The Uncommon Commodity: The Common Sense Guide for New Managers

By Doug Thorpe

Written from first-hand experiences offered by author, banker, and entrepreneur, Doug Thorpe. This is a collection of practical principles, ideas, tips, and life hacks to help new managers thrive.

It is common business practice for companies of all sizes to look across their workforce and make some interesting picks when a new team leader is needed. Often the selection criteria are based upon highest performer, the biggest producer, or 'smartest' worker.

Moving from being the doer on the team to being the leader of the team is a big leap for most. Despite business school learning or practical on-the-job leadership lessons (like returning military), nothing is more sobering that meeting with your team for the first time after you are selected.

Effective transition begins immediately. Miss the first few steps and you might have momentum moving in the wrong direction. There are so many variables that can determine the outcome.

As the candidate who becomes the new manager, your role changes on the spot. Now other people are counting on you for guidance, decision making, and support. You still might have your own work product quotas to manage, but now you add on the load of managing the others.

While things heat up at work during the transition, it is easy for your personal life to get out of balance.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Doug Thorpe
• Release date: Jun 15, 2016
• ISBN: 9780692596289

Doug Thorpe

I am a leadership coach and adviser for Business Owners and Entrepreneurs. I Can Help YOU Build a Stronger Leadership Team in Your Business. Essentially...I allow you to focus on running the business instead of fighting people PROBLEMS. I eliminate your STRESS of how your managers are handling your vision. WHO DO I WORK WITH? C-suite, middle managers, new first-time managers, and Entrepreneurs; all in companies from $500K to $25 million. DEFINITION of 'LEADERSHIP TEAM' - anyone you've hired to manage a work team in your company. When we need managers, too often we select people we think we like the most or trust the best to be our frontline managers or department heads. In the process, we often crush a good producer. To get the best result, we need to provide them some coaching so they can make the shift from front-end employee to manager and LEADER. My coaching is adding a brand new, low resistance way to get more from the management team around you. This is NOT me making a plea for MORE business. This is ME helping you gain COMPLETE control of your freedom and growth. I'd love to connect with you at HeadwayExec.com, DougThorpe.com, on Twitter @RealDougThorpe, or on my HeadwayExec Facebook page, or on LinkedIn.

Book preview

New Managers and Common Sense

There are thousands of books and programs dealing with various aspects of management and leadership. On a regular basis, I venture into booksellers to monitor the latest releases. The books I choose to look in to are all centered around my passion for management theory and leadership development. This perpetual search keeps me looking for better ways to guide each of you toward greater success and happier endings as new, first-time managers.

As I continue my quest, I keep running into a recurring theme. On a very regular basis, the comments readers submit about many of these books include remarks such as:

Good read, but really seems like common sense.

Once I started reading, it was all common sense.

I realized I knew most of this from having watched my old bosses.

This doesn’t seem new.

I’m pretty sure I already knew this.

With more than thirty years of management and leadership under my belt, I cannot disagree with most of those sentiments. While the books are well written and methodical in their efforts to explain the discipline of business management, the conclusions made by the readers were that the books were somewhat simple. My experience is consistent with those thoughts—much of management does indeed come down to common sense.

If you are a newly appointed manager, the idea of relying on common sense to learn how to become a good manager is not a bad thing. I would propose that it’s a good starting point.

There is wisdom in realizing that many management decisions often simply require common sense. Sometimes good, old-fashioned common sense truly does provide the right answer to a situation. To be clear, let me share a definition of common sense: Sound practical judgment that is independent of specialized knowledge, training, or the like; normal native intelligence (Random House Kernerman Webster’s College Dictionary, 2016).

One problem with me advising you to count on common sense is that not everyone has it. In all my years of business experience, I’ve seen some incredibly talented and smart people who simply cannot use common sense. I do not say this lightly, and I certainly have no ill intent. Based on the definition above, you can see how very intelligent people might revert to the specialized knowledge they have, which could cloud what would otherwise be a normal, native intelligence. The irony here is that those without common sense are usually incredibly blind to the topic. Over the years, I’ve been tempted to attribute this lack of common sense to the overabundance of book smarts. It has been said that one of the most difficult challenges for creating artificial intelligence in computers is the ability to emulate common sense (Havasi, 2014).

Common sense can be vital to discovering solutions for problems. Here are some examples:

Deciding right from wrong:

As obvious as this may sound, there are moments when you, as a manager, must be the judge and jury regarding a dispute between coworkers. When the matter is reviewed and you realize the key question is whether one is right and the other is wrong, common sense should be applied when making the call.

Selling your decision:

When you make a decision, you may need to persuade the team to embrace that decision by using sales techniques. One very effective technique is to rely on common sense. "Think about it! Can’t you see what a good idea this is going to be? It makes sense."

Keeping it human:

In businesses, where so much is centered on technology or processes, it’s easy to gradually lose that human element. Leading is about influencing people. Using common sense to solve a problem can add a more personal element to an otherwise sterile environment. In other words, you’re not relying on what the computer said or what some six-step process told you to do, so your management style is less like that of a robot and more like that of a real person.

