A Successful Manager: Managerial Roles and What Really Matters

The primary job of a manager is to help people become productive. Being a manager means that you are on the middle ground between the management and your people. You have to balance the interests of both parties in order to yield the most favorable results. As such, the role of a manager in a company is not easy. You must deal with a lot of different personalities, guide your team, serve many bosses and beat a lot of deadlines.

Indeed, a managerial position in a company entails more responsibilities. You have to handle different roles and, at the same time, you also have to deliver results as expected by the company.

10 Roles of a Manager in a Company

It is essential to identify the roles performed by managers, regardless of your position in the company. Specifically, here are some:

Hiring People

Some managers forego this role because they rely heavily on Human Resources to look for people to work with them. With the numerous responsibilities, a manager has, taking an active part in hiring people who you will work in the future is certainly something you cannot just set aside.

Even if this is the role of the HR in the company, taking an active part in the hiring process can give good implications in the long run. More than skills, you must also have a glimpse of the applicant’s attitude. After all, it will be you who will work together with the applicant once they get hired.

Performance Management

One of the most daunting but fulfilling tasks of being a manager is handling your people. Trying to manage different personalities can be very challenging. However, a good manager would know how to adjust with each of these personalities in order to bring out the best on each one of them.

As the manager, you must be able to set expectations and goals for your people, train them, monitor their work progress, address problems with their performance, give feedback and recognize their efforts.

Ensure the Growth of the Team

As the manager, you must be mindful of the growth of your team members as employees yearn for personal and professional growth. An employee who feels growth and improvement in his/her career is more likely to be more productive and more active in contributing to the achievement of the team’s goals compared to an employee who feels stuck.

Setting Overall Direction

One of the roles performed by managers is to be able to set the overall direction of the team. He/She must disseminate the goals of the organization so that every team member will have a guide on where they will direct their efforts to. Setting a direction can help the team focus on the things that can contribute to the team’s goal.

A Team Player

One of the mistakes most managers commit is making their subordinates feel that they are mere people working for the company. Some managers act like a boss – delegating unbelievable tasks to their team members, expect them to deliver the task without even guiding them, get angry if something went wrong and guise it as a way of “training them.”

This can demoralize your team members. It can also make them lose their respect for you. As a leader, you must take the role of a team player. You must show them that you can do what you asked them to do. You must also teach them the proper dynamics of teamwork.

Show Your Expertise

Respect is earned. You must show your team members that you deserve your position. You must be someone that they’ll look up to. You can do this by showing them that you are knowledgeable enough about your field and that they will learn a lot from you.

Manage Resources

You must look into the resources your team have. You must be able to determine whether these resources are enough to aide the team in delivering the goals you’ve set. You must also be careful that you are not overspending or wasting money.

Streamline Processes

As the manager, you have the authority to improve processes that you think can make the team more productive. It will help if you ask suggestions from your team as well.

Self-Development

Despite the many load on your shoulders, you must not forget yourself in the process. Always remember that you are a person who is also in need of professional and career growth.

Don’t stop learning. Attend training, ask for feedback and continue to explore the realm of leadership and discipline.

Communicate Information

Your role is more than just to disseminate information. A manager must relay information to your team members in such a way that they will grasp the principles behind what you are trying to communicate.

Also, communication must not be exclusive to a top-down flow. You must also take inputs from down-up (from your people), so your team members will feel that you value their contributions.

What does it mean to be a successful manager?

Once the ten roles stated above are performed well by managers, does that already make them a successful manager? What does it mean to be a successful manager?

A successful manager is:

•    Someone who has gained their team’s respect
•    Someone who produces leaders
•    Someone who inspires the team
•    Someone whom the team is looking up to
•    Someone who brings out the best in each of their team members
•    Someone who can balance the company’s deliverables vis-à-vis humane treatment to their people

Being a successful manager is not just measured by the numbers or the outputs. The true measure of a successful manager is determined by how he/she was able to make the team work together to achieve those metrics.

If you are a kind of manager who managed to deliver results by casting fear over your people, then you are not to be considered successful. However, if you are the manager who provided the outputs because you were able to inspire and bring out the best in your team members, then you are a successful one.

Your success as a manager is a reflection on how your people have grown under your watch – they are the output that would best measure your success as a leader.