Effective Manager Conference

After the February conference in London, I re-doubled my efforts in O3's, and started feedback, so directs knew what I expected. Then, just before my vacation, I shared my 'commanders intent' for the last 3 weeks during O3's. Now I'm back to the office, and ready for the mess waiting for me after such a long absence... To my surprise, there is no crisis, no mess, everything is on track. All my projects have progressed while I was away, and all of my directs knew what to do. As I shared at the EMC, I was the technical rock star of our division, and then moved to become a new manager. Now, I'm on my way to being a great manager, but most of the credit goes to Manager Tools. Thanks for sharing your knowledge. It has already helped me SO much, on what I hope will become a long and successful management career

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Andy Allred

Bottom line: This material is the best management training I have seen in my 25-year career. It is practical and simple (without being simplistic). The tools are useful, flexible and have repeatable results across cultures, across industries, and all levels of management. I have one regret in attending the conference-not taking it sooner. I recently viewed my profile on the Manager Tools (MT) website. It says I have been a member for seven years and 41 weeks. That made me pause. I wish I had done more to master these tools over the years and advocate these as a standard in our office. I am now making up for some lost time. Results: These tools are my primary guide in coaching ____ in his new manager position. I exhorted him to give these MT principles the same kind reverence he gives to GAAP (Generally Accepted Accounting Practices). He attributes his progress on the recent employee survey to our weekly coaching sessions. The DISC model helped me tailor my communication to our new CEO when he visited our office. I paid attention to his visual, verbal and vocal cues as we learned in the conference (the CEO is a strong 'I'). As we did our introductions around the table, each person was prepared to state their role in the organization and a recent accomplishment. Most on our leadership team spoke about facts and tasks. I told a quick story about a recent accomplishment. I named two specific staff and shared verbatim quotes from them on how a new initiative affected their work. Afterward, several colleagues commented, "What you said in there really nailed it," "did you see the way he responded to you?!" "He wanted to meet ____ after you quoted her." Benefits: Online, self-directed and "virtual" training does not have the impact of face-to-face interaction. Over the years, I have listened to hundreds of Manager-Tools podcasts, read transcripts, adopted the practices and recommended the material to others. This was not enough for me to understand how to apply it to my style and my circumstances. The small group and candid discussion in the workshop gave all the participants a chance to ask dumb questions (and raise good challenges).

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Tim McCormick

Thank you for the weekly, post-training reminders. I have never experienced any kind of post-training follow up that is anything like this effective. It keeps the training front and centre and reminds me not to go back to old habits. I think they are a terrific idea. The weekly reminders deliver individual snippets of best practice and answer questions I didn't even know I had. I use them as tiny corrections in my post-training adoption, much like the tiny steering corrections of feedback. They reinforce and guide adoption of the new management techniques brilliantly. Kind regards Kevin Picton

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Kevin Picton