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How to avoid management pitfalls

There is no position in business so fraught with pitfalls as that of the manager's. The manager occupies a strange and difficult position. On the one hand, it is humdrum, everyday, full of boredom and routine; on the other hand it is diverse, exciting, and full of opportunities for leadership and aggressive, creative thinking. There are lots of ways to stumble as a manage; lots of pitfalls and traps to avoid. Let us consider a few of them.

1. One pitfall of management is the ambiguous position he or her holds in the eyes of the regular employees. The regular employees are not quite sure how to take the manager. This is definitely a pitfall for the manager to stumble into, but there are ways of avoiding it. The manager must realize that he or she's not seen completely as a boss or as an equal. The regular employees see the manager taking orders from his or her bosses; which in turn makes it difficult for them to take orders from the manager; yet, at the same time, the manager's closeness to the employees makes him or her nearly one of them, but not quite. The manager occupies a very difficult position, fraught with pitfalls, indeed.


2. How can a manager void this pitfall of having an ambiguous position in the eyes of his or her employees? The secret really, is that the manager must do all that her or she can to really ingratiate him or herself with the employees. If it comes to a fight between the employees and the manager's bosses, for example, the manager must take the side of the employees, and, what's more, the employees must see the manager taking their side, and believe it. There can be no twofaced behavior with the manager. If the employees feel that he or she shows one face to them, and another face to corporate, the manager is doomed, and his or her power is more weakened than it ever was before.

3. One way for the manager to avoid the pitfalls of ambiguous leadership is to provide real leadership as often as he or she can. This means taking the initiative; coming up with plans on your own, separate from the corporate leaders; doing things that will please the employees and at the same time move the desires of the company forward. To avoid pitfalls, the manager must realize, and he or she must make his or her corporate bosses realize, that happy, fulfilled employees are successful employees; are hardworking employees. Therefore, the more that a manager can rally together the employees by creating activities, incentives, and so forth, the more those employees will work for and even love the manager, regardless of how they feel about their corporate bosses.

4. Avoiding management pitfalls isn't easy, but it can be done. Avoiding management pitfalls, in the last analysis, simply means that the manager becomes the true friends and allies of the employees. Avoiding management pitfalls means that the manager never forget his place, his double place: that of the friend, counselor, and leader of the employees, but also that of the employee and agent of his or her corporate leaders. One thing we'd suggest a manager do is go and talk frankly to his or her corporate leaders about the sensitive and delicate position that he or she occupies. Have a plan going in, a groundwork for fostering company unity and employee spirit that's right in harmony with the vision of the company itself. That way, the manager's corporate leaders will understand that they have a real leader and visionary on their hands, a manager determined to avoid management pitfalls and thus bring more success to the company.

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