The Self Taught Manager

Leading successful teams

http://www.selftaughtmanager.com/2011/08/define-your-
management-philosophy.html

Defining your management philosophy

“So much of what we call management consists of making it difficult for people to work” – Peter F.
Drucker

What is your management philosophy? Chances are you’ve never really taken the time to articulate it. It
may initially seem a waste of time to attempt boiling down all of the intricacies of your management style
into a few principles you could label as a philosophy. However much like a mission statement it does
help to communicate to yourself and others those core beliefs that should be fundamental to all of your
management decisions. Taking the time to write out your philosophy helps you learn what it actually is
and gives you a foundation to align with when making critical decisions. And it comes in pretty handy
when you hire new team members, interview for a new job or take over an existing team.

Unfortunately the vast majority of managers have never given any thought to this at all. They just chug
along “doing their job” as they see it. They worry about deadlines, deliverables and budgets. They lack a
consistent fountain as the basis for their most important management decisions. But everyone has some
sort of intrinsic management philosophy even if they don't realize it.

Note that I'm referring to management "philosophy" and not management "style". Your style is more the
how and the philosophy is the why. For example I might describe my management style to be sort of like
my poker style: "tight aggressive". In other words I can be passive and hands-off, but very willing and
able to aggressively get into the details and get things done when needed. But my philosophy (below)
provides the reasons for my style.

When it comes to your philosophy there are no right answers. As you are well aware there are many
different types of managers and many successful managers with very different management
visions. There are countless management theories out there to learn from and I recommend you take
some time to look into these. For example the book As One by Mehrdad Bahai and James Quigley is a
good start. Regardless of how you arrive at your philosophy, the purpose of this posting is to encourage
you to spend the time to write one down, even if it’s only a few bullet points.

Some things to keep in mind as you author your own list of management principles:
 Start by thinking about what underlying code of conduct guides you in your decisions already.
 Then think about what is missing or miss-used in your current decision making.
 Consider what other managers you admire do
 Use high level principles that can apply to almost any situation
 Avoid listing things that are general job requirements. For example “Approving all expense
reports on time” doesn’t really fit.
 It should not be a set of rules with any if/then conditions. You will end up creating rules as
implementations of your philosophy.
 Keep it simple
Today I’m going to undergo this exercise myself and write out a summary of my own management
philopshy. Hopefully this will help you articulate your own. In the interest of keeping each of these blog
 articles relatively short I’m not going to talk through my thoughts on different management models today
and in the future we’ll get into more detail on how to apply these to every day decisions.

Billy Turchin’s management philosophy

I. Leadership: The best managers are leaders

The best managers are more than administrators, controllers or followers. They do more than focus on
structure and processes. Instead they are innovators, creators and influencers. They focus on people
and personal development. This principle guides most of my decisions as a manger.

II. Enablement: Employees should be positioned for success

Your team wants variety, learning opportunity and additional responsibilities. If you fail to provide these
you will face decreased morale, apathy or worse. As a manager you should have a goal for your team
members to be successful in their careers and their lives. Do what you can do position people for this
success. Their success is your success.

III. Fairness: Employees must be treated fairly and honestly

Your employees are people too and as a manager you are no better than anyone else. People deserve
to be treated with respect and honesty.

IV. Power: An effective managers recognizes the powers available to them and uses them properly

In a future posting we’ll talk about the five types of power (Legitimate, Personal, Expert, Reward &
Coercive) you have as a manager and how to use them.

V. Communication: Expectations and goals must be clearly set

I’ve found that the majority of conflict and frustration in the workplace results from a misunderstanding in
expectations. The best managers will clearly communicate expectations of their team and of themselves
while still giving employees the freedom they need to get the job done.

VI. Quality: Quality is more important than process or effort

Effort does not equal effectiveness and quality of work is more important then hours worked. Processes
exist to improve quality but sometimes hamper it. At the end of the day the output is what should be
judged.

