What is going on inside organizations that make it so difficult for managers to be effective in their jobs?
Effective Managers and the Telfer School of Management at the University of Ottawa partnered to fill the void in the management sciences literature surrounding that very question. The research study closed at the end of 2013 with nearly 200 managers representing approximately 2,000 manager-subordinate relationships from eight organizations in participation. The research focus was to understand and, more importantly, identify those dynamics that impact a manager’s effectiveness at work.
While we discovered that there are a lot of factors at play that obstructs manager effectiveness, we identified that there was a critical dimension that remained consistent in our research: accountability.
Accountability is at the heart of managerial leadership. It is critical that employees have a clear understanding of what they are being held accountable for and how their outcomes will contribute to the success of their organization.
In an organizational context, accountability is “an obligation for which one can be held to account for one’s results and actions by a specified other.”
Through our research, we gained an understanding of what results in the actual effectiveness of managers. Did you know that on average managers feel they are operating at just 55% effectiveness? That is an ineffectiveness ratio of over two days a week! Measured in another way, managers reported that they spend over 20% of their time doing work that is not part of their job and nearly 25% of their time doing work that could have been delegated to an administrative support position.
The Effective Managers Manager Effectiveness Assessment
We hope to help organizations understand how they can improve productivity in their organizations. And that’s why we developed the Effective Managers Manager Effectiveness Assessment. It is a survey-based approach to assess the current state of your lead management effectiveness. The results are consolidated and analyzed to provide precise recommendations that you can adopt in your leadership.
The web-based survey can be administered to every manager in your organization; other non-manager individuals may also be included if their specialized knowledge or tenure with the organization warrants their inclusion.
Users log on and create an account so that they need not complete the survey in one sitting. Data is saved as it is entered; if a respondent is interrupted or accidentally exits the survey, no data is lost.
Respondents of the survey are assured confidentiality, and results are presented to you in a consolidated way so that individual responses cannot be identified.
The survey contains 94 questions in 9 sections and takes only 20 – 30 minutes to complete. These questions include demographic data, an open text box to gather additional information from managers, and the issues that address the critical indicators of manager effectiveness.
Our research revealed that over 1/3 of managers are not clear about that for which their managers hold them to account. We developed the Effective Managers Manager Effectiveness Assessment to help CEOs recognize if there is such a disconnect in accountability with their managers. This will help the executive leadership gain clarity and a better understanding of the actual state of the managerial effectiveness in their organizations.
We can help you create and sustain a high performance organization.
You can also check out our Engagement Infographic here. Or email me to set up a call.
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