From Engineer to Leader…

Numerous theories, strategies, processes, tools, techniques, and good practices have been presented by seasoned engineering managers and many of them are considered as industry standards, but a lot of areas are still somehow neglected or skipped even by experienced project managers during project life cycle.

This blog focuses on some of the areas personally experienced by me where slight improvement in project and functional management processes could’ve been instrumental in effective execution of projects as well as successful delivery of products and services.

Be Au Courant with Surroundings

As an organization grows and expands it’s operations, people holding key positions are naturally promoted to senior positions and their responsibilities increase with the passage of time. This often leads them to neglect their surroundings and happenings at the lower levels of organizational hierarchy. I’ve witnessed things going wrong due to managerial negligence and lack of communication, causing time and cost inefficiencies. In the absence of senior management’s attention, mid-level and junior management starts taking strategic decisions on their own which sometimes are not aligned with organizational goals and objectives. A manager at any level in the organizational hierarchy should always be aware of the work being done by the staff that comes under his/her supervision.

Avoid Micromanagement

Delegation of authority and responsibility is a key factor in any manager’s success where s/he entrusts a subordinate with specific tasks and tries to achieve results with minimal supervision. However, there’s a saying ‘trust but verify’ so delegation should be practiced in conjunction with the above rule of staying aware of the progress of delegated tasks so that preventive or corrective action can be timely taken in case the subordinate couldn’t carry out the job appropriately. Avoiding micromanagement is important in order to promote confidence among subordinates in their own abilities and to train them for future roles and responsibilities. Micromanagement creates undue anxiety and discontent among staff and affects their productivity.

Introduce Concrete KPIs

Reward and punishment is the key to achieve and enhance productivity by inducting healthy competition among employees. Having said that, the criteria for all sorts of rewards and punishments MUST be established before hand and it should be ensured that all participants involved are aware of the Key Performance Indicators whereby they would be evaluated and hence rewarded or penalized.

Nevertheless, if not used fairly, the same reward and punishment system could result in discontent and demoralization of employees, reducing productivity and increasing negativity in organizational environment. Unfortunately, in many organizations, personal bias and prejudice takes over and managers tend to give away favors based on their personal likes and dislikes. This causes frustration in some of the very loyal employees and as per my experience; it eventually leads to the loss of some valuable resources of that organization.

Establish Organizational Hierarchy

I’ve worked in some mid to large sized organizations where organizational hierarchy was either not clearly defined or wasn’t properly communicated. It’s of utmost importance that every employee in an organization is aware of his/her position in overall organizational hierarchy, about the structure of organization, about the person s/he reports to, and the people reporting to him/her. Negligence of management in this regard often leads to confusion, wrong assumptions, undue differences and conflicts, as well as unnecessary power struggle or politics among employees. Making all these aspects and reporting structure clear to all employees joining the organization from the first day can remove all sorts of ambiguities and can also establish the roles and responsibilities of each individual, hence reducing unwanted conflicts.

Bridge Communication Gaps

Another important observation in my professional career is the negligence of managers towards communication gaps that frequently occur within their teams and harm productivity. Miscommunication leads to misunderstandings, which in turn cause unnecessary conflicts among team members and gives birth to complaints and grievances among each other. An effective manager could avoid it by establishing formal channels of communication among all stakeholders and defining methods of communication to be used. Also, the flow of information should be clearly defined in order to help understand about the sender and recipients of information by intended audience. 

Follow-Up

People sometimes forget or lose track of some of the tasks they’re supposed to perform and there could be others dependent on completion of those tasks. To be a successful manager, it’s of extreme importance to keep a check on this human aspect of all stakeholders and follow up with those who are not able to keep track of their responsibilities, intentionally or unintentionally. Ensuring everyone to act vigilantly is a key factor in any manager’s success. Moreover, following-up is not a sole responsibility of a manager; rather it’s the responsibility of every individual involved. 

Consider Trickle-Down Effect

Last but not the least, it’s very important to lead by example. “Trickle-Down Theory” is an economics theory that is applicable in leadership and management as well. Emotions and behaviors are contagious and an article published in Harvard Business Review shows that on examining 360 degree assessments of high-level managers and of their direct reports who were mid-level managers, highly significant correlations on a variety of behaviors were found. High-level managers who were rated as very effective had mid-level reports who were also rated far above average whereas the direct reports of the worst performing high-level managers were also below average performers. A manager must take this effect into consideration while carrying out day-to-day responsibilities.