Do you know how to hire a great manager?

Leadership

Managements is, above all, a practice where art, science, and craft meet.  ~Henry Mintzberg

managerA recently released report by Gallup, State of the American Manager, is an in-depth look at what characterizes great managers based on over four decades of extensive talent research.  It’s a study of 2.5 million manager-led teams that measures the engagement of 27 million employees.

First, to clarify, Gallup defines a “manager” as someone who is responsible for leading a team toward common objectives.  This individual takes the direction set forth by the organization’s leadership and makes it actionable at the local level.

Gallup found that great managers have the following talents:

  • They MOTIVATE every single employee to take action and engage employees with a compelling mission and vision.
  • They have the ASSERTIVENESS to drive outcomes and the ability to overcome adversity and resistance.
  • They make DECISIONS based on productivity, not politics.
  • They create a culture of clear ACCOUNTABILITY.
  • They build RELATIONSHIPS that create trust, open dialogue and full transparency.

I think this connects directly back to the quote by Mintzberg.  “Management is above all, a practice where art, science, and craft meet.”

I’ve recently done a number of corporate training sessions using the DiSC profile, which is one of a number of behavioral profiles.  I’ll over-generalize the four basic behavioral types to make my point.

  • Dominance: people who are fast-paced and task-oriented—assertive, make productive decisions
  • Influence: people who are fast-paced and people-oriented—motivators
  • Steadiness: people who are moderate-paced and people-oriented—relationship builders
  • Conscientiousness: people who are moderate-paced and task-oriented—accountable, make productive decisions

Many times, I’ve seen leaders in organizations try to stereotype managers into one single behavioral type, frequently into the dominance type.  Gallup’s research clearly contradicts that perspective.  The best managers are those who have learned to adapt their style and develop a more holistic approach to managing people.  In other words, it’s where art, science and craft meet; where dominance, influence, steadiness and conscientiousness converge.

Maybe that’s one reason why so few managers succeed in their role.  According to Gallup’s research, organizations fail to choose the candidate with the right talent for manager roles 82% of the time.  There are other reasons this occurs so frequently… my blogs over the next several weeks will reveal more of this research.