“Management is doing things right; leadership is doing the right things.”
― Peter Drucker
Supervising and managing others is a tough job and requires effective planning, delegation, monitoring, and measuring staff productivity. It also requires empathy and keeping people responsible. Unfortunately, many supervisors believe that being tough and unresponsive are good techniques to use when managing staff, but it is now known that such techniques lead to employee dissatisfaction, and lack of motivation.
In many organisations, well-performing employees are promoted to supervisory roles without considering whether they have supervision skills or not. Being an effective supervisor is completely different to being an award-winning team member. Therefore, training in supervision is essential to get an insight into the role of a supervisor and how best a supervisor can lead the people under him to excel.
A trained supervisor knows the techniques on becoming more efficient at delegation, managing time, setting goals, providing feedback, assigning tasks, resolving conflicts, maintaining discipline. As a supervisor affects the work of the people who are being supervised, it is important for the supervisor to know how to manage people efficiently. The expertise with which a supervisor conducts a work affects the productivity, work satisfaction, and motivation of the employees.
“Good management consists in showing average people how to do the work of superior people.”
– John D. Rockefeller
For internal promotions, it is important that the person who takes up the new role in supervision receives professional training in it. Training helps new supervisors to smoothly and efficiency perform their duties from the beginning, which also assists the staff in absorbing the new change. Knowledge of human resource management is essential for a supervisor, as it is the employees who are the building blocks of an organisation. Skill development for supervisors is essential in making them experts in handling people and resources effectively.