How to be a manager? Six skills that managers should possess.

Lead: From the theory of enterprise management, from excellent managers, from my investigation and thinking of managers in China, and from my years of management and consulting experience, I have summed up six skills that managers should have as an effective manager. Just like doctors treat patients and save lives, management, as a profession, needs to complete certain tasks. What is the task of career management? I always ask this question when I am doing training. What surprised me most was that the following people almost said with one voice: "Our task is to complete the task given to us from above." This actually shows that many professional managers in China don't understand what tasks they have. The first task: setting goals, setting reasonable goals is half of our goals. Some people say that, and I believe it. Our task as managers is actually to find and set reasonable goals in the process of work. As a middle-level manager, you should assign tasks to departments and subordinates. The key to the goal is the content, not the form. The key to setting goals is to set personal goals. Set personal goals for a year, a quarter or even a month. Because we can only hope to achieve our goals if we break them down into individuals. So how do you set reasonable goals? The first principle is to set as few goals as possible. If there are too many goals, there is definitely no way to achieve them. I found that those companies that want to achieve many goals in one year will basically achieve few goals when they make a summary next year. Setting several goals can also force you to decide which goal is important. The second principle is that we should set challenging goals. What needs to be reminded is that we should pay attention to the reality of the object. If our target family can't jump up and reach it, then most people's reaction is "broken cans and broken falls"! Since we can't reach our goal, we might as well do something else. In fact, we can't blame our subordinates for not working hard, but as bosses, we won't guide and manage the team by setting goals. The third principle is to quantify goals as much as possible. If a goal cannot be quantified, it is difficult for you to achieve it. The fourth principle, the goal should match your measures and resources, which is very simple. The fifth principle is that the more difficult the situation is, the more short-term goals are needed. Give an example from life. If you want to take a child to climb a mountain, it is difficult for you to get him to climb the top with you at first. But you tell him that we don't have to climb to the top of the mountain. Let's take a rest every 50 steps and see how much we can walk. Then his attention will focus on the simple thing of walking 50 steps. When you achieve your short-term goal ten times, twenty times and dozens of times, you will find that suddenly, your big goal has been achieved, and you really reached the top of the mountain! Therefore, the more dangerous and difficult the situation, the more we need short-term, specific and small goals. The last principle is that the goal should be recorded in words, so that it is easy to check whether the goal has been achieved. The second task: organizing implementation, that is, how to design your own organizational structure and process. In this process, managers need to answer the following three questions: first, how can I design the organization to better meet the needs of customers? Second, how can I design my staff to better accomplish the task he wants to accomplish? Third, how can I design the organizational structure so that the top management can complete the tasks he should complete? We don't need a complete organizational structure to start a business. Maybe everyone has to do everything. But when an enterprise has a scale, we usually divide various departments according to different functions and form a functional organizational structure. When an enterprise operates more products and fields, we will divide the enterprise into products or business departments. This structure will strengthen every product or business area, but the emphasis on function will be weakened. Further development, enterprises may adopt a matrix organizational structure, the form of which is that horizontal lines are products and vertical lines are functions. Then everything we do needs the cooperation of two lines. Of course, when the enterprise develops to a higher stage, we may tear down the organizational structure again. In short, it is necessary to find an organizational structure suitable for enterprises to complete tasks at different stages. The big organizational structure has been completed, how can we make things specific to individuals? In fact, there is a very simple method called transformation matrix. First, we should make a list of things to do; Second, we should design some posts with specific people in charge; Third, try to match what you want to do with these positions. Through this transformation matrix, we can hand over the tasks to each post and individual. As a manager, how to judge the quality of an organization? In fact, a bad organization has many signs. The first is to set too many levels. We need to approve one thing layer by layer, and you can imagine that the efficiency will be greatly reduced. The second is a lot of inter-departmental coordination. Every time for a little thing, there are many meetings to coordinate. The third is to convene a large number of people to hold a large number of meetings. A good organization should reduce the communication between departments to as little as possible, that is to say, on the one hand, it should emphasize internal communication, but not for communication's sake. The fourth is that there are too many people in the same position, and the three monks have no water to eat. The fifth is the increase of so-called assistants or coordinators. When there are many