According to the sage, we can say: talents are not in place, and they will be tired. This means that if a person's ability does not match the requirements of the job, he will be incompetent and add a lot of trouble.
Yuan Shao in the Three Kingdoms period is such a typical figure. He had a good hand, but he beat him out of the water. Yuan Shao has a prominent position, second only to the four kingdoms. As a warlord with the widest territory and the strongest appeal, he should have made great achievements, but he was defeated by powerful Cao Cao on the historical stage. The reason is that he is narrow-minded, headstrong, indecisive, unable to see that others are smarter than himself, unable to listen to other people's suggestions and lacking effective leadership. Even though it occupied an absolute advantage, it lost the initiative of "relying on the emperor to make the princes" and the fiasco of the battle of Guandu because of its poor talent, and finally lost all its money. No wonder Cao Cao commented on him like this: "Be ambitious and wise, be ruthless and fearful, avoid arrogance but not arrogance, have too many soldiers but can't draw clearly, and be arrogant and have different orders."
A few years ago, the spy war drama "War after the War" also created a character whose ability and status did not match. As a senior officer of the Kuomintang, Zhong, after receiving the task of escorting Japanese war criminal Shi Yanfu to Nanjing for trial, set foot on the road to Tianjin. He was never tempted by beauty, intended to plot evil, bravado for credit to the people, and then on the train back to Tianjin, he was scared and shivering by Shi Yanfu's old men. Zhong You has a high position but little wisdom, even being laughed at by his subordinates. He is in sharp contrast with Dong Yuqing, the chief inspector of the Kuomintang Military Commission. He is cunning and insidious, and he is really a vivid "buffoon".
Xiao Wang is the technical backbone of an Internet operation company. He works hard and has excellent skills, and has won the trust and recognition of the leaders. After the position of technical department head became vacant, Xiao Wang became the department head. This is the result of popular expectations, but soon after Xiao Wang took office, the whole department was in chaos, the project progressed slowly, and the information communication was not smooth, which led to complaints. ? It turns out that Xiao Wang's advantage lies in technical development and execution, and he doesn't understand personnel management and affairs coordination, so he is very miserable in his new position.
Although Yuan Shao, Zhong and Xiao Wang lived in different times, their similarities are all incompetent managers.
So, what is a manager in today's society? Peter, the father of modern management? Drucker said: "In modern organizations, if a knowledge-based employee can contribute to the organization by virtue of his position and knowledge, which can substantially affect the management ability and achievements of the organization, then he is a manager." Therefore, from a broader perspective, everyone can become a manager, even if they are alone and have no subordinates, they can manage themselves well and make their work more effective, thus affecting the performance of the organization. On the other hand, if a person has a high position and many subordinates, but he doesn't use performance to promote the development of the organization, then he can't be regarded as an effective manager, and at best he is only a "boss" in name only.
As a manager, if you want to be competent for your job, you should shoulder the responsibility of management, take the initiative to look inward, strengthen self-training, promote self-improvement, try to polish your ability in time management, increase your work ability, pay attention to contribution, give play to your strengths and make effective decisions.
First, do a good job in time management and insist on giving priority to important things.
When there is no weight, China is no longer Yang. Since ancient times, in the eyes of managers, time has always been the scarcest resource, and with the acceleration of work pace, time will become more precious. Managers' own needs, the need to deal with personnel issues, and the need for innovation and change all make managers must emphasize the management of time and be good at seeking benefits from time.
One is to learn to diagnose your own time. First, record the time consumption, review it regularly, think about which activities on the time record can be attended by others, not many things must be done by hand, and find out which managers waste others' time and reduce unnecessary work.
The second is to eliminate activities that waste time. Find out the factors that waste time due to lack of system or foresight; Too many people often waste time (for example, experts who need consulting occasionally should not be formally hired); The organization is not perfect and there are too many meetings; The information function is imperfect and the information system is out of order.
The third is to arrange free time. A strict and self-disciplined manager has only 1/4 time at his disposal, which should be spent on important things, things that contribute, and things that should be done. Focus on discretionary spare time and set deadlines for important activities.
The fourth is to adhere to the principle of giving priority to major events. Only by investing time in important things can the output be maximized. Get rid of the past that is no longer valuable, focus on today, stick to the priority of important things, focus on only one thing at a time, and avoid grabbing regardless of priorities.
Second, focus on organizational goals and attach importance to the contribution of results.
