the products manufactured – but who manages the people? It may that a technician or accountant may, with experience, become an excellent manager of people, but this is not a certainty.

Products or services are manufactured or provided by people for other people – the equipment or devices used are there to ease the process of manufacture or to improve the products or services. Man has been making things and providing services for thousands of years with very simple tools, considerable skill and a great deal of patience. Equipment and machinery are not the be all and end all of managing. People are.

It is many years since I went to a ‘show’ – I mean a Royal Show – an agricultural and industrial show. But I do remember buying ‘show bags’ for my children (now parents in their own right) and in those show bags was a strange plasticky stuff. You squeezed it in your hand and it squelched out between your fingers like a soft plasticine or play-dough. Kids loved it. Anyway this stuff is a good analogy for what happens when a person is employed in a position which is uninteresting, mundane, unfulfilling and maybe not very well paid. What happens in many instances is that the essence of who they are, their inner being is stifled and constrained and required to conform to the requirements of the job – hours employed during the day (or night), at a desk or in a position not of their normal choosing staring at a screen – they are squeezed into a position, one they would not normally take, and expected to fulfil the organizations wishes, promote their products or services and, most probably, service the public with a smile. They may be ok in the position for a while but then the pressures get to them and like the ‘show bag’ plasticky stuff there has to be an outlet somewhere, somehow. Otherwise it just pops out in the most unexpected way – anger, frustration, alcohol, substance abuse, general ill health and the big one - depression.

A manager (of people) must learn to see the signs, talk to those concerned and, if the firm is large enough, suggest they move to a more suitable position. If the organization is small, then just knowing that the ‘boss’ understands and is prepared for a little ‘give and take’ makes an enormous difference and makes for a much pleasanter work place.

Not many managers do this; not many are good communicators; not many empathise with their staff, more is the pity.