On People Management

Guest post by Avi Salsberg

A lot of individual contributors (ICs) I’ve worked with over the years have talked about wanting to become people managers as part of their career development.

If I ask why, a lot of really great reasons have come out, such as wanting to share knowledge and experience gained over the years, take on greater responsibility, set strategy for a team, and help develop more junior members.

This made me reflect on my own path to becoming a people manager and some of the learnings I’ve taken away from my 15 years of managing teams. *Full disclosure - I consider myself still very much a “work in progress”

First of all, people management is not for everyone. While you may be able to build on many of your experiences as an IC, it really is not an extension of the work you have done to date. 

I think of people management around 3 key themes:

• Bringing strategy to the team

• Elevating and empowering the team

• Addressing the hard stuff

Most people, when they think of becoming a people manager, tend to focus primarily on the first one, which is absolutely important; but without attention to all three, it is very hard to become a successful people manager.

Bringing strategy to the team

Depending on the industry, the team function, the size of the company and stage of growth, “strategy” can mean different things. However, bringing the strategy to the team still involves two key components: 

The “What” - What needs to be accomplished by when

The “How” - How this can be accomplished

The “What”

A good manager brings strong clarity to the “What”. This means having a clear understanding of what has to be done to meet goals, assessing the team resources, and aligning on whether it’s possible before signing off on behalf of the team. Then the manager needs to clearly assign roles and responsibilities to deliver and ensure full understanding and buy-in from the team. 

The “How”

This is where a manager has an opportunity to exercise a flexible management style. Assuming everyone understands what needs to be delivered, knowing who on your team can deliver with minimal guidance versus those who require more concrete steps and coaching to achieve their objectives is critical to success. By taking the time to get to know your team and their working styles, you can develop a more individual style to suit their work approach and ability, while remaining consistent and principled in how you distribute and evaluate the work of the team.

It’s tempting to be prescriptive on how things need to be done based on your past success, but letting your team find their best approach is an important process and is iterative, so requires patience, and sensitive guidance to get the best out of each member. It can be time intensive and challenging, but if everyone buys in, it pays dividends in the long run.

Elevating and empowering the team

This is one of the most important roles a people manager can play. My management style focuses on three principles:

• Support - Ensure that there is a clear understanding of what needs to be done, a general sense of the boundaries, milestones, and what success looks like, and a commitment to check in and follow progress. Where there are issues, identify early and course correct/communicate as needed.

• Empower - Once the goals and boundaries are established, give the space and confidence for each team member to pursue those goals as they see fit

• Amplify - Celebrate the successes of the team, either through casting the spotlight on accomplishments, or identifying the appropriate stage for each team member to shine in their own spotlight. 

In order to truly be successful, communication is key, whether this is regular check-ins to ensure projects are on track, or executive comms to ensure stakeholders and leadership alike are informed on the elements they care most about. There is no one right way to set this up, so it’s important to work with each member to develop the style that works best for them, while still meeting the goals of the project.

I found that the investment in building trust at the beginning is valuable. This has led on occasion to an initial perception of me as a “micromanager” in the early stages. I would agree that it could come across that way, so I have had to refine my approach over the years to be very upfront: 

“I will be more involved at the early stages of the project/deal (or whatever) as I learn what your style is and I can be very clear about my expectations. This may feel a bit like micromanagement, but I see it as a step towards autonomy, which we can get to very quickly by aligning around the key milestones and check-ins.”

By being upfront, I have been able to defuse a sense of being overly involved and change the narrative to aligning on the journey.

Over-communicating at the beginning can be the quickest way to building the trust and confidence needed to give full ownership of the work to the team member. 

Addressing the hard stuff

This is probably the most challenging aspect of being a people manager. 

It’s easy to manage when things are going smoothly. However, there will always be times when this is not the case.

Whether it is addressing low performance, poor team chemistry, misunderstandings, or change management, there is no escaping the importance of handling these situations effectively.

Addressing the hard stuff can define how effective a manager is. There are some key learnings I’ve taken over the years.

Create psychological safety on the team

The easiest way to address a difficult situation is to reduce the risk of having one arise in the first place. This requires building trust on the team, building a strong sense of psychological safety. 

• Listen as much as you speak. This will give you insights into how each individual on the team thinks and works, as well as often opening up your eyes to new approaches and insights.

• Check in with the team and individuals frequently - the more you get to know your team members, the easier it is to identify early signs of problems

• Own the team performance - you are ultimately responsible for your team’s performance and the team should know that you are on the front line for them. That doesn’t mean they’re not responsible for their own performance, but it means you won’t hang anyone out to dry without you taking responsibility as well. 

• Conduct blameless reviews - We always want things to go well, but if your team knows that they have room to make mistakes and learn from them, they will be willing to take more risks to improve their own performance

• Own your mistakes and be willing to call mea culpa - As a manager, we want to do the right thing, but sometimes we get it wrong. Show your vulnerability by admitting your own errors and lay out a course to correct and improve. 

• Communicate transparently - As managers, we can’t always give full context to things that are going on in the company, organization, leadership, etc. but we can be as transparent as allowable and admit what we don’t know or can’t say. This builds trust to have the harder conversations later as needed. 

• Treat feedback as a gift - Build a culture of real-time feedback, both positive and developmental. As a leader, demand feedback. This can mean checking in after a meeting, presentation, or strategy session to ask: “What’s one thing that went particularly well, and what’s one thing I could have done better?” If you lead with this approach, feedback going the other way becomes part of the culture too.

While these steps won’t prevent difficult situations from arising, they do give the team a sense of confidence that a) you care about them as a team and individually; b) you are open to discussion and they can trust you to do the best you can to address any issues.

Measure your response

Despite our best efforts, problems will arise. Assuming you have built credibility and trust through working on creating psychological safety, the key is to balance speed and decisiveness with a fair assessment of the situation. 

However, do not avoid or ignore an issue; a problem that festers, threatens to undo all the psychological safety and trust you worked to establish in the first place.

• Understand the problem and fact check - Whether it’s underperformance, internal conflict or other issues, there is almost always more than meets the eye. Make sure you understand the issue as thoroughly as you can, and fact check anything you are hearing or observing where it is not absolutely clear to you what the situation is. The last thing you want to do is act on only a partial understanding. It’s worth the extra effort to dig deeper

• Get a second opinion - When you are dealing with an issue, do not act alone. Pressure test your understanding and planned response with your peers, your manager, your mentor, or anyone else you trust to help challenge any bias in judgement and help ensure a measured response. This will both give you confidence that your response is appropriate, and provide you with an important support network if the situation extends or escalates for any reason. 

• Own your decision - When you’re ready to act, make sure you feel comfortable with your action or response so that you can fully own it and deliver the plan with confidence. As they say, “you can’t unring a bell”. You are viewed as the leader so when you act, the team is watching. Whatever you do, sets the precedent for any future action.

I love being a people manager. The satisfaction I feel with connecting both the individual and the team far outweighs the challenges I’ve faced over the years.

As I said at the outset, I still consider myself a work in progress, and likely will be until the day I retire (and possibly beyond). 

Happy to connect with any current or aspiring people managers out there.

Avi can be reached via his original post on this topic on LinkedIn.