Timo Söderlund, from Ebit Management, in Sweden, captured an important point in his comment posted last week. It was in response to our series about Cheryl, a technical troubleshooter who was recruited to improve throughput for a manufacturing company.

This is what you see quite often. An excellent salesman is promoted to become sales manager. It may work, but it may also fail. If you, at a certain age, have developed your skills and love the things you are doing – as a specialist or expert, and then start doing something else – like becoming a manager – I question if it can be “trained” into that person to become as successful a manager as he or she was before, in their field of expertise. A manager – in my view – is more concerned in people, their interaction, and the performance of the “team” – and this is quite far away from being an expert in a certain technical or administrative field.

In our classroom program, I have seen a number of technical and engineering people thrust into the role of management. Though they are extremely bright, this new management role requires a completely different skill set.

And it is a skill set of behaviors that can be learned. Interesting, I find that once learned, these skills have a transforming effect on the manager, as a person.

Beginning tomorrow, I will spend a few days exploring the role of positive reinforcement. “What gets measured gets done, but what gets reinforced, gets repeated.” -TF

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Our next management program begins in Fort Lauderdale on September 25. For registration information, please visit www.workingmanagement.com.