Tips for New Supervisors

This is a collection of tips for new supervisors. The advice is useful to anyone in a management position. Most people are thrown into supervisory positions with very little in the way of training or guidance. These tips for supervisors can help you be proactive in avoiding problems that can occur further down the road.

• Know the Rules – In order to be an effective supervisor, you need to be aware of your organization’s policies and procedures. If you don’t, you’ll likely make promises you can’t keep or deal with situations inappropriately simply because you don’t understand the correct procedure. The procedures and policies are there to help you make good decisions even when you are under pressure or time constraints.
• Manage Up – Don’t forget that your relationship upward is just as important as your relationships with the people you supervise. Don’t expect your boss to be competent just because he or she is the boss. Take the time to understand their strengths and weaknesses. Anticipate problems ahead of time being proactive to help your boss succeed.
• Build a Base of Influence – Develop relationships across your organization. People need to know who you are and like you. The fact that someone likes you can go a long ways in helping you out of political situations or when someone else is opposing you. If people know who you are and like you, they will start from the standpoint of assuming that you are a good person. If they don’t know who you are, they will start from the standpoint of whoever is talking to them.
• Develop a Separate Social Life – Make sure you aren’t completely reliant on your coworkers and direct reports for your social life needs. This doesn’t mean you shouldn’t ever do things outside of work with your co-workers, but if your only friends are at work, you are putting yourself in a dangerous situation. If your social and work life are too intertwined, it can cloud your judgment in ways that can be harmful to your career.
• Walk the Talk – Just because you are a supervisor doesn’t give you an excuse to break the rules. You shouldn’t be asking people to do things that they don’t see you doing yourself.
• Keep Good Records – Keep good records of interactions and issues. Modern work environments are political and often full of lawsuits. By keeping good records, you’ll put yourself in a much better position to stop frivolous claims before they become problems.

Definition of Management

If you look up the dictionary definition of management, among many examples you will find clues as to the real definition of management. This article simply takes an assortment of definitions and looks at what they say and what they imply about management.

“Management” (from Old French ménagement “the art of conducting, directing”, from Latin manu agere “to lead by the hand”) characterises the process of leading and directing all or part of an organization, often a business, through the deployment and manipulation of resources (human, financial, material, intellectual or intangible). …
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Management

This definition is interesting because it traces the root meaning back to the Latin phrase meaning “to lead by the hand”. Leading by the hand implies giving direction that is stronger than just a passing suggestion yet still fairly gentle in approach. Leading by the hand also implies that the person doing the leading is first going where the follower is being lead. The leader is not asking the follower to do something he is not willing to do himself.

The guidance and control of action required to execute a program. Also, the individuals charged with the responsibility of conducting a program.
www.ojp.usdoj.gov/BJA/evaluation/glossary/glossary_m.htm

This definition of management refers to a “program”. This implies that, for management to be effective, there needs to be some type of defined approach or system in place. This system becomes the plan and management is guiding others in following that plan. This is often the downfall of managers. They have no plan or system. As a result their actions seem random to the people they are managing and this leads to confusion and disappointment. This is why it is so important for business managers to have an employee manual. Without the employee manual providing direction, managers will struggle to be fair and balanced in their dealings with employees.

is the organizational process that includes strategic planning, setting; objectives, managing resources, deploying the human and financial assets needed to achieve objectives, and measuring results. Management also includes recording and storing facts and information for later use or for others within the organization. Management functions are not limited to managers and supervisors. Every member of the organization has some management and reporting functions as part of their job.
home.earthlink.net/~ddstuhlman/defin1.htm

This definition is more in depth and tailored toward business management. Notice that it consists of three primary activities. First, management establishes a plan. This plan becomes the road map for what work is going to be done. Second, management allocates resources to implement the plan. Third, management measures the results to see how the end product compares with what was originally envisioned. Most management failings can be attributed to insufficient effort occurring in one of these three areas.

The definition goes on to talk about how management is responsible for measuring details that may not be required presently, but may be useful later on. These measurements often help determine the objectives in the planning stage.

