3 Tips For Developing Strong Managers

Written by Tom Gimbel, founder and CEO of LaSalle Network.

With the economy recovering, jobseekers now have more options, which makes recruiting top talent tougher for hiring managers. People don’t quit jobs, they quit managers, so the hours and dollars spent fighting for an industry key player to join the team may all go to waste if companies don’t focus on one key thing: management training.

Here are a few ways to do that:

• Invest. Regardless if the employee has been in the management role for six months or 10 years, continue building their management and leadership skills. Send them to conferences, encourage them to watch webinars, and attend seminars. These opportunities need to be available, and employees need to know that they are available.  Ask them to identify their areas of weakness and find classes to strengthen those. Don’t just send managers anywhere for training. Choose credible organizations.

• Teach empathy.  Managers sometimes need a reminder to be empathetic. It’s easy to fall into the trap of only seeing goals, wins, numbers, etc., but empathy is what gets a team motivated and excited.  Empathy is what develops a passionate team and helps close business. It’s what brings a team into the office on a Saturday to help a colleague on a goal that doesn’t directly impact the goals of other team members. Empathy is among the strongest and most effective characteristics a manager can have.

• Assemble a peer group. When looking for a mentor, people often look to outside of the company, assuming all internal employees would have the same management style…wrong. While core business functions may be similar, many managers have a different way of developing their teams. Don’t leave the onus on the employee to take initiative. Organize a peer mentorship program and pair managers to meet weekly or monthly. Managers can be great resources for one another. For instance, one manager’s strength may be holding people accountable, while keeping morale high, and another manager may be giving weekly quizzes that are making the team more knowledgeable.

Tom Gimbel is the President and CEO of LaSalle Network, a staffing firm based in Chicago.  Founded in 1998, LaSalle has served thousands of clients and candidates, placing job seekers in temporary, temporary-to-permanent and permanent positions.  LaSalle Network was an Inner City 100 winner in 2011 and 2013.  LaSalle Network has also been listed on Inc. Magazine’s 500/5000 Fastest Growing Companies in America list for the past eight years, list by Crain’s Chicago Business among the 2014 Best Places to Work, named by Staffing Industry Analysts’ as a top five “Best Staffing Firms to Work For” from 2011 through 2013, and among the “Fastest Growing Staffing Firms” in 2012 and 2013.