VII. Be positive

This goes along with (I) but the best leaders are also positive thinkers. And a little bit of positive
reinforcement goes a long way toward employee morale and work drive. Fake it till you make it?

VIII. Adapt: My management philosophy is fluid

Never be afraid of change, even to your own management beliefs.

Shaping your own management philosophy is an important step in defining yourself as a manager. It
forces you to take the time to define and further craft your own doctrine. When you hire someone new, or
takeover an existing team, you can then easily given your directs a clear understanding of your beliefs by
reviewing this philosophy with them.
Every once in a while take a look back at your list to remind yourself and re-align your direction. Or even
keep this bullet point list handy at your desk at all times. Remember that great leaders aren't born that
way; you have to work at it!

Posted by Billy Turchin at 11:12 AM

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3 comments:
1.

Mandy Lea TurchinAugust 15, 2011 at 6:15 AM

I feel like conveying a managment philosophy to your team helps set expectations for the
managed employees. Often I've had managers that make decsions that come out of left
field or are more reactive than productive. It seems to me that having a managment
philosophy makes you accountable as a manager to stay focused on the 'big picture' for
your team and the company.
Reply

2.

gujjar gJanuary 23, 2015 at 8:57 PM

Thank you for share this informative post.

Reply

3.

Abner CarlJanuary 24, 2015 at 5:47 AM

This point is very beautiful in your post, that employees are people too and as a manager
anyone is no better than anyone else. People deserve to be treated with respect and
honesty.We should follow this point in our life.
Toward a Philosophy of Management
This article is from the October 2007 issue.

http://ala-apa.org/newsletter/2007/10/16/toward-a-philosophy-of-management/

By Honora Eskridge
What is your philosophy of management? Whether you are a new manager or experienced, odds
are you have been asked this question. I most often hear it asked in interview sessions, and I am
always surprised by the similarity and limitations of people’s answers. People don’t generally have a
well-thought-out answer to this. Too often I hear candidates describe themselves as “hands off,”
which is meant to convey that they don’t micromanage. Most recently, I heard an interview candidate
say that she didn’t have a philosophy of management at all. It is one of those things people don’t
really think about and never take the time to articulate. Maybe they don’t want to commit themselves,
or maybe they’re afraid people won’t like their answer. The truth is, though, that everyone should
have a philosophy of management—even people who have never been in a formal position of
authority. Every worker is a manager. Each of us manages our work tasks, our time and our
relationships with colleagues and bosses. It’s just the scope of management responsibilities that
differs. Thinking about it this way, it’s actually worrisome if one doesn’t have a philosophy of
management! It seems almost impossible not to.
When you’re being interviewed, you may be wondering, “What does this question really mean,
anyway? What is the employer trying to find out by this statement?” Interviewers are trying to
understand what kind of boss you would be. Prospective employees figure out this underlying motive
and give simplistic answers that they think interviewers want to hear. But by providing a glib or
loosely-formed answer to this question a prospective employee passes up a great opportunity to
communicate professional and personal values.

Your philosophy of management will be rooted in your beliefs and your identity. It is unique because
it comes from the lessons you’ve learned and the people you’ve worked with throughout your career.
Below I have outlined my own philosophy of management in the hopes that it will inspire you to
compose one of your own.

