03 Jun So… You’re a Manager now

Dear New Managers,

We want to introduce you to WorldsView Academy’s accredited New Manager Bootcamp.

This programme helps specialists to make the shift to manage and get work done through others.. When we overlook this necessary mind- and behaviour shift, we risk losing good people and fail to build the leadership pipeline required for sustainable high performance.

We see new manager development as a crucial factor in the execution of organisational strategy. The execution of strategy requires the focused commitment of everyone in the organisation, from the executive to the frontline, and the final, critical thrust of delivery is led by frontline managers, often new to the managerial role. Essentially they are the ones guiding actions and motivating their people to do what is necessary. They are the ones that create work environments where people want to work, and where they want to give their best and help your organisation grow.

This means that every managerial developmental effort must explicitly link to the organisation’s ambitions and goals. We do not believe in merely developing generic, functional management skills and knowledge – you know as well as I do that knowing what to do, and how to do it, is not enough to cultivate the right behaviour. For sustainable shifts in behaviour, people also need to believe in what they are doing.

To become a great strategy executor, organisations need to rapidly align a critical mass of new managers to the organisation’s strategy

That is why we develop new managers in the context of their real work: the actual organisational strategy and plans they are tasked to execute; their actual experiences and challenges in moving into a management role; their own fears and resistances in dealing with organisational change, and then having to get their teams on board to make change happen; their confidence, or lack thereof, in doing the “people management” part of their work, like hiring and firing people, having difficult conversations, growing the people in their charge, building great teams, and so on; and their actual aspirations and confusions in adapting to being a manager and leader, and the personal development challenges it poses to them.

We, as practitioners, offer knowledge, tools, frameworks, skills – but always in relation to the work they have to do right now new managers have to do what the organisation is expecting them to do.

What to expect:

When you walk into a session of our New Manager Bootcamp, you won’t hear a trainer droning on about some arcane management theory. Instead, you will hear a buzz: it is the buzz of discovery, of learning, of making friends, and the buzz above all, I think, of growing confidence. I’m often astounded by the unintended discoveries participants make: of not being alone in struggling with aspects of their new role; of realising how other managers are facing similar challenges, and learning from each other how to overcome them; of coming to see how they can communicate much, much better; and of realising their own, inherent strengths, and how they can develop them with your help.

I’m most heartened , always, about how willing new managers are to learn, and how keen they are to become better managers, to create happy, high-performing teams, and to make a real contribution towards the organisation’s success.

It doesn’t have to take long and it doesn’t have to mean days upon days out of the office: our Bootcamp is a Bootcamp in the true sense of the word: six days (in three blocks of two days each or 4 half-day online sessions per block) out of the office, some self-study, and if it will work in your organisation, some time for doing a business-driven action project that will make a real impact on organisational effectiveness – all completed within six months. The programme is SETA accredited, so you will get the full benefit for employee development and talent management related to accreditation – and WorldsView Academy is a private University, in fact, the only OD University in Africa so skills development is guaranteed.

I’d love to talk to you about your new manager development needs, and to see if we can partner towards building the management and leadership capability you need to be successful.

(Accredited at NQF level 5 – 14 credits)