things, a boss and a department manager often don't assign things to fixed posts and specific people, but let this assistant take care of this matter and let that assistant take care of other things. The disadvantage of this is that assistants have a lot of power, but these people are usually not responsible for this matter. The more assistants there are, the more chaotic things will be. Sixth, some posts are unreasonable. This position is responsible for doing a lot of work, but everything is a little bit. As long as this bad sign appears, we will change the organizational structure, change the process and change the post setting, and then we can easily complete the task. The third task: making decisions When it comes to managers, many people think that the first task of managers is to make decisions. We must make a decision and decide something. According to Simon, the Nobel Prize winner, management itself is decision-making, making reasonable decisions and making correct decisions. From this perspective, I think decision-making as a manager's task is easy for everyone to understand. So the question is, what can we do to make this decision? We need to pay attention to the following four points. First, we must find out the problem. We often make invalid decisions because we don't find the right questions. Secondly, we should try not to make decisions under pressure. Decisions made under pressure are usually not good decisions. Thirdly, we should know that there must be other options besides what we know. Making a decision is nothing more than finding the most beneficial and least risky one among different options. If we try to find another option, we usually find a better decision. We used to have a client who worked as a consultant for many years-a paint company. When we started to discuss his strategic choice, we always made a choice in the paint itself. Is it positioned in high-grade paint, middle-grade paint or low-grade paint? But then, we suddenly found that there might be other options besides painting. For example, is it possible for us to enter the high-end of the coating industry as a raw material supplier? If you think like this, you will find that the opportunities in this market may be completely different. The competition of coating industry itself is fierce, but the competition of coating suppliers is relatively weak. From the perspective of paint use, we also found that there is also the possibility of re-selection at the low end. Decision-making itself is important, but execution is more important than decision-making. Finally, in the process of decision-making, it is very important to understand different opinions. The boss of Si Long General Motors once said that I hired a senior manager with a high salary and asked him to give me different opinions. If they all agree with me, what do I need these people for? Therefore, the premise of correct decision-making is to fully express different opinions. To make a correct decision, of course, we should pay attention to the decision-making procedure. It is necessary to identify the problem, understand the preconditions for making decisions, know what choices you have, know the risks and consequences after choosing, and make decisions according to the risks and consequences. After decision-making, implementation, and implementation, constant feedback. Based on this feedback, we will adjust our decision. In fact, in order to make the right decision, we need to have such a complete decision-making process. Need to be reminded that don't make a decision because of possible risks, which is actually the biggest mistake. Drucker said: In a successful enterprise, you can always see someone making important and bold decisions. In fact, many enterprises are doing well now, to some extent because of the bold decisions made in the past. The fourth task: monitoring why many things can't be implemented is because we don't have enough monitoring tools and monitoring means. I am often asked by friends in business circles: On the one hand, I trust my subordinates, but in China, trust means losing control. If you trust him, then you can't control the later things. What should you do? My answer is that trust and control should be put together. If there is only trust without monitoring, then this trust will not go far. On the other hand, if a manager only supervises others and makes others feel that you have no trust in him, then this supervision will actually fail in the end. Therefore, on the one hand, we should learn to trust, on the other hand, we should know how to supervise, so that others will not abuse our trust, which is the task we must complete as managers. So how can we achieve effective monitoring? First, don't want to monitor too much, that is to say, only monitor the most important links. Look at the dial and instrument on the car. They are actually used for monitoring. On the dial of the car, we found that there were no redundant instruments. Why? I don't care about anything that is useful to us, and I don't test anything that is useless. Management is actually the same. If we supervise and control too many things, we will eventually miss the things that should be supervised most. Secondly, from the perspective of supervision, we usually have to conduct spot checks, and we don't have to check them one by one. Because one inspection after another means spending a lot of time and distrust of employees, spot checks can play a good supervisory role. Third, the purpose of our supervision and control is to achieve the goal, not to collect information. I know many managers like to collect all kinds of information. He has a lot of reports and figures in his hand, but they are useless. So from this perspective, we don't need to collect information that has nothing to do with my goal. Fourth, the purpose of monitoring is to change the future and let the future develop according to our wishes, not to correct it afterwards. I'll tell you a little story about two