Examination of Personal Management Competencies
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Institution
Examination of Personal Management Competencies
Employees make a great contribution to businesses and enterprises today. In this realization, managers have gained training, and they are equipped with management competencies that will give them the skills they need to handle their responsibilities and roles. The essence of management is pursuing high efficiency and attempting to seek an appropriate management model that could bring great economic benefits to the business. Therefore, it is important for managers to develop managerial competencies. During my undergraduate internship experience, I was given a chance to realize my weaknesses as a manager, and identify the management competencies and skills that I needed to develop in order to fulfill the business managerial requirements. This essay will be based on the theories ‘A Model of Managing” in Minztzberg & Henry (2009) and Global management competencies model in Bucker & Poutsma (2009) to objectively examine my management skills, knowledge and competencies of these theories. Additionally, drawing conclusion about my management development needs.
Management capacities should practice well-rounded managing in the company. Managers do all the duties they are supposed to do daily, and they develop the roles identified in the plans to ensure that the management is balanced. As Minztaberg (2009) states, managing comprises of managers who with information, through people and to action directly. Hence, I will utilize one of these plans to analyze my competencies and weaknesses as a manager. I will identify the probable ways that I can develop the most significant of the skills and capacities, which is people plan. I will begin by illustrating my experience of being manager. Last summer, I was assigned the role of a marketing manager by a beverage company. My duty was to form a team and sell the company’s new products. The main objective was to make more profits than the last section during the very limited time.
I started by discussing with my partner and creating the basic structure for the project. After that, I called a meeting to collect the ideas and valuable information from our team members and then distributed the tasks based on their ability. After 27 days, our team had managed to increase the profits as expected. However, there was a problem because the team relationship was tense because of my wrong leading methods and making unwise decision in specific situations. This was a good experience in leadership as it helped me to analyze my own managing capabilities based on the information plane of Miztzberg’ theory. I am generally equipped with some capabilities such as the ability to communicate with different people and being able to control all the units that are assigned to me. However, my weaknesses in being a manager were also obvious. For instance, I did not manage to stimulate the positive energy that exists naturally with the team workers, and I was unable to maintain the team well.
Henry (2009) points out that whenever a specialist becomes a manager, he has to change his focus from focusing on himself as an individual and consider the interests of others. It means leadership and managing have huge differences. This could be illustrated in several ways, For instance, the people plan requires the managers not only to focus on leadership but also to be responsible for linking all other aspects of managing. Managers should act to set an example for the others. They should strive to find ways of energizing the other members, as this goes a long way in realizing the team’s goals. I have benefited a lot from this theory and attempt to develop leadership while linking individual competencies to build teams. I will try regularly to end bias and prejudice, which can exist when the leader favors some of the members at the expense of others. I will also strive to empower workers to do daily duties based on the framing. In addition, I will find ways of energizing individual in the specific situation.
The second theory is global management competencies, which could also help me to identify my managing capacities and find the possible ways of enhancing the skills I have and developing those that I need. The theoretical foundation presented competencies, which consist of the knowledge, skills, ability, and other personality traits. Such competencies are important, because they enable the manager to deal with people from diverse backgrounds. The competencies that one has act as building blocks and they determine a person’s behavior in different environments (Bucker & Poutsma, 2010). It is possible for a person to acquire the competencies he lacks through learning. People with such competencies are able to benefit their companies. They are capable of adapting to changes quickly. As Bucker and Poutsma (2010) observe, having emotional stability is important. Being able to communicate effectively will ensure that the right message is passed along to all the people within and outside the organization. They add that the ability to form interpersonal relationships makes a person competent and more effective in his work performance.
Based on Global management competencies model, I focus on two construct coving cross-cultural competence and global mindset. According to Johnson et al. (2006), an individual should bring capabilities to cope with cultural diversity and attempt to jump the barriers or “knowing-doing gap” the theory of cultural intelligence competence. Furthermore, the construct of global mindset express “accepting life as a balance of contradictory forces and continuously seeking to be open to themselves and others by rethinking boundaries and changing their behavior” (Rhinesmith, 1992, p.63). From the information gathered concerning management using the Mintzberg model, I am aware of my weaknesses in management. The acquisition of such knowledge is of paramount importance in correcting my weaknesses, as I will be able to acquire the most appropriate information.
People skills are important for effective management. Proficient managers demonstrate skills in interpersonal abilities (Dreyfus, 2008). Such skills include the ability to communicate well with different people and cooperating within the team. A manager may change the way he or she communicates depending on the people being addressed. The way that he approaches other managers may be different from the way he will talk to the subordinates. The recognition of what hinders effective teamwork is important. According to Miller and Karakowsky (2005), team characteristics can influence and determine how the team members seek feedback. One of the main obstacles in such a case is gender. This occurs when some people are not able to communicate well with others because of their gender. Feedback from the team members is important because it ensures that the team cooperates and works well with minimal conflict. Team members get a chance to learn from each other. In addition, the members establish ways of helping each other by identifying individual capabilities and skills. This knowledge could have prevented the conflict that I experienced in my team
I am an international students pursuing a masters degree and living in the west. I have experienced different cultural practices from what I am used to at home and this has presented a major challenge for me. Irrespective of a person’s capacity, be it work or study, one has to have cross-cultural ability. Individuals who learn or work in foreign countries need to adjust their behavior and adopt an open attitude towards issues. By using the Attitudinal and Behavioral Openness Scale, I will be able to determine my personality constructs of openness. The scale will be essential in helping me identify my behaviors and attitudes (Caligiuri et al., 2000). The scale examines the openness that a person has to people and experiences.
Using
the Mintzberg model, I have been able to identify some of my management strengths.
I am good at communicating, scheduling, and collecting and using information.
These strengths ensure that I am able to attain the goals and objectives set.
However, the model also reveals my weaknesses and the areas I need in order to
become an effective manager. It is clear that I need to improve my people skills.
People are important in achieving any goals that the organization has set. I need to find
ways of improving interpersonal skills and ensuring that people are able to bond and form
relationships. The chance I have at learning management as well as taking more
leadership roles in different groups will ensure that I improve on my skills in
management. I
can learn some managing knowledge and skills from these two management
competency theories. I should begin by developing my leading skills and should
focus specifically on energizing people and building teams. In addition, I
recognize that there is a need to improve my cultural intelligence capacities.
References:
Bucker, J. & Poutsma, E. (2010). Global management competencies: A theoretical foundation. Journal of Managerial Psychology, 25(8), 829-844
Caligiuri, M. P., Jacobs, R. R., & Farr, L. J. (2000). The attitudinal and behavioral openness scale: Scale development and construct validation. International Journal of Intercultural Relations, 24(1), 27-48
Dreyfus, R. C. (2008). Identifying competencies that predict effectiveness of R&D managers. Journal of Management Development, 27(1), 76-92
Johnson, J. P., Lenartowicz, T., & Apud, S. (2006). Cross-cultural competence in international business: toward a definition and a model. Journal of International Business Studies, 37, 525-43.
Miller, L. D., & Karakowsky, L. (2005). Sharing: When men and women fail to seek peer feedback. The Journal of Psychology: Interdisciplinary and Applied, 139(2), 101-118
Minztzberg & Henry. (2009). A model of managing. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall, pp.43-96
Rhinesmith, S. H. (1992). Global mindsets for global managers. Training and Development, 46(10), 63-69.