The Five Levels of Management Mastery
I became a manager for the first time in 1997 and even though I thought I was ready for it, I really wasn’t!
I’d been hired as a project manager from my sales job with the Liverpool Echo for my ‘people and communication skills’. I was told I’d be managing a small team and that I had to learn on the job. Both about people AND project management!
In the year leading up to this promotion I had invested in a notebook and used it to record the skills that I appreciated in the managers I interacted with. I also noted down any behaviours I’d observed that I didn’t like. I felt that this would give me a head start when I finally achieved a people management role. But it didn’t really.
When I have talked — in interviews and podcasts — about my management journey between 1997 and taking my first truly senior role 10 years later, I estimated that I travelled through five stages of management, which were as follows:
The Navigator — in this stage I was just trying to find my way and understand what the role entailed and how I should ‘be’ with the team and my boss. This stage is a whirlwind where it feels like things are coming at you from all angles and you don’t know what to do!
The Accommodator — in this stage I moved on to trying to please everyone and be their friend. I had some of the basics under my belt and wanted to make time to build relationships. However, I didn’t relish having tough conversations as I wanted to be seen as the ‘good guy’!
The Fluctuator — at this stage I’d been given feedback that I had to be more direct with the team and take them to task when things hadn’t been delivered. Of course, I wasn’t given the skills to do this, so I oscillated between being their friend and being tough on them. It’s the Jekyll and Hyde era!
The Director — once I learned how to have the tough conversations and became comfortable with setting expectations and celebrating success, I set about rattling a few cages! I now had the confidence to be ‘brutally’ honest about situations and although the team appreciated this, my boss didn’t!
The Cultivator — more feedback later (‘We like honesty Colin, just not that honest’) and I’d learned not only how to build culture and communicate to the team about strategic endeavours and necessary process, but also to senior management too in a way that set me out as someone who could have a bright future at the organisation.
Whenever I run management development programs with clients I ask attendees to rate where they believe they are right now. These people have the benefit that most managers don’t, the benefit of education. Middle managers are the difference between organisation success and failure and yet most managers lack the training to make a real difference every day.
This was the situation I found myself in for almost 10 years. Showing up every day trying to do the best I could with the knowledge that I had.
To elevate management impact in your organisation, remember: the best managers aren't born, they're deliberately developed. This one simple action can replace 10 years of learning.