Lecture 1: role of manager

Assignment 1 : 2000 words

Include a references list in the appendix

Write the questions you asked, answers aren’t necessary

Relate the findings you get from your interviews and see if they conform or do not conform
to the pattern of the Managerial Escalator. In addition to this task, the report has to answer
the following the questions:

1. What is a Managerial Hybrid as defined by Rees & Porter (2015)? Establish if your
interviewees fit that definition. (are the people your interviewing in the managerial
hybrid and explain why it is the case)

2. What is the Managerial Gap as defined by Rees & Porter (2015)? To what extent is
there a managerial gap in the activities carried out by your interviewee? What are
the possible causes of this? See Rees & Porter (2015) pp 10-13

3. What are the 4 remedial strategies identified by Rees & Porter (2015) pp14-17? Have
any or all of these been implemented by the organisation for which your interviewee
is working?

Reflect on the potential implications of the managerial escalator model and the finding of
your interviews for your own career
Read chapter 1 of Skills of Management and Leadership Rees and Porter (2015) to identify
the issues involved in career progression and the questions you need to ask

How do people get to become managers? = The Managerial Escalator

Career of a manager
normally start at the bottom
so that they can train
themselves to gain
experience. The specialist
skills will be acquired over a
number of years. Most
managers will start as a
specialist. Sometimes like 5
years before moving up in
the escalator. This concept
explains how specialists
become managers.
Specialists examples,
engineers, IT etc.
The amount of time spent on managerial activity is indicated by
taking the reading from the vertical scale – on the left hand side
After the certain duration, there will be a moment where the person will be promoted.
Promotion gives you more advance abilities. This process of going up on the escalator can
carry on after every 5 years. The higher you go up the escalator, they will be performing a
much wider range of formal responsibilities. The graph shows that from the left side that
the amount of time spent on managerial activity with each promotion, the activity increases
and the specialists activity is less and less until one point where most of the responsibility
will be related to the manager. The graph is the difference between the amount of time the
person should spend on managerial activity and the amount of time actually spent. The gap
can also be big because of a number of reasons. E.g. research says that some managers do
not receive enough training and as a result they find it difficult to perform tasks especially
managing staff in the department. A survey has said that out of 50 managers that were
interviewed, only 12 received prior management training. Many of them said they hadn’t
received any training based on managerial training. They could be other reasons for this
e.g. not enough time etc.

Managerial Hybrids

The fact that what happens in the reality of most organisations showed that very few
managers are starting as managers from day one therefore most people start as specialists
then they start to be given activities that have a certain managerial responsibility element in
them e.g. responsibility for planning certain activities, managing budgets, solving conflicts,
allocating resources, but also supervision of staff (selecting staff, advising them or praising
them, handling grievances from the staff etc.)

Most management is done by people who also undertake specialist work. The balance
between management and specialist work will be determined by their position on the
managerial escalator.

Entry into management:

 Promotion to management is a way of getting more influence in the organisation
 Also a means of gaining more power/money or status
 But those who are best at the specialist may not necessarily make the best manager

Reality of managerial roles: many jobs which have not conventionally borne the tag
‘manager’ rely none the less on that bundle of actions – taking charge, securing an outcome,
controlling affairs – which amount to managing (Local Government Management board
1993 Managing Tomorrow)

Managerial Gap
The extent to which managerial tasks are neglected in favour of specialist. In the seminar
case study, it talked about someone that was promoted quickly to manager but when they
experienced the reality of the job they didn’t like it. Therefore, they reverted to his comfort
zone of specialist, and the responsibilities he was meant to perform, he was avoiding them.

Training ratio
 Specialist activity - Usually years
  Managerial responsibilities – usually days/weeks. This can create a problem as
research has showed that most managers are not receiving then correct
management training earlier in their careers. This can lead to poor performance.
Another problem relates to the career structure

Limitations of Specialist Career Structures

 People in the medical field may not want to be managers later in their career

Key Action Points or Remedial Strategies

 The reality of today is that most employees will make their way up the managerial
escalator and end up on the managerial side of the axis at one point in their careers.

4 strategies:
how have the managers your interviewing been selected for the job? Promoted?
Is it clear what they have to do in the role?
Is the managerial role clearly defined?
Have they received enough training? What training? Weeks? Months?
Who is monitoring this? Direct manager? How is the monitoring done? How was the
performance evaluated?

 Role definition – about making sure the managerial responsibilities in the job are
indicated clearly before the person takes on the certain position. Needs to be
defined correctly so when the person is selected
 Selection – when selection is happening, in many cases, it doesn’t take into account
the managerial element in the job and the selection process is not always focused
 enough on the managerial job. This means you have to assess people and not just
promoting people because of the length they have been in organisations. e.g.
interviews to see if they can perform to the ability. The problem is they are selecting
people based on their past performance rather than actual performance. E.g. a past
specialist may not necessarily mean that they will be as good in a managerial job and
this is the mistake that many organisations make.
 Training and development – in order to perform well, the person should be provided
with a reasonable amount of training which should start before the job is given to
the person.
 Monitoring – the manager appointed will need to be monitored to see if they are
performing well. This evaluation needs to be done and taken seriously by the person
above them. If the monitoring isn’t happening, then the person will just carry on the
way they are until people start complaining or people start leaving. Therefore, lack
of monitoring can leave a detrimental effect on the organisation

IN CONCLUSIONS, MANAGERS NEED TO UNDERSTAND SPECIALISTS AND THEIR WORK BUT

SPECIALISTS ARE NOT NECESSSARILY GOOD MANAGERS