As you go about your duties on a day-to-day basis, look at the ways common sense might help. This is by far not the only approach that should be used, but it’s a good one to test before pursuing more technical solutions. This is why I chose to write this book: I believe that in management, the effective use of common sense is truly an uncommon commodity. The following chapters should serve to trigger some thought about this topic.

Question: What has been your experience regarding your ability to use common sense to settle work concerns?

How to Know if You Have the Heart of a Leader

There is a whole body of academic work surrounding studies about management versus leadership. One of the best explanations I’ve heard simply states: Management is about process. Leadership is about people (Guerra, 2009).

Being a good manager means business goals are being met. The process is working close to or at its peak potential. You, as a manager, can influence the priorities, push the right buttons, direct certain actions, and get things done. Some managers build good, stable careers operating at this level of performance. However, individuals who take a purely managerial approach may not be able to meaningfully impact their employees’ lives.

Managers can certainly be decent handlers of their people: fair, honest, respectful, and so forth, but frankly some managers are not good with people. While business results are posted, people on the team slowly begin to feel disconnected and uninspired. True leadership takes the influence a person can have on his or her employees to a different level. Leadership gets the work done and meets or exceeds goals (i.e., management), but when leadership happens, people feel inspired. Team morale builds. Loyalty grows. 

Understanding how to be both an efficient manager and an effective leader takes some work. In Mark Miller’s book The Heart of Leadership (2013), the author tells a story of a young businessman named Blake who is struggling with his duties as a team leader. He seeks counsel from a close family friend. I won’t tell the whole story, but the core value comes down to this simple acronym: HEART. These initials stand for:

Hunger for wisdom: Keep learning new and different things to improve yourself.

Expect the best: Set a high standard and maintain your expectations for it.

Accept responsibility: Stop the blame game. Take your ownership seriously.

Respond with courage: Be bold with your decisions.

Think of others first: Be willing to be more of a servant as opposed to just a boss.

Real leadership does, in fact, have a heart. As with Blake in Miller’s story, you might need to seek multiple mentors to guide you in each of these areas. Find role models who fully understand these principles. Soak up their experiences. Begin to apply their teachings to your efforts both in the office and at home.

You will be amazed by the shift in the attitudes and working habits of those who report to you, for you will have influenced and impacted them. When all things are said and done, leadership—which is used to inspire and guide people—far outperforms pure management. Having a heart for leadership always wins!

Question: Do you have the HEART to be a leader?

Ten Things I Learned About Life and Business from a Single Mom

I was raised as the only child of a hardworking single mom. In my formative years, she taught me so much about life and business. Truthfully, I didn’t know that’s what I was learning until the day came for me to enter the business world. Then, moment by moment, as the tests and trials of my career began to unfold, I realized she had done an amazing job teaching me some very profound wisdom. Here are her ten truths:

Believe in yourself: Seldom will others believe in you, so you must always believe in yourself. This is especially true when starting a new gig. You are an unknown. It’s only human for others to have doubts about you until you prove yourself. So during any period of transition, believe in yourself. Stay strong.

Mistakes do happen: You will make them. But a winner will bounce back up. Learn from your mistakes, and be sure to never make that error again.

Your word is your honor: Let your word be true. When my mother made a promise to a businessperson, that promise was kept, no matter what it was. If something got in the way, causing a delayed delivery date or prohibited her from being able to honor her word, she was quick to address the issue and get permission or acceptance to make a change.

Set lofty goals: Dream big. Why work hard for small goals? Do something different if you have to, but hang on to those dreams. My mom left a steady paycheck to start her own business when I was still in school. Talk about being brave! Her dream guided her. She created a successful interior design business that grew from residential design to large commercial projects.

Don’t let them see you sweat: I know it’s been said by someone else, but I watched my mother live it. I have no doubt she went to bed some nights and cried herself to sleep because she had a big deadline or a problem in front of her, but she never let it show. In the public eye, she was steel with grace.

Keep learning: Mom didn’t have a higher education. She started working right out of high school, but she never stopped learning. She read voraciously and maintained an open mind about culture, ethnicity, and moral code. This open-mindedness equipped her to be a gracious hostess and a cherished memory for those who got to know her. From friends and colleagues, she earned respect far beyond her original station in life. She also taught me the value of being mentored. Since there was no man in our house, she arranged my involvement with several very significant male mentors who taught me many things. As a result, I am a patchwork quilt of the best qualities those men could teach.

Be compassionate: Despite her steely business sense, my mom had a distinct compassion for others. Her warmth was felt by many. She volunteered at my school and elsewhere in the community, though her time was limited due to her roles as both a mother and a business owner. She created her own sense of work-life balance, which never left out quality time for the generous giving of herself.

Know your banker: Mom taught me about getting to know the banker. Perhaps that’s why I ended up in banking. Because of her tenuous financial condition as a sole provider and single-income head of household, she needed bank loans