When you think of the qualities required by a manager, what comes to mind? Most likely, words like trustworthy, communicative, interested, open, honest and supportive emerge.
Although these qualities are essential for a manager, they may not be the ones that the decision to promote an employee is based upon. Sometimes and employee is simply moving up the ranks and a managerial position is the next step. Thus, a new manager may be unprepared for his or her role.

According to Andy Holloway of Canadian Business, three essential qualities of a manager are
“An interest in developing talent and bringing out the best in others
-Being receptive to feedback and, perhaps more importantly, taking action on that information. The best leadership candidates seek out feedback instead of waiting for it at performance review time
-The ability to enjoy ambiguity. Leaders often find themselves in grey zones where there is no clear-cut answer, so they have to thrive in those situations”

Not every manager will possess these three qualities or have them at a level necessary to manage well. The nature versus nurture debate certainly applies here. It is logical to ask how to recognize when a manager naturally has enough of each of these qualities. Alternatively, one could ask how to recognize when a potential manager does not have enough of these qualities to be able to develop them to an appropriate level?

It seems to me that the last two qualities Holloway mentions are perhaps more easily developed than “an interest in developing talent and bringing out the best in others.” Yet, there are limits. While individuals can learn to become more open to feedback, a propensity to enjoy ambiguity may be more of a personality trait than something that can be learned. What do you think?

Do any of these graphs represent how you see the importance of these skills, or would you propose a very different graphical representation?

pie chart 1


pie chart 2


References:
Holloway, Andy. “Spot the leader: Workplace development.” Canadian Business Online [www.canadianbusiness.com]. March 27, 2006.