When someone is promoted to the role of a manager, it’s usually down to the hard work and performance they’ve shown over a period of time as part of a team. They’ve likely shown commitment to the company, made positive strides to meet deadlines in projects and been proactive in problem-solving. But does this qualify them to also know how to manage an entire group of people, all with different levels of experience, communication styles and preferred ways of working? Whilst making sure that they’re getting the most out of each team member, keeping team harmony and building a team that is inspired to collaborate together? It’s a lot to ask of our people managers – and without giving them the right tools, we’re setting them up to fail.
What we expect from our managers has become unreasonable. Gartner reports that today’s managers are accountable for 51% more responsibilities that they can manage and 77% of employees place an increased importance on manager support. And with only 50% of employees feeling that their managers treat them with empathy and fairness, this can only lead to higher rates of turnover, lower rates of productivity and damage to your workplace culture. In short: we need to help our managers, and we need to help them now.
An article published by Forbes detailing what makes a good manager doesn’t contain the qualities you might expect. Instead of highlighting skills such as organization or expertise, the articles focus on soft skills such as communication, trust, self-awareness and vulnerability. These soft skills come naturally to some, but not to everyone, and it’s not enough to print the list of vital soft skills off and stick it on the work fridge for everyone to crack on with. We need to give managers the tools to use and understand these soft skills within their teams. This is where people science comes in.
Psychometric assessments in behaviour and personality capture insights on the psychology of how someone likes to work. Think things like how someone likes to communicate (do they prefer a phone call or email? Do they enjoy small talk or want to get to the point quickly?), how someone likes to be motivated (recognition for the work they’ve done so far, competitive targets or the freedom to work independently) and how your team will collaborate best (brainstorming sessions, a clear itinerary or the opportunity to plan before coming together and sharing ideas). This is just a small selection of what you can use people science for. It’s an easy, user-friendly way to fast-track your managers to understand the soft skills of the team and themselves and use them to create a stronger team, whilst giving each report the personalized support they need.
In our Thomas Connect platform, we’ve taken these insights one step further. Our Colleague Compare feature allows team members to compare profiles with each other and easily see their shared strengths and where they differ. You can build a team within our platform and run a tailored session with insights on how to get the most out of everyone, written by our psychologists. Or, if you’re after something slightly more personal, you can ask Thom, our AI coach, any question about you or someone you work with and how they like to work, and it’ll tell you instantly. We’ve made our industry-leading psychometric insights easy to read, easy to understand and easy to put into action.
The role of a manager is ever-changing, and we can’t predict what they’ll need in the future. But what we can do is give them a solid foundation of connection within their teams by using people science to hone their skills, understand themselves a bit better and ensure the people managing part of their job is as supported as possible.
