There is, of course, an important difference between being an efficient Boss and being an effective one, the same one that exists between doing things well and making things happen.
Although the contexts and situations differ, in the case of a Chief, efficiency must be taken for granted and effectiveness must be worked on.
It should be understood that “doing things right” is part of the assessment done with the individual before naming him Chief, while “making things happen” is an ongoing challenge.
There are subtle but important differences between what a supervisor, a foreman, a director or even a leader is, but there is a common denominator: they are all bosses, that is, people who have authority or power over a group to direct their work or activities..
There are many mental processes that must guide the performance of a Chief, but a few are indispensable and guiding the others. Here are some:
1.- The adjective that qualifies the work of the Chief is Responsibility.-
Responsibility is never delegated.
The Chief is Responsible for the work of those who are under his tutelage. Fully responsible. Understanding the scope of this responsibility is a complex and delicate subject, since if it is already difficult to achieve the best personal performance, it is much more difficult to get a group of people to do it.
The effective Boss manages to “extract” the best performance from those people he leads by issuing INSTRUCTIONS, not necessarily giving orders.
There is an important difference between the two concepts: the Instructions involve an important degree of orientation and teaching, whereas the orders are imperative commands.
In groups where professional solvency prevails (and everyone should be of this nature), orders must be limited to specific situations and constitute the exception. People who know well what they do and what is expected of them need to have clear instructions and objectives about the work to be done, nothing more! When he sets reasonable, measurable goals, guiding and teaching what is appropriate to achieve them, the Boss becomes effective and gets the best performance from the individuals he leads.
As long as the Chief is forced to give orders to do things, he moves away from achieving the best performance of others and honoring his Responsibility.
There are two main reasons why orders need to be issued:
1.- Because people do not do what corresponds to them
2.- Because people do not do well what they should do.
In the first case the orders fulfill their objective and are perfected, in the second they must be progressively transformed into Instructions so that the orientation and the teaching fulfill the purpose of optimizing the tasks that are carried out.
The concrete sign that the Chief does not have quality people on the team he commands is the excessive existence of orders rather than instructions. In these cases, it is necessary to make the changes of people and processes that are necessary. If the latter is not given for any reason, it is also the responsibility of the Chief.
2.- Being a Boss is a function that is fulfilled for a determined time.-
This is a statement that forces you to model personal behavior.
Individuals who link their identity to the role they eventually have to perform are not good bosses. The particularities of the individual cannot permeate the function of leadership and vice versa.
The command task should not involve anything personal, in the same way that an actor's representation of a role does not necessarily refer to his nature as an individual.
The Chief acts as such in terms of certain conditions of space and time. It fulfills a function. No aspect of personal essence is involved in it. It is true that all the DOING of a person is conditioned by his BEING, by his nature as an individual, but for the exercise of a function this must be manifested at most as a causal relationship and not as a "substitution". In the Boss the person that one is will manifest, of course, but "the Chief" cannot manifest himself in the person.
Being the boss where it corresponds and when it corresponds is very different from feeling and acting as the boss always. This creates unnecessary distances with the people to be directed and with others with whom activities must be coordinated.
All people have different character, but who is appointed Chief cannot base the exercise of his task in arrogant, arrogant or arrogant acts. Every act of command is based on Responsibility rather than Power. There is a difference in this, since Responsibility compels, while Power is exercised. The Chief is obligated to honor his responsibility to be effective instead of trying to demonstrate effectiveness as an effect of the exercise of power.
3.- The effective Chief understands that He depends on others, he does not consider that he has people who depend on him.-
The efficient work of the team supports the effective work of the Chief. Things do not happen in reverse.
If people don't do their job well, the Boss doesn't get good results, no matter how efficient he is. This is part of a basic logic, since it must be understood that a Boss exists because there is a task that requires the work of a team, not individualities.
The Boss who “knows more” than all the team members together, has a bad team and, at the same time, is not a good Boss. What is the use of forming a group of people if one only knows more than all the others? The team must always be more than any individuality or the sum of them. Achieving this critical mass is the responsibility of the Chief.
The effective Boss is like the comic man who puts on mechanical armor that increases the capacity of all his members and makes him a super hero. Without the "armor" he is an ordinary person, with it he achieves feats. The equipment he commands is for the Boss like that "armor" that increases his capacity and reach. This clearly reflects a situation of healthy dependency.