When management is following this type of sequence, it becomes a continuing cycle. Plan, execute, and measure. The measurements become the basis for the next planning stage and so on.

is the activity of getting things done with the aid of people and other resources.
wps.prenhall.com/wps/media/objects/213/218150/glossary.html

This definition of management focus on management as the process of accomplishing work through the efforts of others. Skilled managers can accomplish much more through others than they can through their own single efforts.

Effective utilisation and coordination of resources such as capital, plant, materials, and labour to achieve defined objectives with maximum efficiency.
www.ecbp.org/glossary.htm

This definition of management looks at not only the people but the entire range of resources necessary to follow a plan. Notice how it focuses on efficiency. Management isn’t just getting from point A to point B. It is getting there by choosing the best possible path.

1. The process of getting activities completed efficiently with and through other people; 2. The process of setting and achieving goals through the execution of five basic management functions: planning, organizing, staffing, directing, and controlling; that utilize human, financial, and material resources.
www.crfonline.org/orc/glossary/m.html

The first definition looks at the fact that management is getting work done through other people. The second definition divides management up into five components. These components are all parts of the three components (plan, execute, measure) that we looked at above. However the more detailed definition helps show the activities that occur in each of the three phase definition.

The process of planning, leading, organizing and controlling people within a group in order to achieve goals; also used to mean the group of people who do this.
www.booksites.net/download/chadwickbeech/Glossary.htm

Once again, this definition of management addresses accomplishing work through other people. This definition stresses the activities that are necessary for reaching particular goals.

the process of achieving the objectives of the business organization by bringing together human, physical, and financial resources in an optimum combination and making the best decision for the organization while taking into consideration its operating environment.
www.ucs.mun.ca/~rsexty/business1000/glossary/M.htm

This definition talks about the different components that managers need to control in order to achieve objectives. One differentiator of this definition is the way it considers the operating environment as part of what a manager must understand.

the role of conducting and supervising a business.
www.becbiz.com.au/glossary.htm

This is a broad definition of management that doesn’t consider management as something that can take place outside of a business.

Creating Confidence

As a leader, you need to cultivate your team’s confidence. Your team should have confidence in themselves as well as confidence in your leadership skills. The best way to create confidence is through a series of victories. In general, people will judge the probability of future success based on past performance. As you work with your team you will build a history. If you maintain a good track record of success, you will create a sense of optimism that future, proposed projects will also be successful. If you have a record of failure, your team will probably view any new projects as having a high chance of failing.

To be effective, you need a team that is very confident in their abilities to achieve success and in your ability to choose projects that will be successful. If an individual doesn’t feel like what they are working on is going to be successful, it is very unlikely that they will invest themselves entirely in the project. Sometimes they will even start trying to plan ahead in order to have a good excuse for the project’s demise. At times, this means ignoring obvious obstacles that will provide an excuse for their failure.

When an individual believes a project will be successful, they are able to put themselves behind it 100%. Instead of looking for obstacles that can function as excuses in the future, they are proactive in eliminating obstacles that would cause a failure of the project. A team full of people looking for solutions will have a much higher success rate than a team of people looking for things to use as excuses later on.

It is the job of the leader to select projects that will contribute to an overall sense of success within his team. By starting with projects that the entire team believes will be successful, a leader is able to raise the level of confidence for the next project. Over time, the confidence of a team can be built to a point that it can easily complete a project that would have been a failure previously. A series of projects can be completed easily and successfully when they are arranged in order to build confidence, while the same projects can all be complete failures when done in a different order.

When you need to develop confidence, you should arrange projects in an order that is similar to the way questions are asked on the game show “Who Wants To Be A Millionaire.”  The first project should very easy. So easy that no one will have any doubts that it can be completed successfully.

Historically, nations have built monuments in memory of their success. When the Israelites crossed the Jordan river into Canaan, they took 12 large stones from the river and stacked them on top of each other to remember their success in leaving Egypt.

The world is full of triumphal arches that were built to remind people of a war victory. These were built to remind people of their success in the past and encourage them in future endeavors.

When Yahoo completed a groundbreaking version of their web mail system, an artist was commissioned to create a sculpture celebrating the success of the developers who worked on the project. The statue is on display at the Yahoo headquarters.

