Managing knowledge workers

If you’re a competent knowledge worker, sooner or later you will probably have to manage other people. Not everyone finds this easy.

Part of the problem is the nature of knowledge work means we are highly trained in specialist areas. A typical knowledge worker has plenty of skill, expertise and experience—but these worthwhile qualities are generally focused on an extremely narrow area of activity.

And despite the millions of dollars invested and all the hours now spent on lifetime learning, surprisingly few of us get the opportunity to pick up much in the way of people management training.

One estimate found less than 10 percent of all line managers operating in Australia and New Zealand have had any formal instruction organising, leading, motivating and otherwise dealing with subordinate workers. And much of the formal training people have been through is rudimentary, maybe a day or two in a seminar and few hands-on workshops.

This glaring lack of formal management education means that you should always show interest if your employer offers to pay for any management training. As all knowledge workers know, rare skills that are in demand are valuable. If you can show a prospective employer you’ve completed a conflict resolution course or similar in addition to your specialist skills, you’ll push yourself to the front of the short list and maybe able to negotiate a better deal. After all, everyone is looking for leaders.

The biggest problem is that people often don’t like to take these courses. Don’t kid yourself you don’t have the time for formal management training. Make the time. Then use your new skills to lead others as you catch up on missed work and then move into fast forward.

In the coming weeks, I’ll post a number of people management stories on Knowledge Workers web site and add or read comments at the bottom of each story. Alternatively, you can email me via my contact page. I can’t promise to answer every question that arises, but I will attempt to do so and will certainly try to respond to every email that I read. Where possible I’d like to include your comments in future stories. If you want to remain anonymous that’s fine by me.

There are lucky people who seem to have innate people management abilities. I’ve seen a few of these in my time, but I cringe watching younger knowledge workers as they struggle to deal with subordinates. From experience I can tell you that biggest error made by the current generation of beginning managers is to take fictional management role models at face value and act out the role as if they were playing in a soap opera or a movie. You might see successful two-fisted managers on TV, and Australia has had its fair share of these types in the past, but thumping the desk and screaming at people is no way to succeed in the knowledge economy.

Funnily enough, there are good management role models elsewhere on television. For example, many sports team coaches and captains show the management qualities that you’d expect to see in a modern information-based company.

International cricket captains are particularly worth watching. You’ll notice the best ones consult with key players, listen to their specialist advice, deliver sober encouragement when required, calm down the more headstrong mavericks and take calculated risks. They all have an ability to keep everyone focused on the result while ensuring that the process works.

Clearly there are major differences between captaining a cricket team and managing a group of skilled knowledge workers. Yet on some levels the two tasks are absolutely the same. Of course these captains are not perfect, they do dumb things and make mistakes. But from a management technique observer’s point of view this is even better than watching them glide along never putting a foot wrong. Next time you decide to kill a few hours watching any top-level professional sport make a point of observing the management styles of both teams with a critical eye.

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