For the team to function efficiently, the Chief must build a productive network of relationships at the horizontal and vertical levels. Horizontally in relation to the relationships of team members to each other and vertically in terms of the relationship of all team members to himself.
Modeling and maintaining this network of relationships is her primary job.
To achieve this, the Chief needs to take care of the following aspects:
- Know each team member appropriately, in their personal and professional dimension. Communicate appropriately and in a timely manner with each other, taking into account the personal particularities and the demands of the professional task. Constantly supervise the state of relationships and the results of individual work.. The result of teamwork is the sole responsibility of the Chief.
4.- The effective Chief must know how to “manage the distances”.-
The best way to maintain hierarchical and personal relationships (in that order) is to remain discretionary close and relatively distant from each team member, according to what the situation and the moment determine.
The Chief must be a person close to his people at certain times and "distant" at others. Never one or the other. Closeness strengthens ties and "distance" obligations.
No member of the team should feel "very close" to the Chief or "very far". Both scenarios are unproductive. In the first case, there is a risk that obligations will not be prioritized and in the second, relationships will deteriorate. Sometimes close and sometimes far, that is the premise of contact that the Chief must practice according to his best discernment.
The logic of the "open door office" cannot be understood as a precept written in stone. It is the Chief who must manage these "doors" according to the previous premise. Being an "accessible" boss does not mean always being willing. In reality, the less team members need to go to the Chief, the better, because it means that things are going properly. And it is the responsibility of the Chief to ensure that this state is reached.
5.- The effective Chief maintains a “gelatinous” structure in the work team.-
Each member of the team must be very clear about what is expected of their work, but this does not necessarily mean that they have the same clarity regarding the set of things. The latter must always be in a "gelatinous" state.
Finding another word is not easy. "Gelatinous" does not mean diffuse nor is it linked to any type of uncertainty. The "gelatinous" is a solid but "mobile, permeable and not very rigid" state.
The people in the work team do not need and should not have a completely clear and detailed “overview of things”. This vision must be provided by the Chief to the extent that is advisable and pertinent. When people have complete knowledge of everything, they tend to dose efforts according to the nature of the overall result. The product of the Synergy of the parts progressively conditions their future performance, and the subsequent global results may decline.
When a member of the work team knows perfectly the general result that the group is achieving, they can “lean” on it and not maximize their individual performance.
The Chief must have the power to manage the information on the General Results based on what he considers convenient for the individual efforts. The Chief has a clear vision of the set of things, but the members of the team the one that he considers convenient for the purposes of the particular performance and his contribution to the results of the set. This is maintaining a "gelatinous state".
This management technique helps a lot in the control of team performance, because it depends on one person: the Boss. This prevents control of the situation from being accidentally located in any of the parts and to the detriment of the whole.
6.- The effective Chief must have in the structure a person prepared and ready to replace him at any time.-
If this constitutes part of the Organizational Policy, so much the better, but otherwise it must also be carried out by the Chief.
The lack of people who can take alternation only increases the level of pressure on the performance of the Chief himself, a margin that constitutes a risk that no Organization should take.
The effective Chief forms an “alter - ego” in his leadership structure from the moment he assumes the responsibility of commanding a team. And when work teams exceed 10 or 12 people, develop more than one individual who can take command post when necessary.
If the Organization allows it, this procedure is practiced formally and if it is not covered by the Policies, it is carried out informally, but in any case it is carried out.
In the mind of the effective Boss, ALL the people on the team are indispensable and therefore everyone must be "substitutable" at any time. The best way to achieve this is to develop a group that can take on the responsibilities and tasks of others with ease, beginning of course with the Chief's own tasks.
This is the way in which a working system achieves homeostasis and from there sustained efficiency over time.
7.- How does the effective Chief perform in the relationship he maintains with his superiors ?:
The answer is simple: as established by the spirit of what is manifested in “A message to Garcia”.
The virtues of reasoning as elemental and profound as that have not changed in time.
AUTHOR'S DATA.-
Carlos Eduardo Nava Condarco, a native of Bolivia, lives in the city of Santa Cruz de la Sierra, is a Business Administrator and Entrepreneur. He currently works as Manager of his Company, Business Strategy and Personal Development Consultant, writer and Entrepreneur Coach. Author of several books on Entrepreneurship, Business Strategy and Personal Development, including:
“Entrepreneurship is a way of life. Development of Entrepreneurial Awareness ”
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