For most people looking to move up the ladder at their job, being awarded a managerial role is a key step toward realizing professional ambitions. Nonetheless, managing a team, and especially a large one, can be demanding. Balancing the happiness, ambition and satisfaction of the people for whom you are now responsible can be a serious challenge, especially if the staff is composed of people from different countries and cultural backgrounds.
To help you on your way to becoming a manager who is liked and respected as well one who has a reputation for delivering results, we have put together this list of four tips for good managerial practice. Read on to find out more.
- Direction and Engagement
An engaged workforce is a productive one. While this may sound obvious to you as the reader, many managers seem to overlook this maxim. The reasons for this are not always clear, but as a manager, you should constantly be looking for innovative ways of increasing enthusiasm. One of the simplest and best ways of doing this is by communicating clearly with your staff. This does not just mean ordering people around – it also requires you to listen to the ideas and concerns of people on your team.
- Team Building
The modern world of work and its decentralized nature can give rise to working relationships that are more distant than they ideally would be. As a result, the modern manager’s job will require an extra effort to try to bring people together to ensure that everyone is on the same page and feels well-integrated in the team. Make a special effort to organize regular occasions where team members have a chance to touch base and share ideas.
- Managing Personalities
It is natural that within any team there will exist a wide range of personalities, not all of which will immediately hit it off and form productive working relationships. As a manager, it is your responsibility to get everyone onside, so catering to and managing differences is one of the most important elements of your job. Once you have gotten to know the people on your team, you may want to pair or group people together so that they are with people whose personalities will help bring out the best in each other.
- Cultural Differences
Most large companies today will have staff members that come from around the world. An effective manager will look to be conscious of and make allowances any differences in the working cultures that are prevalent in different countries. Finding the way of work that yields the most optimum results depends on identifying cross-cultural working relationships that work best for all parties.
The job of a manager can be challenging. You have to balance the ambitions and desires of a large number of employees in a way that produces the optimum results for the company. However, if you abide by the four basic principles detailed above, it will not be long before you gain the respect of your team, no matter how large it is.