On Being a People Manager > 1.0 Weekly Overview > Welcome to Week 1
- Welcome to the first week of the course, Introduction to People Management.
- I’m extremely delighted to see the enrollments of this course.
- A course of this kind benefits immensely from different perspectives because no two managers will ever think alike.
- On that note, let’s look at what’s the theme for this first week.
On Being a People Manager > 1.0 Weekly Overview > Study Plan for Week 1
- Hello everyone, I’m Vijaya Tripathi, the teaching and research assistant for this course.
- I would like to confess that the journey for creating this course has been really fascinating, and interesting.
- I and professor were sitting together, and this idea of coming up with a course plan, just strucked us.
- So I would like to ask Ma’am that, Ma’am, how did we just thought of building a course plan for the participants? “In fact, I must confess, I completely second what you’re saying, because yes, this has been quite an interesting and a challenging journey for all of us, and thanks to people like you who make this happen.
- I think, in particular in this course, Vijaya, the reason is quite simple that, when you have, I was just looking at the statistics of enrolment for this course, and it’s fascinating.
- It’s interesting, how do you build conversations, that are meaningful, and that actually connect with what you are experiencing? I would like each one of you to use the discussion forum, as really a space to create conversations with others.
- That was really very insightful, professor, and one important thing for effectively managing your time for each and every week, we have created a detailed document.
On Being a People Manager > 1.1 Basics of People Management > Being a First Time Manager
- Joe, seeing you good work we have decided to promote you as People Manager.
- This is Neeta from HR. There is a training organized for your team members on Effective Team Building at 10.00 AM today.
- Yet I have got confirmation from only two members of your team.
- I should reach the office as soon as possible and make this right.
- Mr. Joe, you have a meeting with a very valuable client in half hour regarding the urgent issue of delivery.
- Miss Boss had instructed me to inform you about opening ceremony of our Churchgate Office and you need to attend it on her behalf at 1.00 PM. Where should I start my day? “.
On Being a People Manager > 1.1 Basics of People Management > Why is People Management Important
- I am often asked, ‘why is People Management important for us as managers?’ Organizations are about people and any strategy of an organization, however wonderful it may be cannot be executed if there are no people.
- I think it is quite obvious that People Management is necessary for any delivery of products and services.
- Particularly when market and consumers are so diverse, employee is within the organization and their understanding of the nuances of the markets and the customers can be a very key differentiators to organizations.
- When we say that the people are the source of competitive advantage we are really talking about two kinds of advantages, a short term and a long term.
- As there are greater and greater demands placed on you as managers it becomes very important that you have a team of competent people to whom you can delegate confidently.
- This team of competent and confident people to whom you can delegate will free up the bandwidth for you in terms of your time, energy and effort to be able to invest in value creating activities.
- If People Management is so important for you then you could turn around and ask me saying, ‘is it something that can be taught?’ or ‘is it some plain commonsense?’ or ‘is it something that intuitively comes to some people and not so easily to others?’ To know how good a People Manager you are please pause and take a self-assessment.
On Being a People Manager > 1.2 Understanding Human Behavior > Two Facets of People Management
- The second part is about understanding organization structures, strategy and the people related systems and processes.
- You need to have a good understanding of the organization systems, the processes, and at the same time, you need to also have a deep understanding of the team that reports to you.
- In the next section, we will explore these two parts in greater detail, and till then think about what in People Management can be learnt and what in People Management can be taught.
- Why is it important for you as People Managers to understand these two dimensions? It is extremely important to understand because many of you will broker and engage and manage in this space.
- As Managers one of the key requeirements of your job is really to understand and predict human behaviour within your team and across other parts of the organization.
On Being a People Manager > 1.3 Impact of Organizational Factors > Organizational Culture
- How is culture created then? Culture is created through the way they select people, through the way we induct people into our organization, through the kind of behaviors that are recognised and rewarded in the organization, to the role models that are available for people to emulate and finally by the signals the top management send about what is important for the organization.
- So to sum up, organizational Structure and organizational Culture together have an impact in terms of employee behavior.
- If you have to broker between those expectations and the organizational Expectations, you need to have a deep understanding first of yourself.
On Being a People Manager > 1.4 Weekly Insights and Conclusion > Weekly Insights
- In successful and not so successful managers is really the capability to make tough decisions.
- Welcome to this MOOC Ramya, and good to have you with us! Ramya: Thank you, professor! It’s a pleasure to be here and to share my experiences with all of you.
- Professor: Thank you, thank you! Ramya, one of the things I really liked was the fact that you called your experience as a first-time manager and drew the analogy to that of a captain of a ship.
- I am thinking, do I just row them to safety first and then address them, or do I just let them do what they’re good at and trust in them.
- If there is one thing that I have learnt in this first year, what I call my maiden voyage, it is that trust is important.
- Professor: See, and again to the participants, trust.
- Trust, Okay? Trust is the heart of any relationship.
- Trust is what allows people to know that we are predictable, we are reliable, and we are dependable.
- As first-time managers, trust is probably the most important aspect in being effective.
- One question for you to think about is what is it that I do that actually builds trust and enhances trust with my team.
- The second question is, what are the times that I have actually done acts which have eroded trust from the team’s perspective.
- Every time someone in your organization is asking you, look at the big picture, what they are telling you is that you are a manager and as a manager, your job is to be able to align the organization’s purpose, its vision, and its strategy with that of the team members who will actually deliver on behalf of the organization.
- In some sense, you as a manager are really a broker of trust.
On Being a People Manager > 1.4 Weekly Insights and Conclusion > Weekly Insights
- I often find that delegation is the most difficult thing for first-time managers.
- I make sure that I say, “by when” and what do I mean by the “what”.
- In successful and not so successful managers is really the capability to make tough decisions.
- The works are so, you know, becomes the type and the intensity of the work also prevents that, but what we do sometimes reflect on certain things which is not, which probably should have done in a better way.
- It’s my pleasure to introduce Mr Sonu Soni who is the Vice President Corporate HR of Interglobe Enterprises, a large Indian Conglomerate Mr Soni has wide ranging experiences both with multinational companies and Indian companies in various facets of Human resource management.
- There are lot of women now in his team End of the day as Corporates you realize that this band of people are the least equipped and also the realization that we do not have an adequate eco system as a corporate to help these people.
- Because they are not in a cocoon somewhere outside system.
- For them to work effectively, that manager has to understand what are the informal networks within the organization, what are those iterative algorithms which he has to do every time when he has to navigate himself.
- In addition I think the complexity of this role now also require him to manage people who are not under his direct control any more.
- These could be people who are sitting as contracted people these people could be sitting in different locations, part of some other teams I think the way our organization structures have evolved got both simplified and complexed has had a direct bearing on the first time manager’s role complexity.
- Like most of the corporates who are anyway busy doing restructuring and derailing.
- The most of the onus of action and accountability actually falls on the first time manager.
- So the role is no longer an easy one Professor: Very interesting because you mentioned successful managers.
- Yeah? Mr Sonu: True Professor: When you are making this distinction between what is core and what else is it that they need and so let’s just pick that I mean you have seen in your life successful managers and unsuccessful managers and what in your experience really makes this difference Mr Sonu: I think for the successful managers the most key thing I would say is one as an individual does he have the integrity of the good individual That for me is the starting point Is he a good listener? For me that person is a successful person who is having a keen insight a keen ear and a keen eye to look into the organization.
- So once we talk about these personalities, the other big thing is to ability to manage people And there this manager has to transcend the binaries of you know, not being too people focused or not being too task focused and I think somewhere this person has to strike a very fine balance.
