Promotions into Management?

[RobertEH]

My guiding principle when it comes to work...

"I want to wake up everyday and say I get to go to work, not I have to go to work"

I spend way too much time at work to dread going in every day.

I have lead teams for close to 30 years in the field of Technology. Some of the reasons I enjoy leading teams are:
1. I get to see people grow and excel
2. I get great satisfaction in being handed a mediocre or poorly performing team and helping them transform into a well performing team that produces.
3. I enjoy leading people in such a way that I can achieve desired business results.

Conversely there are many things I do not enjoy about leadership
-Having to deal with HR situations
-Needing to terminate someone for lack of performance (have only needed to do this a handful of times in my career though)
-Needing to lay off good people due to corporate targets/needs.

These are terrible things to deal with and one must be willing to address them head on with honesty and integrity or they will spin out of control and destroy your team's culture.

When it comes to developing people, especially Engineers I have found one of the absolute best ways to destroy someone's career is to promote a really good engineer to a management position. The skills it takes to be a top notch technology engineer are totally different than the skills needed to be a top notch manager. It takes a special person to be both a strong technology player, and a good technology manager.

To combat this, I have always attempted to try to create two professional development ladders (when I have had the chance to do so within the company I work for). One for Engineers, one for Managers. The two paths both come with commensurate compensation. I feel it is totally appropriate to have an stellar engineer making more than their manager. It comes down to what value do the Engineers and managers have to the company? If they are worth it, then compensate for it. Not every company allows for this of course. But it has always been something I have strived for.


Anyway, things to consider when deciding if you want to jump ladders from a "doer" to a "manger of people". Don't forget that it is totally possible to be a "leader" without being a manager. Leadership is something I heavily cultivate within my teams.

 

[RobertEH]

Also, I believe strongly that Leaders are born and then cultivated, not made. One either has the innate skills of leadership or one does not. It is up to a good manager to recognize those innate skills and bring them out.

 

[paulsharvey]

Wife did end up taking the management job.

But; not the end of the world, but this week is Nurses Week. So, it's her responsibility to get each nurse in her units a goody bag, 25 nurses. Now, she can get reimbursed upto $250 for that, eventually, but in the meantime...

This afternoon, she gets home late, "they just spring on me, I have to provide the taco beef for tomorrow's taco bar", when she gets home at 8pm, after getting there at 6:30am.

Honestly, so far, 3 weeks in, she's still OK with it; but the little things you don't think of. Got to enter an incident report at 3:30pm on a Saturday, that you're supposed to be off.

I've been a superintendent before, that I'm not gonna lie; it Stressed me out, i was grumpy and drank a lot more...

 

[ultrarunner]

Yep Nurses week through next Monday… last Monday being Cinco De Mayo might be why Nurses week started today?

I use to arrange the mid week catering event so none of the nurses would have to do it… not sure what’s planned for tomorrow but Admin is arranging.

Few seek management from the ranks or so it seems… many well paid positions are staffed with individuals willing to put in the work but only when on the clock…

 

[Torvy]

A few things I remember when I went from to management. I was a "level 2" tech for a big PC mfg. Good wage + OT and mostly technical coaching/troubleshooting type work.

It was really the top hourly job. The longer you wait, the bigger the initial pay cut. Pros: Hourly jobs I didn't ever really take work home. Physically or mentally. I was only really accountable for my performance. Cons: I could see the pay ceiling. (Lower increases and eventual hard cap) Profit sharing on base pay, not OT. No growth opportunities unless salary.

Management meant having to depend on others (to a degree) for your rating. Didn't always get to hire my own team. Work comes home. More input into how things run. Firing people is rough, even if they deserve it. Less pay initially as OT adds up. Higher profit sharing helped. Many more opportunities for promotion. More flexibility in day-to-day. More meetings (good and bad).

Some stuff really comes down to your preferences. Management was both rewarding and frustrating at times. Lots of laws and extra CYA training that serves no other purpose. Helping your team succeed is awesome.

 

[Sigarms]

many well paid positions are staffed with individuals willing to put in the work but only when on the clock…

25 years ago I took a new position which allowed me to make my own schedule and basically report to no one on a daily basis.

I still remember driving in my car driving home (4 hour drive) after I was given the position and how I was thinking how great the job was going to be because of all the free time I was going to have.

I was never so wrong!

That said I'm blessed in that I really love my work.

 

[LittleBittyBigJohn]

I see that the decision has already been made so I'm late to the party, but I thought I would share my experience anyway... I made the change from hourly to management long ago. I started out in manufacturing and have always had a good head for most things required in that area. For me it made sense to get into management because I was able to make good decisions on scheduling production and could operate and train all the equipment among other things. I ended up leaving manufacturing management mostly due to the stress involved. I had the bandwidth to either keep production going or deal with the personnel side of things. I ended up feeling like I was not doing a good job in either area because of the other area... and I was chasing my tail all week long.

