the historian Froude wrote that ‘experience teaches slowly and at
the cost of mistakes’.
Experience is an essential way of learning to improve but it is
an imperfect instrument. We also need guidance from a good
manager and from other sources such as this book which will
help us to interpret our experience, learn from our mistakes and
make better use of our experience in the future.
What you can do
Perhaps Francis Bacon provided the best answer to this question
when he wrote: ‘Studies perfect nature and are perfected by
experience.’ The art of management, and it is an art, is important
enough to be studied. The aim of such studies should be to help
us to make better use of our natural attributes – our personality
and intelligence – and to ensure that past experience is better
interpreted and more fully used, and that future experience is
more quickly and purposefully absorbed. And the rest of this
book provides practical guidance on what you need to know and
be able to do to become a better manager.
TEN FUNDAMENTAL WAYS OF BECOMING A
BETTER MANAGER- Know where you are, where you are going, how you are
going to get there and how you will know you have arrived. - Aim to master the present and pre-empt the future.
- Communicate effectively – what is happening, why it is
happening, what is going to happen and why. - Make it clear to people what you expect them to do.
- Realize each person is different.
- Let people know how they are getting on.
- Let people make mistakes.
- Be prepared to say ‘no’.
- Don’t worry about being liked.
- Build trust.
How to be a Better Manager 13