Promoting New Supervisor Training Services Is Shown To Be A Vital Factor For Developing Companies

By Nancy White


If commercial enterprises are to do well, then providing new supervisor training services needs to be a key element in their strategy. Yet to often it is in this area that enterprises fall down in so far as they tend to promote people into supervisory jobs before they have acquired the required expertise.

It is unlikely that a company would appoint a trades person or a technician without first verifying that they had both the skills and tools required to do the job. With supervisors, however, it regularly happens that new appointees are sent out into the workplace totally unprepared for the demands that lie ahead of them. As a result many newly appointed supervisory staff rapidly begin to doubt their own abilities, suffer crises of confidence and soon begin to fail in the execution of their core responsibilities. This leads to a vicious circle of anxiety and stress which in turn feeds back into the job situation only serving to make matters worse.

The heads of some companies seem to believe in a strange fallacy that leadership skills are incumbent within people from birth, or in other words people chosen with sufficient potential will cope with overwhelming situations in the workplace relying solely on raw intrinsic talent. Another fallacy is the belief that if any employee excels technically, he or she will also be likely to succeed with supervisory duties. This theory stems from the belief that the technical aspects of a job are the most important, and it is simply assumed the individual concerned will also have the ability to handle the man management tasks which are regarded more as an ancillary function.

Technical ability and experience is clearly necessary to perform adequately, however, leading companies have realized that their growth and success is heavily dependent upon this lower level of management, the supervisor, and invest considerably in this area. Successful businesses have been known to call this body of knowledge and experience a supervisory toolbox. Many larger companies have training departments dedicated towards the development and ongoing coaching of supervisors. Smaller businesses can equally take advantage of the wealth of training consultant businesses that specialize in this area

A managers development course would ideally be divided into key areas of functional performance. Clearly the subject of leadership, both in theory and practice, would be prominent. This would include topics such as motivating, decision making, communicating, empowering staff as well as the selection and development of staff within the work unit.

The second main category for training development would likely cover the subject of planning. This would cover topics such as the importance of planning and why organizations plan, forecasting for the future, defining success and action planning. This would very likely include a section on industry specific workplace policies and procedures and in particular health, safety and protecting the environment.

Of vital importance is the subject of organization or put more simply the process of how to get things done through others. The all-important management tools, delegation, communication and of course developing and managing teams, and the relationships both within and between teams.

Controlling and monitoring progress is another important supervisory function which should be a key part of training. This would cover the process of measuring the progress of work, evaluating this against planning objectives and taking appropriate corrective steps when required.

If supervisors are to be successful, and companies should sincerely wish that they are, then it is absolutely necessary to invest the time and resources to make this happen. Empower line mangers with a decent set of tools.




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