Right out
of college I was hired to be a supervisor in a poultry processing plant (yes, I
studied chickens in college). With the ink on my degree still wet, I was now in
charge of 42 people at the seasoned age of 21. I received no leadership or
management training other than a four week indoctrination where I spent one
week in each of the four major areas of the business to learn what they do.
Then I
was thrown to into the fire of ‘management’. With absolutely no formal training
on how to lead people I reverted to what I learned from my dad as I was growing
up. He was a military man and very strict. I learned pretty quickly that his
way of raising us did not necessarily work in everywhere. The result – I failed.
It was ugly. And now I look back and can see how I failed the people that
reported to me.
I entered
the Navy after that and during that time I received some of the best leadership
training I have ever had. Throughout my career I had formal training and on the
job training. The military invested in my training. What was taught to us in
the classroom was only the starting point for leadership training. But having
that formal framework gave me the foundation for each job I have had since.
Those jobs, in turn, gave me the opportunity to apply what I had learned and to
grow as a leader. I made a lot of mistakes but I always had good mentors that
guided me through the learning point of each mistake. Because of this it was
very rare that a mistake was repeated.
Keep in
mind that when you put a person in a leadership role of any kind you are putting
them there to help the people reporting to them do their jobs better and be
successful. But are you helping your leader do a better job? If you don’t train
them then you are doing them and your company a huge disservice. There is
really no reason not to invest in them. Would you hire someone to do a job for
you without training them on how to do it? I don’t think so. So why do we not
invest in our leaders? Why is it expected that just because someone is promoted
into a leadership role that they immediately know how to lead?
They need
training, especially those that are in their first supervisory role. This
training can be in a formal classroom setting and/or with a coach or mentor. Ideally,
it is formal training followed up with some degree of leadership coaching. But
they need to be given the right tools to do their job just like anyone else in
your company. Sure, there is cost to it for both the formal training and the
coaching, but what is the cost of having someone in a role that was never
trained to do it? Can you afford to have someone learn it as they go?
So when
do you invest in them? As I discussed in a previous blog,
the time to do this is when they get their first supervisory/management role. Invest
in them early and the return on that investment will be greater. With proper
training/coaching they can become good leaders and help your business grow.
Invest early because it is also very hard to correct improper training and ingrained,
poor habits. And the damage that can be done to your business will cost you in
the long run if we continue to Fail Our
Leaders.
We want
to hear what you think. Leave a comment and let’s start a discussion.
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© 2014 The Cobalt Group, LLC. All rights reserved.
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