Basic Values. A good philosophy of management is centered on basic principles that are important
to you and that ring true. For me, the most important thing I can do as a manager is treat people like
human beings. This means remembering that my co-workers are people with lives, families and
priorities outside of the library. The job is just one facet of whom they are. So if someone is not doing
well at work, it doesn’t mean they are a bad person. It means they are not doing well at work. This
value also means realizing that no one wants to perform badly at their job. Everyone wants to do
well and make a contribution. Before becoming a librarian, I was an engineer. I never felt I was very
good at it. I seemed to be doing OK; I received promotions and raises, but truth be told, I was a “B”
player; I didn’t like what I was doing! As a librarian, I know I’m a much better worker than I was as an
engineer because this career is a better fit for me. Sometimes people get into the wrong job. How
often do we promote people who are great employees but who end up being lousy bosses? It’s not
entirely their fault—they are just in the wrong job. Getting the right “fit” between a job and an
employee is a truly difficult thing to achieve. We all know this, but it is hard to keep it in mind while
dealing with the day-to-day frustrations of working with someone who is struggling at their job.
Nevertheless, we must try to do it anyway.
Another aspect of treating people like human beings is telling them the truth. If someone isn’t
performing well or makes a mistake, they need to be told the truth. They deserve it, because telling
people the truth recognizes that they are human beings, and as such, we all have faults and make
mistakes. Every single employee is a mixed bag of strengths and weaknesses. A good manager
looks at the whole person, makes an honest assessment and communicates it. But telling the truth is
no license to be mean or hurtful. Too often we are either completely terrified of confrontation, or we
are rude, blunt and/or cruel. If you don’t respect a person’s feelings, you are not respecting the
person. If you truly respect the person and can separate them from their work, this respect will come
through in what you are saying, and it will be almost as easy to give criticism as it is to give praise.
Leadership. A philosophy of management should include some thoughts on leadership. Managers
are expected to lead. I believe that leadership is a natural-born quality. Natural leaders learn to be
better leaders, but people who do not have natural leadership ability will never learn to be great
leaders. It is easy to spot a natural leader—people gravitate to them. If you are in a position where
you have absolutely no authority and people are coming to you for advice, you are a leader!
And so, if you are thrust into a management position, you must be prepared to truly lead. You must
be willing to make decisions and take responsibility for them. You shouldn’t agree to be a boss if, at
the end of the day, you are not willing to make a decision (especially an unpopular one) or to tell
someone to do something.
To be a leader you must be able make up your own mind about situations and keep a sense of
perspective when addressing your own professional challenges or the challenges of the staff.
Consider other alternatives. This is especially true when it comes to work-place drama. When staff
are freaking out over something, it is imperative that managers do not get sucked into the
drama. Leaders don’t follow the herd.
Managing Roles. The last part of my philosophy of management has to do with roles—my role as a
manager, and the interplay with the roles of my staff. In essence, I believe that it is a manager’s job
to manage the relationships s/he has with staff and to be responsible for drawing the line
differentiating each person’s roles.
First, it is critical that every manager understand why they were put in their job. You are not the boss
because you are the best worker or the highest performer. Rather, you are in charge because of that
elusive thing called “fit” that we talked about earlier; basically, you were a good fit for the
requirements of the job. You had the skills and experience demanded, as well as the right fit in terms
of personality. After all, if all that being the boss meant was that you knew how to do everyone’s jobs
better than they do, management wouldn’t be a very interesting thing! Unfortunately, many people
(some of them managers!) do think this way, and to me it shows a serious misunderstanding of what
management is. A good manager should never want to be the best in his or her department; s/he
should never want to be smarter than the staff.
Which leads to one aspect of managing roles: Everyone is replaceable. My father learned this lesson
after leaving a company where he had worked for 23 years. A few months after his departure, he
called his old boss on the telephone, and was leaving a message with the secretary. He said, “Tell
him Warren called.” The secretary replied, “Warren who?” It was a tough lesson in how quickly
people can move on. Keep perspective on how critical you are to the organization. If we leave, our
work will get done by someone else, or it won’t. Either way, the world won’t end.
The last aspect of this is probably the greatest lesson of my career: It’s not about me; it’s about
them. In other words, my job as a manager is to focus on the people that work for me. To give them
the great projects to work on so that they learn, achieve and make a name for themselves and, yes,
move on to bigger and better jobs. The more people I work with, the more I know this is the truth,
and what’s more, I believe it is key to success as a manager. If you come to accept this,
management becomes a humbling experience. And so, a good manager will take the time to really
get to know the staff, to learn to see the whole person, strengths and weaknesses, what motivates
and what doesn’t. That sum total should be measured against the requirements of the job, the
organization and against a worker’s previous performance. But you should never measure one
worker against another and absolutely never against yourself (i.e., it’s not about you). People
manage their own careers based on their own personal experience and goals. Some librarians want
to publish and present and some want to move up into administration. Others want to be frontline
librarians for their whole careers. It is a manager’s job to understand the work that needs to be done
and know each employee well enough to match skills with work and, always keeping an eye on the
bigger picture, direct an employee to work that will be challenging and enriching and that will
ultimately build on strengths and help them reach their goals.
http://www.accountinglibrary.com/articles/management-philosophy-1/

