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According to a recent report by the CMI, the UK has a big management problem. With evidence from approximately 4,500 employees, both managers and those managed by others, the report drops the shocking statistic that 82% of people entering a management role have no formal management and leadership training.
The report found evidence that managers with formal training are more comfortable calling out bad behaviour, more comfortable leading change initiatives and are significantly more likely to trust their team than those without formal training. This confirms what those of us who have spent our careers working with managers and leaders already know: management and leadership training support better work and better performance.
Why don’t we invest in management training?
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The report goes on to say that 33% of all current managers (so this includes all managers, not just those newly promoted) have never had any formal management & leadership training. More worrying, the same thing is reported for 26% of senior leaders. All of this tells me that the UK dismisses the importance of management and leadership skills. We wouldn’t let anyone operate expensive and delicate machinery without proper training, so why do we let our leaders loose on the most important asset we have, our people?
All of this made me wonder: Why do we dismiss the value of management and leadership skills? Why do we believe that strong technical skills equate to strong leadership and management skills? Why do we promote people before they’ve been trained? Why do we assume that people who have been managing for some time have magically learned all they need to know? And if it’s hit and miss whether people get any training at all, what does that tell us about how we support managers to keep learning and developing their skills?
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My hunch is that many organisations are sceptical about leadership and management training for two reasons:
- because the effects of poor leadership and management take longer to show up than the effects of poor technical training, and
- because there’s been a lot of bad training out there.
What are the early warning signs of skill gaps in leadership & management?
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It’s fairly easy to spot the warning signs that your people don’t have the technical skills they need. If you think about operating machinery, you’d notice a drop in quality of the products. And if you don’t then your clients probably will! You’ll also be able to log how many times the machinery breaks down and what this costs the company. Worse, you’ll certainly notice if people are injured and you may be liable for breaches of Health and Safety law.
Where you have gaps in management skills, the early warning signs are less easy to track back to the source. Yet, you can spot them if you know what you’re looking for.
1. You have difficulty hiring the talented people you need
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It’s tempting to blame the quality of candidates, but difficulty hiring and new hires struggling to settle-in is often a management problem. Effective recruitment is a set of skills in itself, plus managers need to set clear expectations and support team building for new recruits to flourish.
2. High levels of sickness absence or high levels of stress among your people
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It’s not good enough to blame stress on heavy workloads. The role of a manager includes managing workload, setting realistic goals and aligning the team around them. Even if your workplace doesn’t seem to have a stress problem, high levels of sickness are a clue that employees are struggling.
3. No one ever disagrees about anything
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Everyone always agreeing is not a good sign – it means no one’s saying what they really think. The role of managers and leaders is to create a safe enough space for people to speak up and you get much better problem solving from respectful discussion than from complete agreement.
4. You have a high staff turnover
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The saying that people don’t leave a bad job, they leave a bad manager has some truth in it. If your people don’t trust their managers, if they don’t feel valued and if they don’t have support for their development they will find work elsewhere.
How do you know your training will be effective?
One of my favourite testimonials for my Realising Your Leadership programme starts with the participant sharing their first thought was “oh no, not another management training course.” They go on to say how they actually found the programme fresh and they appreciated using their new skills in real-life scenarios.
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Here’s how I ensure my training programmes create a real difference, and therefore give a real return on your investment:
- Behaviour based – we don’t plough through management theory. Instead we look at the behaviours needed for effective management. It’s tangible and easy for delegates to see their progress.
- Practical – each participant shares real-life work challenges to work through in small groups. Everyone is supported to apply what they’re learning back in the workplace between sessions.
- Coaching – I teach coaching skills and we practice with peer-to-peer coaching. This means participants work through their own solutions, instead of being told what to do, while also learning how to coach their own teams.
- Tailored – we cover all management essentials and by discussing real-life work scenarios, we tackle the real (not assumed!) skills gaps for the group.
My next 12 month open programme Realising Your Leadership Potential starts at the end of November. It’s not too late to enrol if you have a small number you’d like to support with training.
