Friday, November 23, 2007

Technical Advise Week #17 - On Top (so they think)

Happy Post-Thanksgiving.... Mabel & I decided to get a jump on things, thus allowing us a bit of a long weekend.

Management is an interesting position. From the roots of being an excellent technician, to the heights of supervisory excellence emerges the manager. We view this rise to fame pretty predictable, but once attained the managers is left to survive without a safety net. Sometime ago we started a service called 'Executive Valet Service'. It was our intent to provide a vehicle where the manager could ask questions, seek council, and even probe sources without the fear of being looked upon as inadequate. We saw that not only were managers without collaborators but were often left to their own demise. Not all that long ago we saw a survey of executives that talked of this, but also lamented the fact that amongst their ranks there was a significant level of fall out. Many would say... "oh, that is to be expected", but the reality is that it is caused by the almost immediate jump from technician to manager. Rules that one would apply to the technical realm are not suitable, or applicable, to in managing a globally reaching enterprise. What is a bit interesting is that Senior Corporate Management holds the IT Executive to a standard that they are often ill equipped to meet. The litany of reasons is large; education, experience, business connections (vs. technical concentration), personality (yes, technicians are often inept in this area), but most important is the imbalance that exists between senior management expectations and IT service capabilities. Overlooked is probably by far the easiest and most effective solution.... Coached Facilitation. The difficulty in picking a Coach who can facilitate is that the person needs to be versed in technology, in business and in coaching. While there are many coaches in each of these areas, they fail to be balanced and intensely knowledgeable.

We wish to leave you with this thought, know that your secret is safe with us... but reach out and take the first step to overcome this shortfall. Don't hide in a daily fear, when it is solvable.
For another week Max & Mabel... Out!

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