I'm now a Procurement manager and love it. My team is small and they are good at their jobs. I still get to flex my problem solving and continuous improvement muscles, but in a different way. I have the bandwidth to do a good job and make good decisions for the company while also being able to mostly leave work at work. There are times that I will need to do some work outside of normal hours but it's generally something that actually needs to be done for the bottom line of the company that I can directly effect and is a project that is complete when done. Not like the unending drone of production being behind or personnel issues that are never solved.

For me it worked out well but it took a while, and some blessings, to find the right fit. I guess my main thought is - if you feel like you can make the best decisions for the company then choose to manage, develop a vision, then lead.

 

[Sigarms]

I remember my first 100 plus work week as an hourly employee (not married, no kids nothing tying me down to not work more hours).

Was about 110 hours in one week and I'm licking my chops waiting for that paycheck to come in.

This was my first lesson in the adult world of taxes and diminishing returns Here in my mind, I would easily double what I generally cleared in a 50-55 hour work week (not union, no double time or anything like that)...

After that paycheck, I ended up working out a deal with the regional that I'd just keep track of my hours, accumulate them, then take time off when I wanted. Looking back, probably illegal as heck, but it worked for both of us and we were both happy with the arrangment.

It was that work ethic though that led to becoming a salaried employee in a different position with the same company.

What I tell my son is no different than the 1990's. Come to work every day, stay and help more than you're asked to do, try to be a team player, don't take sick days unless your really sick, and sooner or later, you're going to move up the food chain because dependable people who use common sense are hard to find in any decade of time...

Ironically enough, if you take that advice, you better not work in a union, as I did prior to that job and couldn't stand the cover your butt mentality and don't ask to help where you see they need it. Sorry, that one union was a bad experience. Had to get that from my dad. When he got out of the military, my uncle got him a job in a union. Dad hated it and left after a couple of months.

Firm believer that with proper management, a union is not needed, although I understand the necessity as to why they were created, having lost both grandfathers working in the coal mines.

 

[Duds13]

I see that the decision has already been made so I'm late to the party, but I thought I would share my experience anyway... I made the change from hourly to management long ago. I started out in manufacturing and have always had a good head for most things required in that area. For me it made sense to get into management because I was able to make good decisions on scheduling production and could operate and train all the equipment among other things. I ended up leaving manufacturing management mostly due to the stress involved. I had the bandwidth to either keep production going or deal with the personnel side of things. I ended up feeling like I was not doing a good job in either area because of the other area... and I was chasing my tail all week long.

I'm now a Procurement manager and love it. My team is small and they are good at their jobs. I still get to flex my problem solving and continuous improvement muscles, but in a different way. I have the bandwidth to do a good job and make good decisions for the company while also being able to mostly leave work at work. There are times that I will need to do some work outside of normal hours but it's generally something that actually needs to be done for the bottom line of the company that I can directly effect and is a project that is complete when done. Not like the unending drone of production being behind or personnel issues that are never solved.

For me it worked out well but it took a while, and some blessings, to find the right fit. I guess my main thought is - if you feel like you can make the best decisions for the company then choose to manage, develop a vision, then lead.

I'm a Procurement Manager as well. In my current company I only manage myself and inventory since it is a small size company. Previous employers though I had people reporting to me and absolutely hated it. Drama, drama, and more drama from a few direct reports ruined everything.

I have to ask, do you experience co-workers from other departments always pointing the finger at the procurement team if an order arrives late or perhaps business shifts and you end up with excess inventory on some items? That part drives me insane.

 

[LittleBittyBigJohn]

I have to ask, do you experience co-workers from other departments always pointing the finger at the procurement team if an order arrives late or perhaps business shifts and you end up with excess inventory on some items? That part drives me insane.

I wouldn't say this is a big problem for me. We are not a huge company but not a small one either, over $250MM in sales last year. Our teams are accustomed to a few hiccups along the way. Not that finger pointing never happens though...

The way I have handled it is by having built a culture of help and communication. Way too deep for a short post... But, mostly my guiding vision is to help and support our internal "customers" the best way we can, providing solutions not just answers or parts. Often that means stepping out of a traditional purchasing mindset and becoming almost a one stop shop to provide solutions for any issues of the departments that rely on the procurement department. It may mean putting on a production engineer's hat to make small changes to packaging for easier or faster throughput on an assembly line. Or it could be helping a vendor organize their production by prioritizing our orders with said vendor if they are running behind. I might get that priority list by gathering the CS team, sales, and field service together to set expectations. That meeting may allow me to get a true picture of what projects can actually install, what external customers are needing the product the quickest, etc. I also like to anticipate needs or intuit how sales is going to use the information they get from our team so we can provide that information in the best way possible for them. We often work harder in procurement to save sales, service, and production work or time on their part. I'm also accepting of blame if our team makes a mistake, and don't make a big deal of another department's mistakes. Just fix the problem and move on.

As for inventory, that is very much business by business. Some want very little inventory on hand and run on a "Just In Time" system. Others want the warehouse full and have a 5 year inventory turn. Here it's dependent on vendor, product, and lead time as to how much to keep on hand. You are never going to be perfect with a forecast.