06 October 2009
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People management in a harsh financial climate


Blair McPherson

Even large local authorities can no longer afford to send managers on expensive MBA courses, yet a recession is when effective managers are most needed, says Blair McPherson.

When budgets are tight, organisations are operating in a harsh financial climate – and training is vulnerable. Management training is particularly at risk, because it is often seen as desirable rather than essential.  But this is short-sighted, because when a council has to make less go further, it needs highly-skilled and innovative managers.

Traditional management development is expensive. Frequently, these courses are developed with local universities, allowing them to be tailored to an organisation’s needs, with an emphasis on work-related situations in return for a guaranteed supply of students.

Managers enjoy the fact that they can bring in their work experience, but their real popularity with managers is that the resulting qualification looks good on the CV.

Few employers can justify this level of expenditure on a small proportion of their managers when budgets are under severe pressure. Nor is this the most effective way of growing the type of manager specific to your organisation needs.

What organisations increasingly need is a cost-effective way of developing the leadership skills of large numbers of managers in a way which moulds them into the type of manager best suited to the organisations’ needs – and preferably, without taking them away from their day jobs – ideally through, an approach that allows them to dip in and out when time and opportunity permits.

In Lancashire, we have built just such a management development programme based on executive coaching, management learning sets, 360-degree feedback, mentoring and management surgeries, plus posting discussion material on the intranet. The aim is to give managers insight into how their behaviour affects others, and to provide opportunities to share and reflect on their experience. The programme starts with feedback from colleagues and direct reports, and then either one-to-one executive coaching or membership of a management learning set.

Executive coaching has been provided to all 30 senior managers. This involved observing managers in a range of management situations, such as board meetings, presentations to multi-agency groups, addressing a large staff group, or conducting negotiations with a key partner agency.

Senior managers rarely get such direct feedback on their performance but, despite some initial apprehension, those involved felt the material generated offered some genuine insights.

The whole programme has been funded out of the money saved by not sending the equivalent of four people on an MBA. The programme has been running for four years, and is on course for developing the leadership and people-management skills of all 500 managers.

While all the techniques used in the programme are tried and tested, it is the systematic way they have been pulled together, plus the use of management consultants and the innovate use of the intranet, which makes this approach different. Two management consultants have been used throughout for expertise in executive coaching and learning sets, and the consistency of message they provide. Management ‘guru’ material has been placed on the intranet and used in learning sets, mentoring sessions, and as homework for aspiring managers.

This material reinforces the type of manager and management behaviour the organisation wants to promote. The material focuses on leadership and people-management skills by presenting typical management scenarios for discussion.

This includes issues around managing a diverse workforce, such as dealing with a dispute between two staff which may or may not have a racial dimension, responding to a member of staff who claims colleagues are excluding them and talking behind their back because of their sexuality, and a member of staff who claims their disability is not being taken into account when addressing issues of performance and attendance.

In this way, the management-development programme addresses issues of equality and diversity which are at the heart of good people-management skills, and reflect the values that the organisation wishes its managers to promote.

Blair McPherson is a senior manager with in a large local authority
 



Your comments

Blair's clear and inspiring story is mirrored by our own experiences of giving clients what they need on the job and in a more pragmatic way than an MBA. The 1-2-1 coaching in particular is highly effective as are team learning sets. It sends the message to managers "you matter and we will focus on your success in this role".

Jonathan Perks MBE, Managing Director Board , Added: Friday, 16 October 2009 10:48 AM

I would add that effective learning should be all about learning through the medium of the individual's day-job. By focusing on 360 Degree Feedback and coaching, as in this great example, individuals can reflect on how they do their job, what they need to change to improve, and then do it, in the context of their workplace and their colleagues.

Jo Ayoubi, Director, Track Surveys Ltd, Added: Monday, 12 October 2009 12:10 PM

No-one would say that an MBA does not provide individuals with a tremendous broadening of experience and education but that is often it - it's the individual that ultimately benefits and not the employer who has paid for it. It comes down to the perceived ROI - perceived because when finances are tight it's a brave employer who does not take a hard look at how their 'training spend' is being used. Targeted coaching is always a cost effective option and shows continued commitment to staff.

Paul Slater, Managing Director, Mushcado Consulting Ltd, Added: Thursday, 8 October 2009 06:48 PM



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