Management is No Laughing Matter

This is the first installment of a three part series on management. In no specific order I will discuss management styles, the responsibilities of management and the power of management.

First and foremost everyone is not cut out to manage people. Some may agree with me and others may disagree. For some of you that disagree, let me say, there are many high paying jobs that do not involve managing people. When it comes to management I won’t get into the discussion of nature vs. nurture. Whichever side you are on in that debate everyone needs some sort of formal training in their profession and management is no different.

Managing people is a skill-set and regardless of how good of a manager someone is they can always be better. In today’s workforce many organizations are putting people in managerial positions without training them. When promoting someone to a managerial position, many times, upper management views the situation from a micro perspective when they should be looking at it from a macro perspective. The big picture is going to determine the success or failure of the person that is hired and the people they manage. The responsibility starts with upper management making the best decision for the organization not individual people.

Once upper management decides who is going to occupy the position they have one more major task in front of them. They must empower the person to do their job. Many times managers are hired with their hands tied behind their backs. If the person is going to be successful they must be given the power to make decisions regarding the people they manage. If upper management is not ready to relinquish power they should leave the position vacant until they are ready.