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CARRER PLANNING – Become a Senior Manager in 2016

In mid-December 2015, the Irish Times featured a brief article reporting the launch of a new recruitment platform “exclusively dedicated to high-performance senior management roles” (The Irish Times, Business News, Friday, December 11, 2015, page 2)

When browsing the job postings available in the fields of accounting, marketing, sales and education the following expectations of the candidates’ character are stated:

• Possess initiative and innovation
• Proven multi-tasking skills
• Demonstrate strong problem-solving talents
• Ability in championing strategies
• Talent in building build strong relationships

The recruitment guidelines provide insight on how to conduct an interview by using answers that demonstrate the fitting qualities of the candidate. For example, a very effective strategy is to provide concrete examples, anecdotes of direct experience. “I have designed and delivered on abc’s marketing plan for 2014 and 2015, providing the organisation with x millions of euros in direct revenue”. “I have re-structured xyz’s sales team bringing the organisation’s profit from x to y, with an 150% increase in 18 months”: those are sample statement that a candidate must run-through when preparing for the interview.

However, not always experience is directly accessible to aspiring senior executive and while waiting for the right opportunity, specialised learning and development are extensively available.

To become a senior manager, an executive or a business owner is the career path chosen by many: striving towards self-actualisation, the acquired experience in delivering a service, a solution and a product evolves in the aspiration to manage others in the pursuit to gain and establish revenue for the organisation.

Below we share the 5 key areas of knowledge that a Line and Middle Manager need to develop in order to be able apply for senior position, become an executive or an entrepreneur:

Human Relations: management is about managing people, directly or indirectly, by the implementation of sound business processes. Listening skills, empathy and understanding of motivational triggers are essence to any management position.

Strategic Planning: the ability to appropriately plan and execute develops as the position grows: from scheduling daily actives core to a Line Manager’s role, towards the creation of year-long strategies and business processes.

Analytical thinking: the primary skill required to deliver timely management of multiple projects and coordination of cross-departmental strategies, ‘analytical thinking’ support senior executives from Go-to-Market strategies to effective Risk Assessment.

Communication Skills: from constructive feedbacks to coaching, from mentoring to change management: communication skills allow for strategic branding of the organisation, for the senior manager and create the basis for a committed management team and employees.

Negotiation skills: an under estimated skill that applies from daily management of customer care to large contracts negotiation, from sourcing founding to obtaining buying-in from investors for the organisation strategies and goals.

The Irish Times article concludes by affirming an Amárach research show “that 72 per cent of employees in senior executive and c-suite position expect to move roles in the next five years.” (ibid.).

In view of significant changes , 2016 will be the year for Irish Managers  to assess career paths and goals.

Career planning begins by establishing how to gain essential skills and techniques that will facilitate the manager in accessing the desired jobs and, most importantly, will guarantee the successful delivery of the established expectations.

http://www.symposiumlearning.com/contact-us.php

http://execjobs.irishtimes.com/

KNOWLEDGE ACQUISITION – Investment in modernisation

TIME MANAGEMENT: Choosing the best route to destination

Professionals and organisations often begin to address Time Management from a crisis point: predictable delay in delivery of products/services; chronic overtime; stressful and on-edge work atmosphere.

When discussing the challenges of Time Management, Symposium Learning begins by reviewing each person’s daily route to the workplace. It is our direct experience that Effective Time Management stems from the same talents which we apply to get to work each day: imagination and the mind-mapping skills

“Imagination” assists with FORWARD THINKING and DECISION MAKING. “Mind-mapping” supports the creation of a ROUTINE and PLANNING.

When we travel we apply thoughtlessly those skills: the familiar way is DECIDED and it can be drawn on a MAP. Aware of the overall length of the journey, we assess traffic and weather condition and decide instantaneously if it is more convenient to change route or keep on it. Optional ways have been tested and when a different route is taken, we do not forget to contact the office and notify a potential delay due to unusual traffic conditions.

Keeping with us the image of our experience of stepping on the bus or taking it left at the traffic light – here the bullet points for a stress-free Business Time Management.

1. Break it: address your job in small sections and create a list of “action/tasks/projects” –Include your breaks and travel to and from the office.
2. Time it: for each “action/task/project” estimate a time for it completion (how long.)
3. Categories it: assign categories: “Critical” “Important” “Basic” “Once-off”
4. Escalate it: pick from the list enough work for 1 week –
   • Enter repetitive tasks each day (e.g. lunch)
   • Mix actions/tasks/projects from all categories.
   • Respect a 10-hour day including travel.
   • Leave 30 minutes of your day BLANK to allow for unplanned events (best after lunch break).
5. Do it: start from the top and CROSS OUT what has been completed as you go along for the entire week.
6. Review it:
   • Revise the category assigned
   • Revise the mix (was one day more stressful than another?)
   • Adjust estimated time
   • Add new actions/tasks/projects
7. Move to Week 2 and repeat successfully.

