manager-tools short hand

Podcasts @ http://manager-tools.com/manager-tools-basics

• Solution to a Stalled Technical Career 35:22 27/06/05 Mike and Mark discuss a friend's stalled technical career.  What's the secret to reinvigorating his career?
• more technical expert => less people management, less public relations
• organization only advertises technical skills for IT folks, but not social skills
• these folks are intelligent enough to understand social skills, but they need to put their mind in this direction.
• we dont want him to be salesperson, but just good enough to communicate and get things done.
• relations in company are important: one can not improve his/her skills or organization position in short span. Rely on relations to grow
• I want to work with people I like, need not with smartest people
• Divide "success one gets" into two parts based on what leads to success
• 10% technical
• 90% relations
• How do I improve my relations?
• Ans: Communicate the way others want (quantity and quality)
• quantity: lot of emails, voice mails
• quality: talk what interest them (be it their dog, children, etc.)  Code really does not interest much to most :)
• Make eye contacts, talk about what they work, etc... => look for a common ground (e.g, oh! i have a friend in that team).
• Tech guy -> email, marketing guy -> voice mail
• If there is a problem, first talk about the problem, communicate it. Do that before you fix it. Keep your customers communicated, updated, in sync.
• How was your weekend? must to ask on Monday!
• Do not sit in your group. Try to sit with people from other side
• my take: ok, I understood that we need to be little personal with people and not just code talks. But I still believe they underestimate the power of tech (aka code) :P
• The Single Most Effective Management Tool - One on Ones 53:08 04/07/05 The Single Most Effective Management Tool - One on Ones

The Single Most Effective Management Tool - One on Ones 53:08         04/07/05

• weekly one on ones
• write agenda, give a skeleton, format to employees so that they can structure their thoughts and talk to the point
• total 30 mins
• before one on ones, give 5 mins to board the story after looking at previous one on ones, etc.
• 10 mins for them to talk (official/personal)
• 10 mins you talk (feedback, etc)
• do it on desk of employee and not in a conference room (really?)
• reschedule and not cancel the one on ones, incase there is some other commitment
• do not pick phone calls, etc. Make sure employees feel that these meetings are important for their manager.
• do not talk what you should talk in a team meetings. for e.g. some upper management decisions etc, should be told in team meets and not individually in one on ones.