Good Management = Good Habits

We already know the 7 habits of bad management (Learn From The Worst: 7 habits of highly unsuccessful leaders) but what are the behaviours patterns, tendencies and dispositions (ie, habits) of good management?

Good habits are just the flip side of bad habits.

So just acquire these 7 personal attributes of good management:

1. Get real, be real, stay real.  Nobody dominates the environment; everybody adapts to it (ie, those who survive, adapt). Ignoring reality is no road to success in business. Maintain business perspective. Everyone operates within a larger environment of which you are but a small part. Never lose site of the larger context in which you work.

2. It’s not about you.

It’s never about you.

Ego is neither uncommon among leaders nor unwelcome. It provides drive.

A well-directed ego is productive; an unrestrained ego is counter-productive.

If you really want to lead, focus on them, not you.

3. Business is, was and always will be a collegial endeavour.

In business, it’s never about “I” or “me”— it’s always about “we.”

Other people must be accommodated because they are essential.

Need proof?

Hold a fire drill.

Watch your people gather on the pavement outside your office.

Now look back at your office and imagine how little is being accomplished without your people on-site, at work, and engaged.

5. A corps of ambassadors represents a country’s interests abroad.

Likewise, all employees are ambassadors of the company.

Even if they don’t know it.

And if they don’t know it, it’s due to poor leadership.

5.  Corrective feedback often originates and manifests as dissent.

Ignore the latter and you’ll miss the former.

You may not like negative feedback but good leaders profit from it, they don’t get defensive or ‘precious’ about it.

Corrective feedback is an essential ingredient in the recipe for business success.

6. Some business problems are solvable; some are not. 

Know the difference.

Even solvable ones come with a cost.

Not every problem has a solution; not every solution is cost-effective; and not every problem is worth solving.

7. Adaptability is the hallmark of the human species.

We’re not the biggest, strongest, fastest animal in the jungle but we’ve adapted our way to the top of the food chain.

Same goes for the corporate jungle.

To survive it, stay flexible and avoid rigidity.

Rigidity foreshadows death (as I learned in psychiatry).

Being unable or unwilling to change simply dooms you, both personally and professionally.

What you must adapt to is your environment.

Or else.

Bottom line:  In my experience, the best leaders are the ones who take it seriously.

They seek to be good leaders;

they overcome their default ways of reacting;

they take pride in motivating and inspiring others.

In short, they learn good habits.