There is usually training involved, perhaps some management courses, support from senior colleagues and, over time, a considerable amount of experience gained simply by doing the job.

A few years later, that person may be running a department, managing a team and carrying significant responsibility within the business. They know their subject, understand the organisation and have probably become the person others turn to when there is a problem.

They’re experienced. They’re capable.

They’re also busy.

And that’s sometimes where the problem starts.

When the Day-to-Day Takes Over

One thing we’ve noticed over the years is how easily an experienced manager can become consumed by the operational side of their role.

There are meetings to attend, targets to achieve, customers to look after, staffing issues to resolve and decisions that need to be made. Add emails, telephone calls, reports and the unexpected problems that arrive throughout the day and there isn’t always much time left for anything else.

Some of those problems are probably familiar ones. The same issue with a process. The same performance problem. The same conversation with another department. The same pressure to hit this month’s numbers.

The manager becomes very good at dealing with what’s immediately in front of them.

But there’s an important question we perhaps don’t ask often enough:

While they’re busy developing the business and the people around them, who’s developing them?

Management training is important, but there is a difference between attending a management course and continuing to develop as a manager.

The further someone progresses, the more valuable it can become to occasionally step away from the day-to-day and think about the bigger picture.

Where is my department going? What could we be doing differently? Am I spending my time on the right things? Am I developing the people around me? What am I avoiding? And where do I want to develop personally over the next few years?

Those aren’t always questions that get answered between meetings on a Tuesday afternoon.

 

Good Managers Still Need Support

There’s sometimes an assumption that because somebody is an experienced manager, they should have all the answers.

We don’t think that’s realistic.

In fact, the more responsibility someone has, the more complicated some of their decisions become. They may be dealing with confidential issues that they can’t easily discuss with their team. They might have an idea but want to test their thinking before taking it further. They may know something needs to change but haven’t quite worked out how to approach it.

And sometimes they simply need somebody to challenge them.

That’s where having an independent business mentor and sounding board can be extremely valuable.

Not somebody who arrives with a textbook and tells an experienced manager how to do their job, but someone who listens, asks the right questions, challenges their thinking and brings a different perspective.

Because mentoring isn’t about creating dependency. Quite the opposite. Good management mentoring should help somebody become more confident in their own judgement and increasingly capable of finding their own answers.

From Managing Today to Thinking About Tomorrow

One of the dangers of being constantly busy is that activity can start to feel like progress.

They’re not necessarily the same thing.

An effective manager needs to deal with today’s problems, of course. But they also need enough space to think about what happens next.

That could mean developing someone in their team who is capable of taking on more responsibility. It might mean addressing a recurring problem rather than continuing to solve it every week. It could involve improving communication between departments, looking at performance differently or recognising that the manager themselves needs to delegate more.

This is where regular one-to-one management mentoring can create something that’s difficult to find during the normal working week: time specifically set aside to think.

Through the Mentor Members Management Mentoring Programme, we provide managers and supervisors with experienced, independent support and a confidential sounding board. Somewhere to talk openly, work through challenges, develop their management and leadership skills and remain motivated and focused on the wider objectives of the business.

The conversations are based around what’s actually happening in their role. One meeting might involve a difficult people issue, another could be about performance, delegation or priorities, while another may concentrate on where they want to take their department over the next 12 months.

That’s one of the differences between management training and ongoing mentoring.

Training can give somebody knowledge and tools. Mentoring helps them think about how they apply them in the real world.

They’ve Been Trained. What Now?

Businesses quite rightly invest in training their managers. But perhaps we should think beyond the training course.

If you’ve got a good manager or supervisor in your business, the objective shouldn’t simply be to keep them performing at today’s level. It should be to help them continue developing, keep them motivated and give them the opportunity to become even better at what they do.

And that doesn’t necessarily require another course.

Sometimes it means giving them access to somebody independent who has the time to listen, challenge, encourage and help them see beyond whatever happens to be demanding their attention that day.

Mentor Members provides practical one-to-one management mentoring for businesses across Portsmouth, Southampton, Hampshire and the Isle of Wight, supporting managers and supervisors as they develop their skills, their teams and their areas of responsibility.

Because management development shouldn’t stop when the training course finishes.

Could One of Your Managers Benefit from Independent Support?

If you have a manager or supervisor who could benefit from an experienced, independent sounding board, Mentor Members can help.

Our Management Mentoring Programme provides practical one-to-one support focused on the real situations, challenges and opportunities your manager is dealing with.

Find out more or get in touch to arrange an initial conversation and discuss two complimentary one-to-one management mentoring sessions for a manager or supervisor in your business.

There is no obligation to continue. It’s an opportunity for them to experience management mentoring for themselves and see whether it could provide useful ongoing support.