Management Philosophy Creates An Atmosphere For Success

A truly effective management philosophy is a belief system that defines what’s truly important to everyone
within an organization, particularly how people within the organization should be treated in pursuit of best
business practices (Business Excellence).

An organization’s management philosophy is the glue that joins

everyone in an organization together so that they can all focus their attention on the attainment of
excellence. The key differentiator is that a management philosophy isn’t a set of specific business tasks
or methods subject to improvement. Instead it’s all about how people will be treated, not because
someone dictates it, but because that’s the “right” way.
In actual practice, a management philosophy is also a personal life philosophy. There is no real difference
between the two.
People need a strong foundation or belief system that will encourage them to “want” to strive for
excellence. To say the very least business can be chaotic even in the best of times. Markets change.
Profitability rises and falls. Potentially threatening issues pop up every day. Even though chaos might
surround them, people should always have something that can serve as a protective environment to
which they can retreat. That panic room is the firm’s management philosophy.

What is Management Philosophy?

Why does one business prosper and another business in the same industry fail? Does the victor know
something the loser doesn’t? Each may offer the same products or services. Each may have the same
type of client base. Each may have the same level of expertise with respect to the mechanics of their
products, services, business and industry. However, one may possess a jewel more precious than many
people realize. That jewel is a well defined management philosophy.
Let’s present one definition of management philosophy for your consideration.
“Management philosophy is that set of rational principles which form the basis for guiding or controlling
the operation or performance of a business activity”.
The key concept contained in the definition of management philosophy above is the identification of the
rational principles, and that’s our primary task. Our secondary task is the testing of each principle to
insure that it’s applicable to all phases of business life and action.
Keep in mind the fact that management philosophy isn’t best business practices. There are no process
steps that can be defined and improved over time. In fact management philosophy has nothing to do with
how a business will be run. It’s a belief system that guides how people will interact with other people. As
such management philosophy is closely connected to the corporate culture as well as the concepts of
value systems and leadership.
One of the most important concepts regarding management philosophy is that you cannot describe it in
some form of “Statement of Management Philosophy”. Management philosophy is a way of life. You live it
and therefore show people by your actions what constitutes you personal philosophy as well as your
management philosophy.
If you are interested in learning more, you might want to use GoogleBlogSearch to find other articles and
blogs that relate to management philosophy or business philosophy.
After considerable thought and experience (What better way to test this definition than in the cold light of
reality?), I would like to propose the following list of management philosophy principles. This isn’t an all
inclusive list, but presents what I consider to be the leading candidates.

Management Philosophy Cornerstone #1: People Matter

The most important asset of a business is its employees. No business operates without employees. No
business can achieve its potential unless each employee has the ability and the right, to achieve their
individual potential. Each employee must feel as though they are a part of the total organization. Each
employee must feel as though they matter. It’s just that simple and that’s why this is the most important
contributor to a management philosophy.

Management Philosophy Cornerstone #2: Profits are a Good Thing

The objective of any business is to stay in business and you do that by generating profits. While some
might dispute this statement as not being applicable for non-profit entities, I would counter that all
organizations must generate profits, for it’s only through profits that any business can sustain itself. We
should not be afraid of being profitable. We should strive to be as profitable as possible without violating
any other aspect of our management philosophy. That’s a key concept.

