What is a manager?

My father used to own a small company. He would do the selling, deliver the goods, and collect the money himself. If there were any problems, he would try to resolve it on his own. There was not much else, because there were not that many people in the company. For me, he was the owner and general manager of the company. When I got into business school, I fall into argument with my instructor of what a manager is. According to him, while my dad may be the owner, he was a doer, and could hardly be defined really as a manager.

Managers are individuals who get things done through other people. They make decisions, they allocate resources, and they direct the activities of others in order to attain goals.

The Function of the Manager
In most management books, you will note that they have condensed management functions into four main activities. In a way, general management and project management functions are almost similar, and in fact, the book will be organized on these lines. You can also say that this is really a management book, only that you manage specific endeavors called projects instead of organizations. Part II and III will deal predominantly on the planning and organizing function, while Part IV and V will deal more on the leading and controlling part. Let us briefly take each one in turn.

Planning.
This encompasses the defining an organization’s goals, establishing the overall strategy for achieving those goals, and developing comprehensive plans to integrate and coordinate these activities.

Organizing.
This includes determination of what tasks need to be done, who is to do them, how the tasks are to be grouped, who reports to whom, and where decisions are to be made. Organizing follows and should support the goals and strategies defined in Planning.

Leading.
This includes executing the plan and its goals. It may include tasks like motivating employees, directing their activities, selecting the most effective communication channels, or resolving conflicts among members.

Controlling.
This ensure that things are going as they should, and includes comparing actual performance with previously set goals. If there are any significant deviation, it is management’s task to get it back on track or plan the necessary changes. It may also include rewarding or discipline of people involved.

Different Skills of the Manager
Another way to understand the role of the manager is to look at the skills needed to do the proper job. Here is a quick checklist to see for managers on areas to focus for improvement.

Technical Skills.
These are knowledge and expertise that are held by professionals like civil engineering or specific skills like marketing or finance. All jobs require some amount of expertise, and the manager will be more effective and will be able to command also respect if he shows some level of understanding on the specific technical details of the project or work that he manage.

Human Skills.
This ability to work with, understand and motivate other people cannot be overemphasized. Many people that are technically proficient, but have difficulty relating or working with people will find their ability to manage much hampered. Some human skills that are important is simply like being able to listen and emphathize, understand human dynamics and needs of people, or simply knowing how to resolve conflicts. Motivation and Team Management has become a big topic in general management.

Conceptual Skills
This is not frequently mentioned, but nevertheless quite important. This refers to the mental ability to analyze and diagnose complex situations. Have you meet managers who seemingly can spot problems and identify alternatives on the fly? Bill Gates, founder of Microsoft, has a term for this, and in many occasions have emphasized that this is one of the must-haves before the person can be considered for a job in Microsoft. He calls it bandwidth. This refers to the ability to rationally process and interpret information. Sometimes this is called intuition, learning speed, or gut feel, but nevertheless this is an essential requisite to be effective.

What makes Effective managers?
Fred Luthans and his associates enumerated some findings in his book, Real Managers, which is based on a study of more than 450 managers. He concluded that managers are engaged in four main activities.

1. Traditional Management. This involves the work of planning, decision making, and controlling.

2. Communication. This involves collecting information, and also becoming a conduit to transmit ideas, information and knowledge to the group, and also to outsiders. This will probably include attending meetings, fixing policies, and processing paperwork, among other things.

3. Human Resource management. This involves the motivating, disciplining , and training of people. It also includes the recruitment and selection of people, as well as managing conflicts.

4. Networking. This involves socializing, politicking, and working and interacting with outsiders.

Our main interest is his conclusions. He found out that while the average manager would spend roughly the same amount of time in each of the four activities, the effective manager ( meaning those that score high in the quantity and quality of their performance as well as the satisfaction and commitment of their employees) of which is our main objective, spends the largest amount of time in the communication function, ( upto 44%), and the human resource function ( 26%).

Another interesting sidelight is his notation that successful managers do spend the largest amount of their time in networking. Obviously, success and effectiveness are not the same - and it does occur that effective managers may not succeed, while successful managers may not necessarily be effective. However, this IS a book on effectiveness, and we confidently assert that effective project managers are so few and far between that being effective will insure success. If you think otherwise, please do go ahead to buy some other books that will effectively teach you how to network.

The nature of projects is slightly different, and definitely the work of planning, and controlling is important. The bulk of the book will be predominantly on the techniques of the proper planning and execution of projects, the ‘nuts and bolts’part, but you will find throughout liberal sprinkles of communication and human resource issues.

Do you really want to manage?

One of the very first thing you should be very clear about when your boss comes in, and wants you to manage a project is to answer very truthfully to yourself , do you really want to manage?

Note the question that I did not ask whether you want to be a manager. Obviously everybody wants to. Managers earn better money, have bigger office space with nicer views, and gets better perks all the time.

One of the things I learned in the last 15 years is that everybody wants to be a manager, but nobody really wants to manage. For those not yet managing, don’t envy too quickly. It is hard enough to be asked to be responsible for yourself, how much harder is it to be responsible for the quirks and shortcomings of 10 other people? Remember that to manage is to be responsible.

It can be noted that project managers are well compensated, averaging over 80,000 dollar according to PMI Project Management Salary Survey for year 2000. However, it should be noted that project managers also generally have an average of 8 to 10 years experience in other disciplines before they attain such position. Compensation also reflects the grave responsibility of the position, as well as the necessary years of experience necessary to qualify. Thus, normally new graduates would not qualify. Note also the same survey indicated that well over 75% of them work more than 40 hours a week, indicating a higher average of workload. These considerations need to be taken into consideration when choosing your careers.

So What does a Project Manager need?

General management skills are essential in managing projects. Varied expertise like financial skills to evaluate viability, strategic management skills to plan, organizational skills to create teams, or human resource skills to supervise and motivate are all necessary requisites. These are same skills in managing corporations.

Process is also the same. You start with a plan, organize according to the plan, and execute it. Then you monitor, and change the plan as you go along to make the requisite changes to accomplish the objectives in spite of the difficulties and risks.

The final goal is to accomplish the objective, as desired by both the project team, the sponsors, and also its customers, as well as all other people ( called stakeholders) which have an interest and stake in the project’s outcome.