Whether it is a government agency or a company, managers often pay attention to the management of people, which is easy to fall into the misunderstanding of "paying attention to diligence and ignoring results". However, for an organization, what is more needed is results and performance. If employees only know how to work hard, though they work hard, they don't "do it right". The result can only be that efforts have no merit and fall into the trap of "fake diligence". Hard work can't promote the development of the organization, and it has no practical significance except self-satisfaction.
As managers, we must establish the overall concept, cultivate strategic thinking, pay attention to the strategic objectives of the organization, attach importance to achievements and contributions, and often think about "what can I contribute to the organization."
Managers who attach importance to contributions can sort out priorities in a mess, eliminate some trivial things, and effectively grasp the internal relevance of each work; Can make the goals of the organization consistent, unite the spirit and strength of the team, and enhance the centripetal force of the organization; Can let attention not be limited by their own expertise, their own technology and their own departments, and see the overall performance; We can shift our attention from "internal affairs, internal work and internal relations" to "external world" and organizational achievements.
Efficient managers should pay attention to the contribution from three aspects: first, it brings direct results to the organization, which is the main indicator to measure the management effectiveness, but it must not be the only indicator, otherwise it may induce employees to fall into a short-sighted, eager for quick success and exhausted situation. The second is to strengthen and revise the existence value of the organization and clarify who to provide value for. How to make the value bigger? By establishing clear values, it plays a cohesive role. The third is to cultivate the talents that the organization needs in the future, update or improve the level of human resources, and ensure the sustainable development of the organization.
Third, give full play to strengths and tolerate people's shortcomings.
No one is perfect, and giving full play to people's strengths is the only purpose of the organization.
An effective manager knows how to organize ordinary people to do extraordinary things. Discover and give full play to everyone's strengths, and make the best use of everything and people. And mediocre managers focus on the shortcomings of others, especially making a fuss about the shortcomings of others, which can be described as finding fault and deliberately finding fault.
Managers should learn to tolerate the shortcomings of others, don't try to make people "perfect" or "all-rounder", and take certain measures to make a person's shortcomings not work, at least not affect his work performance.
In terms of employing people, Cao can be described as knowing people and being good at their duties. He recruited a large number of masters, such as Yu Xun, Guo Jia, Zhang Liao, Coss and other counselors and military commanders. Even people who hate Cao Cao the most, such as Hong Mai, who wrote "Rong Zhai Essays", have such an evaluation of Cao Cao's employment: "One official is wise and resourceful, and the power of a county, regardless of size, is outstanding." Even for those who betrayed and attacked him, such as Zhang Xiu, Zhong Wei, Chen Bi and Chen Lin, Cao Cao was very tolerant and tried to tolerate the shortcomings of others. He sincerely hopes that all the talents in the world will come to him to serve the country and truly exchange trust for loyalty.
Managers should not only give full play to their strengths, but also pay attention to organizational contributions and do what they are good at. We should take the initiative to help our superiors, give full play to their strengths and give them advice in a way they can accept.
If an organization can do this, it will have a strong attraction to external talents, and its internal human resources will be more motivated and make greater contributions to the organization.
Fourth, scientific analysis and judgment and effective decision-making.
Only managers need to make decisions, but only when managers make important and operational decisions can they have a favorable impact on organizational performance.
When do you need to make a decision? If we continue to stick to the routine, the situation will get worse and we must make a new decision. When a new opportunity comes, it is crucial and fleeting, and we must make a new decision at once.
Effective managers know that a decision does not start from collecting facts, but from their own views. To analyze and judge scientifically, we need to master five elements of decision-making: establishing rules or principles, finding out boundary conditions, thinking about satisfying conditions, defining implementation measures and attaching importance to feedback.
What managers should do and in what order determine whether their decisions are effective. Specifically, we must first understand the nature of the problem. For truly universal problems, problems that have occurred in many enterprises, and universal problems that hide new situations, these problems often occur, so it is necessary to establish rules or principles to solve the problems. For truly unique problems, we must deal with them alone. Secondly, it is necessary to clarify the problem and find out what happened and what factors are related to it. Thirdly, it is necessary to further clarify the limited conditions of the problem, judge the "correct" decision, consider implementing actions when making decisions, and pay attention to timely feedback. Finally, we should pay attention to the use of negative opinions in decision-making to avoid being confused by specious views.
If a person, especially a manager, does not work in a suitable position, his ability level will not be fully exerted, and there will be a gap between the work demand and the expectations of the masses. Over time, he will be exhausted and do nothing, he will be tired and will be tossed sooner or later. Therefore, smart managers usually have a clear understanding of themselves, choose positions that match their abilities, or redouble their efforts to improve their abilities to match new positions.