Introduction
Whether it involves managing an office, a work team, a small store, or a large retail outlet, the processes all remain the same, wherein a manager must be able to balance the needs of the business, take into account current economic trends, the culture of the organization he works for as well as the various nuances inherent in the work of the employees he is tasked to supervise. To investigate the factors involved ineffective management, the researcher contacts Joel Julius Amadore, an operations manager for Convergys, to ask what processes he utilizes in managing the personnel, and what practices are necessary for any manager to employ to increase performance, meet the company’s goals and objectives and ensure a stable work environment.
How important and influential is your job as a manager?
Mr. Amadore states, “What you have to understand is that there are two ways in which you can get an employee to do a certain task. You can either force them to do influencing them as their boss, or they can be willing to do it due to their respect”
As Mr. Amadore explains, at times, managers need their employees to do certain tasks that are beyond what they have normally done at work before. In such instances, the likelihood of them refusing to do so is quite high; however, if a manager has a certain influence on that employee in terms of having a good relationship as well as a proper understanding and respect from that person, these will result in that that employee will be more than willing to help.
How important is proper organization in your work as a manager?
Mr. Amadore says the following statement using a metaphor, “if a building does not have girders, platforms, steel beams, and a foundation, how is it suppose to stand?”. Based on this reasoning, as well as asking him to elaborate further, it is determined that proper organization is the cornerstone of any managerial practice since it is often necessary to be able to do the following things:
- Do one step at a time.
- Arrange tasks to be done in a certain order.
- Implement a certain method.
- Interact directly with a particular person.
Lastly, it creates a structure due to which managers can determine how to better improve performance levels.
What is the most important factor in proper management planning?
In this question, Mr. Amadore indicates that data and metrics are the most important factors since through them you can analyze the performance of the business. All business decisions need to be based on factual data obtained through credible sources. This means that before performing some actions related to expansion to new markets, the removal of a particular product line, or the creation of a new product, a manager must base such decisions on data obtained from customer data, market analysis (SWOT, Porter 5 forces, etc.) and, finally, financial data to develop an accurate strategy.
What is the best way of controlling an employee?
The topic of control for Mr. Amadore is rather contentious in that he indicates that a good manager should not control his/her employees. According to him, what is necessary is that a manager should guide them in fulfilling their roles as well as help them become more independent. Such actions enable a manager to do his/her job properly without constantly checking if his/her employees are doing the right things.
These days, employee retention has become an issue for managers since the economy currently getting better, more and more employees start to leave companies for better opportunities. In your opinion, what would you state as the greatest contributing factor to employee retention and what strategies would you employ to keep the employees you need?
Regarding this particular question, Mr. Amadore responds that when it comes to employee retention and performance, job satisfaction is the deciding factor behind such principles of corporate human resource development, and as such, they should be examined from a multilevel perspective, to ensure employees continue to perform adequately and work further with the company. As such, he refers to the concept of continuous training and development as a means of ensuring continued job satisfaction by enabling employees to develop different job skills while keeping them interested in their job.
When it comes to continuous training development programs, it is interesting to note that researchers indicate that continuing to develop employees for them to accomplish multiple tasks, actually results in a greater degree of job satisfaction since it removes the factors related to repetitious actions that cause job dissatisfaction. From the perspective of various studies, an employee becomes dissatisfied with his/her job over time degree of variability is included to make the job more interesting.
It is recommended that continuous training development programs, which allow employees to assume different job roles as well as sufficient progress in their career, are to be implemented as an optimum method for increasing job satisfaction since this enables the personnel to “reset’ their marginal utility as they are placed into new roles. This creates continued interest, the desire to learn and improve which results in high degrees of job satisfaction.
How important is it for a manager to listen to input from his/her employees?
Mr. Amadore surprisingly elaborates on the following story, “One time, I witnessed a manager so sure of his infallible decisions that he refused to take advice from his employees as he was content with his own belief that he was unable to do something wrong. The result was predictable; his actions had caused the ruination of the entire company which led to 50 people losing their jobs.”
Based on this story alone, it can be seen that it is important for a manager to listen to the advice of his/her employees from time to time since this ensures that problematic decisions can be corrected before they get worse.
In your opinion, what is the most important trait needed by a manager when making decisions?
Mr. Amadore describes the concept of sound business reasoning as an absolute necessity in decision making. For him, good business decisions must be based on sound business reasoning; this means that when a decision is made, it must be logical (meaning that it makes sense), resulting in positive effects for the company (assuming that it creates profit, reduces costs, etc.) and finally conform to proper ethical practices (meaning that it is not illegal in the least).