Modern Times

The Benefit of Developing Your New Supervisor

Supervisory skills don't come naturally to everyone. Many companies use the sink-or-swim process that would sometimes be enhanced by a supportive veteran supervisor stepping in to lend a few words of guidance. For a new supervisor to be successful companies need to adopt a training program for folks who were new to these duties and responsibilities. The goal is to provide them with a higher level of support and preparation than in the past.

Don’t keep workers in the dark. As managers and coaches, isn’t it part of our responsibility to help our staff identify their strengths through tools and training and then develop goals that enhance those strengths?

It’s easy to make assumptions about individuals based on presuppositions, hearsay, isolated incidents and old information and miss the opportunity to develop raw talent right in front of you.

Shouldn’t we be providing opportunities through projects that allow staff to use what they already have to drive performance? Isn’t it our responsibility to review those goals and provide feedback?

One day a person is ‘one of the team’ and the next day they can be a supervisor of the team. To perform this role effectively and get results through other people, requires a new range of skills.

Many times we quickly gravitate toward the discussion of an employee’s weakest area rather than the discussion of how they could capitalize on their predominant style.

It is in everyone’s best interest to help new supervisors understand the importance of selecting team members with varied and deliberate skills. With training they come to realize that often with strengths, your employees already have natural talents and knowledge in particular areas that just need to be developed. In knowing their weaknesses, they can help the employee determine: (1) is it critical to his/her success? (2) What level of competency is needed for success?

Development of employee talent is an active process; it not only requires an investment of time and energy, but also an environment where development can occur. By helping your staff to gather those tools and put the knowledge together to gain, with each insight, a truer picture.

• To provide supervisors with the necessary knowledge, skills and behaviors to increase their effectiveness in their current roles.
• To equip supervisors with the managerial skills necessary for them to adapt to changing demands in the future.
• To improve succession planning by providing a structured development program which will enable supervisors to fulfil their potential within the company.
• It's not enough to follow directions ... now you must give directions about what gets done, when, and by whom.
• It's not enough that your projects are accurate and on time ... you have to help others keep their projects on track, and see that everyone works together.
• It's not enough to focus only on your department ... suddenly you're a member of the management team. Your new peers will expect you to have a broader perspective, including other departments.
• It's not enough to keep yourself motivated ... you have to be a coach, cheerleader, and "strong shoulder" to people who have bad days, conflicts with each other, and other demands that you might not be able to satisfy.

Front-line supervisors play a key role in business success.  Supervisors are the company’s unsung heroes, and are the glue that holds it all together.  They could not do it without the infrastructure of the organization, but the organization could not function without them either.

Modern Managers offers a turnkey supervisor training course that we have created so you can customize your leadership training needs to help the new supervisor gain a deeper understanding of leadership training elements that can be applied in everyday situations.

Our New Supervisor Training Program, an effective Leadership Development Course, and our Employee Handbook were designed especially for small businesses that do not have the time, resources or expertise to develop their own.

Our TurnKey New Supervisor Training Program product can be made specific to your company’s needs and helps new managers develop successful skills to effectively communicate, delegate and manage priorities to increase employee productivity, morale, work quality and accelerate their ability to focus their time and efforts on tasks that achieves results that are most important to the organization’s success.

Why write your own New Supervisor Training Program or an Employee Handbook when it's done for you? Pre-written course ware saves you time and money and helps you better prepare for classroom training with well-researched and proven course materials.  (ModernManagers.com HR in a Box)

A  turnkey handbook  that covers employee-related policies and benefits.  Make it your own merely by inserting key words, selecting alternative phrases, deleting segments that are not required or adding topics unique to your operation. Included is a power-point presentation that you can use to introduce your employees to your company products, customers, and community!