Phase 1 – Break it – involves list making: essential step in Time Management. A list gives a tangible sense of achievement by crossing out completed task/projects. It will also help to remember what is to be done.

Phase 2 – “Time it”, “Categorize it” and “Escalate it” – involves planning each item on the list. If newly assigned projects require discovery, consider if each step of project planning should be added to the weekly list.

Phase 3 – “Do it” & “Review it” – especially after the first week, revision must be completed. For example, a weekly meeting with a co-worker might always need more than 1 hour as it beings and ends with a friendly coffee break. Do not under-estimate the importance of your social interaction, which might include connecting to your Social Network – make time for it daily.

Final Recommendation:

Time management will result in the adoption of organizational skills that parallel the routine of getting to work each day. Adapt a Weekly planning to allow vision of individual project tasks over time, as it is TIME which is managed in this process (not projects or tasks).

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Samantha@symposiumlearning.com

“I have a dream” – Anatomy of an influential speech

It is to history that we refer to when searching for influential and mind-changing speeches. Steve Jobs, Barack Obama, Winston Churchill, Nelson Mandela are the people that have delivered successfully their messages and whose slogans and mottos are citied daily. The “Call to Action” contained in each of those speeches resulted in change, success and history making moments.

The speeches have in common a key message of BELIEF: the belief in the importance of what is communicated, the belief in its urgency, the belief in its possibility. A belief understood to be essential to the future of human kind.

“I am happy to join with you today in what will go down in history as the greatest demonstration for freedom in the history of our nation.” – This is the opening line of Martin Luther King, Jr ‘s speech on 28th of August 1963, addressing the crowds at the March on Washington.

Together with the use of key terms that identify the subject of his speech such as “palace of justice” “freedom”, “civil rights” the listener can recognize without difficulty the purpose of the speech.

The call to action is linked to time – words as “history”, “five years ago” and “one hundred years” frame the issue. The iconic sentence “I have a dream” is in fact followed by “today” when voiced as a slogan and it provides the tone of urgency to embrace the necessary solution.

The audience is firmly represented in the speech: “our nation”, “Alabama” “brotherhood” and the speaker is directly and personally invested in the cause. Martin Luther King directly commits to the protest: “I am happy to join”, “I have come to cash a check”, “there is something I must say”

Practices of repetition are also used to allow the audience to grasp and retain key, simple sentences. Furthermore, the use of negative reiteration, e.g. “we cannot”, “we refuse to believe” provides a powerful warning against missing the call to actions: “It would be fatal for the nation to overlook the urgency of the moment.”

Martin Luther King in the opening statement of his speech predicted the future: today the March on Washington is still considered one of the largest demonstrations for human rights in the USA.

Please join Symposium Learning at

Entrepreneurs Anonymous – “Last Tuesday” Meeting

to further engage in

“How to become a powerful influencer and bring about change!”

6.30 pm – 27th of October at Mercantile, Dame Street, D2

www.symposiumlearning.com

www.entanon.com

http://www.americanrhetoric.com/speeches/mlkihaveadream.htm

EMPOWERING PERFORMANCE – THE CULTURE OF SUCCESS

Success for most professional equals revenue, commissions and salary. A deeper consideration effortlessly reveals that more factors participate in the realization of success, factors that cannot be measured. Motivation and reward stem from non-sizable influences such as enjoyment of the work environment, sense of acceptance and recognition of the individual contribution towards company’s goals. Success can be redefined as “making a difference.”

Considerations regarding an organisation’s success are recommended to include both countable and uncountable elements which have contributed to its creation.

“What is done right” and “what should be done differently” are two essential questions for managers and directors. Considerations on performances guide the evaluation of success against quantifiable indicators such as sales volume or customer satisfaction indexes. Nevertheless, excellent performances in quarterly revenue targets is not perceived as success by an organisation when the “cost” of sales included chronic overtime, problematic delivery of services and product, endless resolution of quality issues.

Each evaluation must be situated and allow appraisal of the re-occurring industry specific challenges; considerations must follow to connect how the organisation responds in its own distinctive way. The guidelines available from governing bodies and institutions are provided “sui-generis”: each organisation must adopt the directives in the processes that generate services and products and, furthermore, industry guidelines must be become part of the collective culture that a business develops. Culture is ultimately based on the founders believes, MD competence, marketing inspirations and employees commitment.

The creation of a culture of success which equally weights performances and perception of achievement are core to a LEARNING ORGANISATION. Organisations which invest in the creation of processes and procedures as well in knowledge enhancement, employment of best-practice, organisation of motivational events and scheduling of appraisal, will be able to maintain the necessary positivity in the managers and staff when challenges occur. The opening of a new competitor, new market regulations or increase of product costs will directly affect the countable performances given by revenue and cost of sales. Positivity and the culture of success established will be essential in the making of a new competitive edge, in brand redesign. Positivity will firmly motivate the organisation and its members towards a resilient push for the desired revenue; revenue that will generate a bonus on which all employees and managers count upon to enhance their personal living standards.

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