generations of love. One day, two generations of love asked his servant to go down the mountain to fetch water. He said to his servant, "You can't spill my water or break my bucket." If you spill water and break the bucket, I'll slap you in the face. After saying this, he gave the servant two slaps. His friend felt very strange and asked Afandi: Why do you hit him now? Afandi said: If he spilled water and smashed the bucket, wouldn't it be useless for me to slap him again? ! This story tells us that the purpose of monitoring is to prevent unexpected things from happening, that is, we should control the future, not correct it afterwards, which is actually the essence of monitoring. Let me give you a very small example in reality. An entrepreneur and a partner worked out a good business plan together. After making it, his partner took the whole plan and did it himself. Spent millions and finally married someone else! He asked me how to deal with his dishonest opponent. In fact, it is difficult for us to change this thing afterwards, but if he and his partner had made an appointment in advance, then this thing might not have happened at all. Managers should close the loop and complete six steps: the first step is to determine the control range; The second step is to determine the key elements to be controlled; Step 3, determine the control standard; Step four, collect data and information; The fifth step is to measure whether the effect has reached our standards; The sixth step is to correct. In this iterative process, the key areas are cost control, business process control and risk control. The fifth task: Cultivating talents is the most important intangible asset of an enterprise, but it is precisely in this respect that entrepreneurs in China feel extremely confused. Many friends have asked me this question: My market is good, my products are good, and there are many things I can do, but I don't have enough people to do these things. What should I do? The answer is usually to recruit and train talents. The manager asks others to help you finish the task. Recruiting and cultivating talents may be the most important task for top managers. We may face a choice, whether to recruit some airborne troops from outside or train them from inside. On the surface, the benefits of recruiting airborne troops are obvious, and you can use them if you find someone to bring them. Self-cultivation seems to be a long and ineffective process. But I believe that from the perspective of the long-term development of the company, the best way is to cultivate talents by ourselves. Maybe at some time in some special positions, there can be a person like two airborne soldiers to recruit. However, we must not hope that these people can play a role immediately. Because it will take them about a year to get familiar with the company's environment, maybe the next year he will have some feelings and know how to do it. It was not until the third year that his role could really be brought into play. And most of our entrepreneurs or managers can't wait for three years. If we understand that it takes time for an outsider to play a role internally, we will be more inclined to cultivate a person internally. It will take him two or three years from the beginning to being able to do something independently. But you can believe that the people you have trained in these two or three years are completely suitable for your company's environment. Therefore, the talents cultivated internally are actually better used than those cultivated externally. If we want the long-term development of the enterprise, we should try our best to cultivate internal talents. One of P&G's corporate principles is not to recruit managers from outside. Of course, this involves another problem, thinking that insiders are not qualified enough and must go to outsiders. In fact, a person's potential is great. If you give him a chance to develop his potential, a person can do great things. Western proverb says: When God gives a person a task, he usually gives him a talent to accomplish his task well. We must never underestimate the potential of our subordinates. Sometimes we may need to take a step, close our eyes and give him a chance to see what he can do. But in most cases, I believe he will give you a surprise. In the process of cultivating talents, we should pay attention to four elements: the first element is the task, and to give a bigger task is actually to give a person a lot of room for development; The second element is to pay attention to advantages and try to give full play to people's advantages; The third is the key point, to equip the person you want to train with a good boss. Because management is not learned by a person from books to a large extent, it is to set an example and take the boss as an example to a large extent; Finally, we should consider whether this person's characteristics match his position. Generally speaking, the higher the status of managers, the heavier the task of supervising, controlling and cultivating talents. If you ask Welch, what does he do all day? Then he will tell you that he spends 80% and 90% of his time supervising, controlling and cultivating talents. At that time, he ran around the world nonstop, talking with the leaders of various departments, setting goals, supervising the implementation of this goal, and selecting and cultivating talents. The purpose of his teaching in person is to cultivate talents. As a manager, I emphasize once again that the higher our status, the heavier our task of supervising and cultivating talents will be. The sixth task of managers may be to manage the "happiness" of employees. An employee's happiness is mainly in his own hands, but as a manager, he has the obligation to create conditions to make employees happy: trust and authorization (giving employees a chance to show their usefulness), recognition (making employees feel useful), and learning atmosphere (making employees more capable and useful).