Managing People in a Lean Environment: Development - Personal Statement Example

 Managing People in a Lean Environment: Personal Development Personal experiences My personal experiences related to my career goals in management involved numerous studies involving the banking industry, including the various concepts of management activities and planning. In these courses I have learned about the different methods that managers use to promote motivation in employee groups, define strategic objectives for long-term business success, and the tools needed to build a rewarding organisational culture. Insight from these classes included a strong knowledge of different models of motivation, such as supporting employee needs in areas of coaching and development in order to gain a stronger employee commitment to meeting goals. These educational lessons taught me the value of using different resources such as the performance appraisal to provide ongoing feedback and help employees to learn their individual strengths and weaknesses. The tools required for a manager to develop a business with a strong competitive edge involves having an understanding of gaining employee commitment, reducing turnover in employment, and helping employees in areas of self-development. My experiences also include an in-depth course on information technologies in order to understand different software packages used in management as well as their application in an actual business environment. Some of the information taught in these courses included electronic resource planning for issues of purchasing and inventory control so that I could have an understanding of how these systems work together to create a competitive value chain. Information technology lessons also included the importance of using the right grammar and context when sending out professional communications and ensuring they are written according to the desired target audience. My skills learned in information technology gave me hands-on knowledge of the systems design and its role in the organisational structure as well as the skills needed to operate and use them properly as business communications tools. I also had the opportunity to travel to the United States for courses in Financial & Entrepreneurship Awareness. The basic lessons learned in these courses included understanding the nature of financial documents, such as those listed in annual report, and being able to use this information as a planning tool to recognize sales trends and other important financial data. In addition, it provided valuable information toward meeting my career goals in management because the course taught how to manage project teams and set a mission or vision for the business that promotes internal unity from all employees involved. I have also learned a great deal about myself through my experiences with sociology and in my family life. I come from a family that puts tremendous value on education and this has been reinforced since I was an adolescent. My family structure was one with tight controls and demanded compliance simply because my caretakers were older and, based on cultural values, considered wiser and more experienced. Sociology lessons taught that during young adulthood it is common to being pursuing liberation from family ideals in favour of a more personalised family concept. However, these experiences were important in identify with my own needs as an individual and has helped to shape who I am today, both culturally and in terms of managing my own situation independent of others. It has made me a more resilient person able to cope with any type of situation. Learning through these experiences The opportunity to work with a different culture also taught me the importance of having cultural awareness as a manager and recognising that there are going to be issues related to diversity that need to be considered. In the U.S., I found that most students in these courses were very independent and did not seem to like team projects. This was much different than what I had experienced before where teamwork is often considered the best method for gaining a better competitive edge in business. After conducting considerable research on culture and the differences that come from ethnic or social values, it gave me the resources needed to work with individuals from virtually any culture. This skill in diversity and cultural awareness will be one of my largest assets as a manager in the financial industry, especially if my job role entails having to travel to international business destinations or when forced to work in a project environment. Of all of my lessons learned that were directly related to management, I found my exposure to cultural knowledge the most valuable, yet challenging at the same time. One model that stands out the most that was challenging to understand came from Hofstede and it is known as the cultural dimensions model. It describes the different characteristics of international workers and how they, as a culture, view different concepts on socialisation and business. For example, this model offers that people in Asian countries tend to have a higher level of uncertainty avoidance, meaning that they tend to be less risky when making important decisions related to business (Schertzer, Laufer, Silvera & McBride, 2008). This is very important, yet challenging knowledge especially in the banking industry that often has different people from international locations working in multiple divisions of finance. They are often put into group work and forced to work together effectively. These lessons taught me to understand that Asians will often need to be exposed to hard evidence about what you are proposing in order to agree to buy into the proposed strategy. If they perceive that the outcomes might pose a risk, they might reject the proposal in favour of an alternative banking strategy that provides a more guaranteed rate of return. The challenge in this is identifying which specific international cultures carry specific characteristics and try to use proactive strategies to gain their support using cultural tools. Since I enjoy diverse working environments, I particularly enjoyed these lessons and it helped me to understand how to manage people more effectively if they come from international destinations. The skill that I need to develop most is improving my interpersonal communications in a way that provides more meaning to employees. By nature, I tend to be a facts supporter and I often expect people that are communicating with me to be less emotional and simply present me the information quickly and without a great deal of outward feelings. For example, in with my social peers, I often get frustrated when they discuss an issue and find opportunities to indicate their stress levels or other emotional concerns instead of simply getting to the point of what is being discussed. Some of my management education lessons taught me that this is a reality in business and employees have needs that require self-esteem development, which is something I often reject in favour of more rapid, to-the-point discussion. In order to be an effective leader, I have to sacrifice some of these irritations and be more empathic toward their needs and use a more effective interpersonal communications style that works with coaching and mentoring in order to gain employee or other management support. If my rather cut and dry attitude were to be firmly kept, employees would likely get a distorted view of my leadership style and be less apt to respond to direction. Toor & Ofori (2009) describe the idea of the ethical manager who openly talks about the importance of ethics in the workplace and tries to empower employees to help influence action. The moral and ethical manager has a charismatic personality that requires them to be more social with employees and appeal to their basic needs whilst promoting an ethical atmosphere of unity, goal-setting, and treating others with respect in all communications and interactions. As I identified, this has been a weakness for me since I am much less social