Editorial - Journal of Finance and Marketing (2017) Volume 1, Issue 1

Effective supervisors and issues in management

Asiedu E^*

California Southern University Business School, Irvin, California, USA

*Corresponding Author:

Asiedu E
California Southern University
Irvin
California
USA
E-mail: elvisasiedu63@yahoo.com

Accepted date: November 05, 2017

Citation: Asiedu E. Effective supervisors and issues in management. J Fin Mark. 2017;1(1):1-2.

Managers have roles assigned to them, which can create many challenges. In this study, we will discuss what other people expect from a new supervisor and common mistakes made by inexperienced managers. At the conclusion of this study, the people should be able to define management, and the challenges they face in their different functions and roles; evolve from being a boss to be people developer.

Expectation of a New Supervisor/Manager

This study is about understanding the ingredient of effective supervision. What are the best practices of effective supervisors? What do they do that the less effective supervisors fail to accomplish? Can we become better at our jobs by studying the success and failures of others? We believe that there predictable and correctable common mistakes that new or inexperienced supervisors make. And we believe that thinking about them earlier on our career is of great value. If it is of great value, then what is management?

Management is “the process of working with and through others to achieve organisational objectives, efficiently and ethically, in the face of constant change” [1]. Management is a learnable process that deals with coordinating the actions of others to get the right things done. It is a learnable process because we can teach people to plan, organize, delegate, control, follow-up, and others. We can teach the principles and the processes involved in managing, and people can learn how to become effective managers. Katz [2] and Ricketts [3] explained management as exercising direction of an organisation or a group through supervisory, administrative and executive positions. Management requires being good about technical and the soft skills. Great supervisors/managers are able to reach out to people; they are able to get things done through people. This study is about understanding the skills that are necessary to accomplish the objectives.

Overview and What Others Expect of the New Supervisor

We truly believe that supervision is a skill that can be learned as we said earlier. Sometimes people want to believe that management and leadership is something we are born with. We might have heard the phrase “leaders are born and not made”. We think the idea that the management and supervision is somehow solely related to our DNA or born with is not a true statement. We believe that is false. So, we are going to learn about these skills and see what others do that we can mimic to allow ourselves to be more effective.

We believe that many people are unprepared for their first assignment, managing and supervising others. This is probably because they were promoted base on technical success. Professor Crant [4] however, argued that “but that’s often different from the type of skills for managing others”. We used to call attention to ourselves and show our skills through our technical competence. Now it’s about other people; it’s about helping others; having a vision; getting people excited, motivating and dealing with conflict. Many people feel overwhelmed when they get their first meaningful management experiences. It’s different being a boss. The people we are managing are probably the people we worked with earlier and it’s not unusual to struggle in this regard. Crant [4] stressed that there are indeed some consistent challenges the people face when they are facing their first administrative assignment.

In this study, we going to identify these common challenges and come-up with solutions. These are actionable items that we can use right away to become more effective on the job. We are going to learn the experiences of other people and rely on influential books and other articles by some of the leading scholars in the area of supervision and management. We are going to greet guidance from the people that have been in our shoes and we are going to learn from their successes and failures. Sure, we learn from our own experiences. When we struggle, that’s a lesson; we seek to avoid those problems in the future. But we can also learn about supervision by studying the successes and failures of others. We call this vicarious or observational or social or modelling learning and the little truth in psychology shows that it is of great value. When we see what other people did to cause them to be successful, we can mimic it. When we see what the people did to make them struggle, we can seek to avoid.

What Do Others Expert from the New Supervisor?

Kreitner et al. [1] argued that “supervisors play a constantly evolving role. Today’s successful supervisors are no longer, I’ve-got-everything-under-control order givers of yesteryear. Rather, they need to creatively envision and actively sell bold new directions in an ethical and peoplefriendly manner. Effective supervisors are team players empowered by the willing and active support of others who are driven by conflicting self-interest”.

The first question we are going to address is this “what J Fin Mark 2017 Volume 1 Issue 1 2 other people expect from the new supervisor?” We are going to review the best practices of effective and admired leaders. We will generate a set of helpful hints for the new supervisors. Can we think about this from our own perspective? Do we naturally tend to do these things? Some of these ideas found from our previous position? Objective of course is to appreciate how our credibility is of function of meeting the expectations of others. The extent to which we use power wisely; we are involved in making active decisions; collaborating with others; leading initiatives; we develop other people; we anticipate trends and issues; we give feedback and we are accessible.

First expectation, use power wisely. What is power? Bluwey [5] defined power is the ability of the ruler to make his people do what they would otherwise not do, and conversely, to refrain from doing what they would otherwise do. It simply the ability to influence others to the extent that other people believe that pleasing us; complying with our wishes will help them or because they in us and they don’t want to disappoint us. This is the essence of power. It stems from both our position in the organization; our ability to reward others; punish others; but also, our personal credibility because people believe in us. That’s also a source of power. Power is good to have. It will be hard to construct an argument that power is bad in business organizations. But it’s very dangerous to use. So, let us think about this; if we have power, people know it; we don’t need to tell them. In fact; it annoying to see someone bragging about how much power they have like “hey I can crush you like a bag if I want to- You better do what I tell you to do”. We don’t want to be with people like that.

President Theodora Roosevelt said “walk softly and carry a big stick”. We think that is a great idea for the use of power in business organizations. Yes, having power, having a big stick is definitely boneless. We never know when we are going to rely on power in order to get our way. But we don’t use it if we don’t have to. People don’t like people that are power freaks. What if a supervisor tells his people something like the following:

“Hey guys, I’m sorry we have gotten a last-minute assignment. I know you have plans tonight but indeed you need to stay late until midnight and get this report done. We need it today. I can’t stick around and help you. I am meeting my family tonight for a dinner. You guys get it done”. This supervisor has the power to get away with that. He/she can tell the direct report that you need to work late tonight and get things done. But wouldn’t that be incredibly insulting for the supervisor to leave on time while everyone has to work all night. That’s power play.

What if instead the supervisor has said the following:

“Guys, we have to stay late; I’m sorry but I’m going to help you to get these things done as quickly as possible; so that we can all go home early”. That, the supervisor builds credibility. We will move mountains for someone to treat us with such respects. It’s better to gain compliance from credibility rather than threats and power-plays. So, yes, it is a great thing to have power but it’s dangerous to use. Walk softly and carry a big stick.

Other Best Practices Based on Expectations

References

1. Great supervisors know when to become involved.

2. They generate ideas.

3. They are willing to collaborate, play well with others and don’t let any personal issues affect their work.

4. They are willing to lead initiatives.

1. Kreitner R, Kinicki A. Organizational behaviour. McGraw-Hill Irwin. 2013.
2. Kartz RK. Skills of an effective administrator. Harvard Business Review. 1955;33(1):33-42.
3. Ricket KG. Leadership vs Management. University of Kentucky. 2009.
4. Crant M. Lecture on effective supervision to students in professional certificate in management. Lecture notes. 2017.
5. Bluwey GK. An introduction, political science. Yamen Press Ltd. 2002.