Management Philosophy Cornerstone #3: Customer Service is Job

One
Customers are just as much a part of a business as employees. How we treat them is an integral part of
our management philosophy. While this might seem to be an obvious statement, far too many businesses
fail to recognize just how important their customers are. Products and service must meet the actual and
perceived needs of the customer.
Notice that I have used the plural form of the word “need”. The physical product or service is but one
need. The process of selecting the initial supplier of a product or service, and the continuation of the
relationship beyond the first order, involves the identification and satisfaction of a whole host of needs.
The only manner in which this can be accomplished is the inclusion of the customer into the daily life of
the business. This is exactly the same goal the business should have with respect to its employees (and
let’s not forget suppliers too).

Management Philosophy Cornerstone #4: Management Gets Paid to

Think
Consider for a moment the example of the business that fails and the business that succeeds. Could one
have a more effective management philosophy? Consider also the examples everyone can cite of
businesses that appear to place their management in a position of “doing” rather than “thinking”.
Could it be that the management of the failing company chose by default the wrong fork in the road,
simply because it was so busy taking care of business that it didn’t even recognize that there was a fork
in the road. I’m not suggesting management must live in an ivory tower, for to do so ignores the realities
of the practical side of business life. What I am suggesting is that management must recognize subtle
changes in the environment in which it competes, and alter the life of the business to reflect these
changing circumstances. It can do so only if it has the ability and the time to think.

Management Philosophy Cornerstone #5: No Business Operates in a

Vacuum
Vacuums come in many forms, and each can be as dangerous as the other. The specific vacuum to
which I am referring produces a form of insulation between the business and the outside world. Our world
is changing rapidly. While management might consider itself to be very capable, nobody has all of the
answers.
Management needs contacts in the outside world to test its competency. It should hunger for knowledge,
and welcome the testing of its principles against others. It cannot be afraid of this process, but should
encourage it. Management cannot afford to be wrong, and should recognize that it might be wrong. The
firm’s management philosophy not only encourages this testing, but mandates a thoughtful testing for
everyone, not just business leaders.

Management Philosophy Cornerstone #6: Business Conditions

Constantly Change
While everyone might agree with this statement, the successful business uses it as one of the
cornerstones of its management philosophy. The successful business assumes it must change, and looks
for opportunities to change. Change here isn’t change for the sake of change, but rather changes that will
enable the business to become more efficient, move into new markets, take advantage of new
technologies, or reduce the impact of downward movements in the economy.

Management Philosophy Cornerstone #7: The Right Information

Leads to Significant Improvement
Information is the key to the identification of strengths and weaknesses. This statement might be
considered to be a corollary of the one dealing with operating in a vacuum. The former dealt with an
outside vacuum, while this management philosophy statement deals with the vacuum of inside
information. The increasing importance of Business Intelligence has led many companies down the path
of excessive information, and ultimate strangulation in their own data. Information systems should be
based on maximizing the effectiveness of the data generated.
As I stressed in my article about Exception Management, managers must define those “few” critical
values that represent the driving forces that lead to success. If the information generated does not lead to
some form of decision or reaction, then it has no meaning and should be discarded. If a business
concentrates on the most important common denominators, then the income statement will take care of
itself.
Management Philosophy Cornerstone #8: Organization Must be Taken
to its Lowest Level
Each business function is important. Some may be identified as more important, but none is
inconsequential. Each person in a business is important. Each customer is important. The company must
be structured so that each person or department has the tools it requires to achieve maximum
effectiveness. The business is, in many respects, a living organism, and it’s the responsibility of
management to create a management philosophy that insures that each cell or body part receives equal
attention. Without this, that part could become diseased, and could drastically affect other body parts.

Summary

Each business must go through the process of identifying its individual management philosophy. Once
these statements have been made, they must be reviewed regularly to insure that they are being
followed. All other actions of the company must be rooted in this management philosophy, and must be
tested against it.
The successful company will acknowledge that it requires a management philosophy. The less than
successful company will not recognize this need. While this might sound simple, it isn’t. Successful
companies know they are not perfect, and will strive to identify their strengths and weaknesses. They are
not afraid to measure themselves, for they know that in doing so, they move one step closer to their goal.
Maybe you should consider if any of these statements can assist your company?