While it might not be appropriate to create a sculpture or triumphal arch for every project, some projects serve as trophies themselves. The visibility of a project doesn’t always correspond with its difficulty. By picking a project that is easy to complete, but is also very visible, you will create a “war trophy” for your team—something that will regularly remind them of their success.

Once a team has had some success, the difficulty of their projects can increase dramatically. To continue the momentum, a leader should be careful not to break momentum by having a failure. However, a proactive leader should be able to turn an occasional failure into a positive learning experience. It is important to admit when something went wrong. When leadership attempts to cover a failure as if it was really a success or just ignore it completely, it often amplifies the failure instead of minimizing it.

There was a large organization that was beginning to saturate the market for its services at a particular location. The leadership decided that expanding to a branch office was the right decision. They leased a building, renovated it and began operations. It was soon apparent that there was a problem with the cost structure at the branch office. Many of the methods of doing business at the main headquarters were very inefficient when scaled down to the size of the branch office. To make matters worse, the branch office didn’t attract many new customers. Most of the clients were existing customers who had previously done business at the headquarters building.

After a few years, the main headquarters built a bigger building and the branch office was shut down. However, the organization told people that the plan had always been to shut it down once a larger headquarters was built, while much of the staff knew that this wasn’t the case. By trying to hide the fact that the branch office had been a failure, they were unable to learn from the failure in a way that could help enable successes in the future. Without this opportunity to learn, it is very likely that any future branch offices will suffer a similar demise–assuming that the organization even attempts another expansion.

Many of the team members who worked on creating the branch office left the organization. Others that stayed on staff carried the sense of failure with them as a lack of confidence on future projects.

Dealing with failure is one of the key skills a leader needs to develop. Failure does not have to be a big deal, but most people’s natural tendencies are the opposite of what needs to happen in order to turn a failure into a learning experience and not a confidence breaker.

A high level of confidence isn’t something that just happens naturally. It is something that develops over time. With a little care and planning, your team can grow in confidence. This leads to a momentum of success that will carry them over the inevitable rough places and occasional failures.

Setting Goals

I was working for an organization that was attempting to go through a re-branding to become more relevant to their customers. They had hired an outside consulting firm to come in and help walk them through the branding process.

After talking with several of the employees, it became clear to the consultants that the employees didn’t all have the same view about the two and three year goals of the organization. To help get a better understanding, they scheduled a meeting with the CEO to ask him what his goals were.

Several of the employees were pretty excited about finally understanding the direction that the organization would be headed and counted down the days until the consultants would meet with the CEO. When the consultants came out of the meeting they were asked about the goals for the organization. They responded:

“We asked, but you aren’t going to like the answer.”

Evidently the CEO told the consultants that he didn’t like making goals clear for the employees. His reasoning was that if the organization missed goals he had set, people would be disappointed. He felt that would hurt his leadership more than keeping people in the dark about where the organization was headed.

This isn’t as uncommon as it sounds. Many people in leadership don’t set goals for the very same reason, but they aren’t self-aware enough to understand why. This CEO was able to articulate his reason for not setting clear goals, which was a step better than most leaders, but it revealed a misunderstanding about how to motivate people.

Most individuals would rather play a game where they understand the goals of the game and come in second, than play a game where they don’t know what they are trying to accomplish and come in first.

When I was a kid, I was playing with a demo video game in a store. Another youngster came up, took the other control and we started playing a wrestling game together. I pushed buttons as fast as possible in order to try to win. After the first round he leaned over to his friend and commented, “This guy is really good!” referring to my skill at the game. I turned and asked, “Which player am I?”

I was winning, but I didn’t understand the game. I didn’t even know what player I was. This was much less satisfying than other games where I understood the rules—even when I lost horribly.

People want to be challenged. This doesn’t mean you should set goals that no one can reach, but don’t be afraid of setting and communicating your goals to the people you lead. This is your job as a leader—to show people where you are going and how you are going to measure your progress. If you don’t give people these goals, it is hard for them to really get satisfaction from their job.