8 Common Mistakes Made By Managers and How to Avoid Them

Back in 1991 I was handed my first management role as a Product Manager for Bonar Rotaform, a specialist plastics company and part of the mid-250 industrials group, Low & Bonar - it was a big deal to me.

Up until that point I’d been just another member of a field sales team and prior to that, an engineer working on missile systems at British Aerospace. I can remember thinking how well I’d done to have secured my first management role at the not so tender age of 29!

Now, some 25 years on I look back fondly on those times. I cringe at some of the mistakes I made and, my reasons for making them. My introduction to management was a hard one and it took me some years to overcome early mistakes and to make a good fist of being an effective manager.

It’s also interesting to look back at my mistakes and to consider what I should have done to make a better, bigger impact sooner.

Mistake 1 - Thinking You’re Important

One of the less desirable traits I exhibited when I became a manager was to think I was better than others. After all, I’d been selected for a management promotion - so there!! Not only was this unattractive and unhelpful to me, it was very much a turn-off for others. At a time when I should have been considering my team to be all important, my mistake was in thinking it was me that was the important one. A fundamental shift happens when you become a manager; your job becomes all about everyone else and very little about you anymore. Results are delivered by the collective efforts of the team, so unless you get that working properly, your results may not be good. There is no doubt I embraced the responsibilities of management, but the mistake I made was to think it was all about me and I wouldn't repeat that - ever again!

Mistake 2 - Holding Onto Stuff

The manufacturing sector in the 90s was much like it is now in that key objectives included cost control, efficiency gains and continuous improvement and at my company things were no different. I had always been an action-oriented person and, given I now had a small team to manage, my second mistake was to ‘hold onto stuff’ and not delegate to others within my team and indeed beyond it. My mistake of ‘trying to do everything myself’ was driven by a desire, "to do it properly". Now that I understand the importance of delegation and am more accomplished in going about doing it, I know the value of it all too well. Not only does it free-up time but critically, it challenges others to improve themselves, to learn new skills and techniques that can be deployed to support the organisational mission. It is the key to effectively development and the cornerstone of sound management practice.

Mistake 3 - Slow Decision-Making

Nowadays I’m told my decision-making is decisive and effective, but back then it was slow and ponderous, which may in part have been due to my role as an engineer working on safety critical projects that had to be right, no matter what. A few years on I was challenged to make decisions that were not only correct but that had to be made on the hoof and with whatever information was to hand. I can remember my boss challenging me once and saying, “Jon, whatever time you have available, the critical thing is always to make the right decision”. Sometimes we are paralysed by a fear of making the wrong decision and this can be what sets good managers apart from bad. Good decisions are those that are made with the fullest information available and which plug into your own and your organisations and sense of values and ethics. Typically it is about trusting ourselves and knowing that if a decision we make does end up being wrong, we made it by applying the right mechanism and for the right reasons.

Mistake 4 - Trying to be Friends with Everyone

One of the hardest things to do as a first-time manager is to step away from some of the closer relationships you have with colleagues. There has to be a respectful distance created and then maintained between you and others. This doesn’t mean being remote but objectivity certainly becomes the key so be mindful of the day-in-day-out proximity of your relationships. People need to see you as independent, fair-minded and capable of applying consistent logic, reasoning and ultimately decision-making to all situations, free from favouritism and unfathomable logic.

Mistake 5 - Not Making Time for People

Management differs from leadership; it’s about getting people to do that which they know they can and should do, whereas leadership is about showing people how to do that which they may not be sure of. Thus a central plank of management is to be there for people, to make time to coach, educate, inform and to up-skill people in the key competencies required. Your time is also required in maintaining accountability - in having those conversations that need to be had, which will include praise and recognition on the one hand, but also accountability and performance discussions on the other.

Mistake 6 - Not Seeing the Big Picture/Setting Goals

One of the joys of being managed (though not sure I saw it at the time!) was the simplicity of doing that which my boss directed me to do. This was easy because the decision of what to do was taken by others and not by me. There have been times In my management career since when I yearned for that same freedom but as an effective manager, our challenge is in seeing the bigger picture, in raising our eyes away from the immediacy of current actions and to focus instead on what may be an uncertain horizon, considering, setting and sharing goals for people and teams such that they clearly understand their roles, responsibilities and the motivations for doing it.

Mistake 7 - Silo Mentalities and Being Overprotective

Silos are created either as a result of discrete functions within businesses or by managers who become overprotective or oversensitive towards their area of responsibility and the people they manage. This is typically characterised by a lack of clear communication and a reluctance to share information with others - peer and seniors team included. The key to avoiding this lies in pursuing a policy of openness and transparency where, whilst decisions may be challenged, the reasons for arriving at them are open to scrutiny and when required, subject to collective discussion.

Mistake 8 - Not Being Yourself

Possibly the most insightful comment I ever heard was that, “Management is a job you get given for being good at something else” So typically, you’re made a sales manager because you’re a good salesperson or a technical manager because you’re technically proficient. The idea persists that because you’re good at one job you must be good at another, right? Potentially not! When we become managers we can tend to ‘imitate’ others and end up morphing into somebody else. It’s a fundamental mistake. Of course we have to learn to be good managers and we have to undergo training and gain experience in challenging situations. Of critical importance though given that we are now managing others, is to fundamentally remain the same person and not to try to be somebody else. If we did that then we are guilty of fakery, because it’s impossible to be anybody other than who we really are.

Image Credit - Adobe CC