A good boss gets things out of the way

It’s easy to overthink management. The minute you’re put in charge of a team of people, you start getting a lot of advice and could drown in a tonne of articles, books and training programmes about how to lead, encourage, motivate, coach, discipline, and inspire the people who report to you.

It’s overwhelming. Like trying to take a drink of water from a fire hydrant.

In one of Organisational Psychologist Adam Grant’s newsletters, he succinctly summarised WHAT a manager should ideally do.

Being a good manager is not rocket science:

• Hold frequent 1-on-1s with direct reports

• Make connections across departments

• Don't expect people to work nights and weekends

• Don't make people spend hours in bloated meetings

The job of a team leader is to get the organisation, the person and yourself out of the way of what needs to be done. Therefore, ask your team what is attacking the priorities of their day? Where can you cut red tape? Hold one less meeting? Save someone from having to attend one? Produce one less report? Leverage a strength from someone else in the team and delegate a task to those who can do it best?

Further Reading:

Farnham Street Blog Aim For What’s Reasonable: Leadership Lessons From Director Jean Renoir