Be Proactive In Your Management Style

It’s been said that there are three types of people in business: – those who make things happen, those who watch things happen and those who ask “what the heck happened?”!

At the start of each month, it’s a good time to analyse how you want the next month to be, so you can look ahead with control and anticipation, rather than look back with regret.

The start of the month gives you a chance to review what went right last month, what can be corrected, and gives you an opportunity to renew, regroup, recommit and reinvent yourself as a manager and leader.

It’s a process that can renew your energy and rejuvenate your motivation. So, what’s the best way of going about it?

• Spend 30 minutes or so with your monthly calendar. Write down all your deadline dates, when projects are due, important meetings, personal and business appointments, and other important dates. Then, working backwards, estimate how much time you’ll need to prepare for each event or project. Enter the start date on your calendar, and then you’ll have a vision of how you need to work to accomplish the goal.

• Make a plan for your own development this month. Read a professional journal, improve a specific skill, write an item for a newsletter or journal, attend a short seminar or course…anything that will improve your contribution to your own personal and business development.

• Now work to a weekly plan. Set deadlines for next week, so you know what are the urgent things that need doing. Practice efficiencies with paper, e.g. handle each piece of paper only once. Notice when you procrastinate, prepare and be on time for every meeting and become a better delegator.

• A strategy you might want to follow is the OATS formula: Have Objectives written down in priority order, plan Activities that will help you achieve your goals, allow the Time to achieve those goals, and Schedule when is the best time to acco0mplish each goal

• Manage your relationships well this month. Make an effort to ensure every member of your team feels important. Remember the old phrase ‘catch someone doing something right’. Be consistent in the way you lead your team, rather than making it depend on whatever mood you are in, and do just one thing this month that will make your work environment a better place for others to work in. For example, when was the last time you bought some fruit or doughnuts in for your team?

• Make a monthly resolution to do one thing better this month. Then do it again next month. And the next. Slowly but surely, you’ll see the team respond to you and, by setting this example, you encourage all to contribute to the whole business in a positive and motivational way.

All this will mean maintaining a proactive management style, giving you the chance to make a really good impression on higher management and clients.

Let us know how it goes. Be the kind of person who makes things happen; then you won’t have to look back and wonder what the heck happened! Have a great month!

Thanks again

Sean

Sean McPheat

Managing Director

MTD Training