in the workplace and prefer to have a more professional attitude when dealing with employees. However, my educational lessons have taught me the importance of being more upfront with workers and trying to build an environment (culture) that rewards better interpersonal relationships and tries to build a sense of harmony with employees related to not only ethics, but their relationship with the manager as a leader rather than a controller. This skill will need development in order to be a successful manager in the finance industry that works with people of many different social backgrounds. Beneficial tools for development Tools that identify a new type of manager that is desired in today’s businesses have been some of the best resources for helping me develop skills in not only management, but in areas of socialisation and business strategy. One concept that has been most helpful is the concept of the transformational leader, who sets a certain goal to inspire through vision and organisational purpose, champions this transformational goal and motivates through inspiration in order to improve commitment and process (Adams & Adams, 2009). Transformational leadership is much different than traditional leadership styles that are often reactive to situations that occur in regular business and tend to focus more on employee control as a means of getting a goal accomplished. I learned that a transformational leader sees opportunities for self-growth and the development of employees and then proactively breaks down barriers between manager and employee by influence and negotiation rather than strict employee controls. This type of manager always looks for the opportunity for a win-win outcome and tries to offer reward or inspiration in order to be a successful leader. Throughout the course I took several learning style inventories that tried to identify my preferred learning style. I learned that I am very much a visual learner, which is someone who prefers visual stimulation in order to retain knowledge. This learner profile is usually one that takes many notes, does not enjoy lectures as much as textbook readings, and can make sense easily of pictures, diagrams, maps or statistical charts (nwlincs.org, 2009). Unlike other learning styles, such as tactile or auditory that involve hearing information or hands-on activities, visual learning is a skill that will be crucial in finance since much of the information used to develop business strategy is in visual or charted format. It is important to understand what type of learning style best fits my personality and ability to retain information and then try to focus on using visuals as the best tool for gaining better skills. These learning inventories have been quality tools in understand myself at the cognitive level and then building on these strengths in order to effectively manage people and comprehend the information being presented through a format that best fits my learning profile. This definitely shows a link between the style by which I learn and my goals for career in finance. To my benefit, I do not think that another type of learning style would provide more benefit when working with financial figures on a routine basis in the workplace. Defining success in skills development Overcoming years of resilience and my appreciation for facts over discussion will be a very large challenge as it means adjusting parts of my learning style and my personality in order to better relate to diverse employee needs. I identified that I get frustrated rather easily when people use emotions in discussion and I will define success in this through measurement and observation. Gander (2009) offers that a quality manager must set up a form of judicial process that balances fairness with controls so that employees have respect for the manager and so the manager can effectively police the environment to make sure goals are being met by different employee groups. Employees, based on their culture, have a very defined set of perceptions about justice and these perceptions will impact the quality of the manager and employee relationship. In order to be perceived as fair, I have to develop my socialisation and communications skills so that I am perceived to be equitable and in favour of the employee condition. I will measure success by first experimenting with different social groups and try to be more empathic to their needs when they tend to move discussion away from facts and more toward their individual stresses. I will look for verbal cues that they give to show support or dissatisfaction with what is being said and I will make a visual notation of what I have observed. Over time, based on responses or body language, I should be able to come up with a better communications style that will help me to better relate to the less-resilient personality type that needs more reinforcement and self-confidence development. This is an actual research approach to the problem, however it is one that could benefit me greatly. I will also define success by taking an inventory of the people in my current social and professional life and identify them as follower types or leader types, based on the level of their known or perceived individualism or group support. Once identified, I will attempt to be more focused on negotiation and teamwork, using principles from my education such as transformational leadership and moral charisma, to see if I can turn the leader types into follower types. There are some people in my life that I already know are very independent thinkers and often reject suggestions simply to show their dominance. Using the tools from many of these models, I will attempt to promote a cooperative attitude and then measure whether this has been successful. It will also give me an opportunity to try out these models and theories in real life and further develop my communications skills that need strong development. The measurements I described should be developed today and then practiced over a six to 12 month period. This is a timeframe that will allow me to make notes, make observations, and see if I can change the leader to a follower profile and develop new respect in my professional and social relationships. Any less than six months would not give me the chance to build any meaningful relationships or associations to my research notes and observations while also performing self-analysis about how I choose to communicate when looking for support. It might also show that new, empathic discussion has brought better relationships in business and socially and it will give me time to measure the results and review what I have written. These actions fit directly with my learning style as a visual learner. Through observation, body language will be a large predictor of whether I am successful in using my new management and communication strategies. The visual notes give me a point of reference that will help me to retain the knowledge so that I can find a pattern of styles that works most successfully and then build on these new learnings. Interpersonal communications is my largest weakness and activities with a visual approach will bring the most positive results in achieving this goal. References Adams, W. & Adams, C. (2009) Transform or reform?, Leadership Excellence, 26(11), p.17. Gander, M. (2009). Managing people in a lean environment: The power of informal controls and effective management of a company culture, Journal of Business Case Studies, 5(6), pp.105-111. Nwlincs.org. (2009). Learning Styles. The NorthWest Internet Gateway for Adult Education Online Resources. http://www.nwlincs.org/mtlincs/pilotproject/studyskills/learningstyles.pdf (accessed April 1, 2010). Schertzer, S., Laufer, D., Silvera, D. & McBride, J. (2008). A cross-cultural validation of a gender role identity scale in marketing, International Marketing Review, London. 25(3), p.312. Toor, S. & Ofori, G. (2009). Ethical leadership: Examining the relationships with full range leadership model, employee outcomes, and organizational culture, Journal of Business Ethics, Vol. 90, pp.533-547. Read More