What "Professional" Managers Do that "Amateurs" Don't Do

“All the world’s a stage, and most of us need more rehearsals.”
                                                                                  --Harvey Mackay

Professionals in any field realize that when they practice their skills they increase their chances of winning. Consider Andy Papthanassiou of Hendricks motor sports. Hendricks fields four competitive racing teams for thirty-six events for each NASCAR season. Their drivers include Jimmie Johnson, Jeff Gordon and Dale Earnhardt Jr. Andy oversees the recruiting and training of Hendrick’s pit crews. Winning is impossible without fast and consistent pit stops.

Andy had no racing experience when he started working on pit crews. As a former Stanford football player, he was surprised that most crews didn’t practice and even the best made numerous errors. Andy viewed a pit stop as much like executing a football play, so he organized crews to practice and worked with them to perfect tiny details. 

The teams that Andy led and coached started discovering many little ways to speed up stops, like coiling the air hose in a figure eight rather than a circle because it uncoiled more reliably. These practice sessions along with advances in car design and driving technique, have enabled Hendrick to become the most consistent winner in the business.

The difference between an amateur and a professional is that the professional practices and gets paid very well to perform his or her skills. In the world of management, there are pros and amateurs. Both play the game, but what distinguishes the professional more than anything else is the practice he or she does routinely to improve his or her game. Both management amateurs and  professionals may recognize their need for much improvement, but where amateurs wallow in their mediocrity, pros strive to be the best. They pursue excellence through practice.

We all believe that if you really want to improve at playing golf, you have to regularly practice. Some people will even tell you that you need a professional trainer or coach. Everyone recognizes the importance of practice, even if we don’t think its importance applies to us. 

Leaders need to view their profession a craft that they are seeking to master. The master craftsman always keeps their tools sharpened and well-maintained. They are always on the look out for new tools that well help them create masterworks or perform in a way that second-to-none.

Leadership requires habits of mind, heart and body: respect, emotional strength, people skills, discipline, vision, organization, resilience, planning, momentum, time management, the list goes on. As you can see, many factors that come into play in leadership are intangible. That’s why leaders, at any level, require so much seasoning to be effective. Everyday, a leader is either developing these habits or losing them, either getting better or getting worse. There is no remaining static when it comes to skills.

The greatest mistake most experienced managers make is thinking that just because they have been supervising for a number of years, they know it all and have no need for training or practice.

Why does leadership require practice? Because all skills require practice. If you stop practicing a skill, you lose that skill. A skill is particular kind of habit or what the ancient athletes called a virtue. As such, they have to be cultivated through practice, or else the habits are lost. If you’re not in the habit, you’re out of it.

Regardless of your how long you’ve been in management, there is a practice program that will work for you, but you must want one and not just say you want one. The reason being is because it is really easy to say, “Yeah that might work in other industries, but ours is different so it won’t work.” Well, that is nothing but a BIG 'Ole excuse!

Personal growth and by extension, leadership growth, does not happen automatically because people are living or necessarily because they have experiences. Leadership development must be planned, deliberate and consistent. In other words, if we want to realize our true leadership potential we have to practice it daily.

Here’s a simple, yet practical program that you can adapt to your situation

• Share a best leadership practice once per week with other supervisors in your organization.
• Start everyday with by listening to a podcast, reading from a book or blog about leadership. 
• If feasible, rehearse and practice an important conversation during your drive time.
• Actively participate in a weekly practice session with your a learning buddy.
• Once a quarter allocate a couple of hours to teaming, learning and working next quarter’s  plan.

You might find that you only implement one or two these ideas right away. That is fine. Any time you increase your practice, you will increase your influence as a leader. In many cases, though, a leader can do all these things in less than two hours per week. Many managers say they can’t afford the time to practice. Actually, you can’t afford not to practice.

Be coachable. So many times, leaders love to say they want to learn or be coached, but down deep inside feel that because they’ve been managing so long and have attended many management classes, they’ve got it all and really don’t need any more coaching. Feeling this way is the biggest disservice you could to yourself.

Check out our post: Tom Brady's Coachability and Lessons for Leaders
                                                                        
Also, we've designed a Leadership Development Assessment to help you and your team create a leadership practice plan.  

1) Click on the following link:  Leadership Development Assessment

2) Download the file to your computer.

3) Complete the assessment (Which is a fillable PDF file.).

4) Review the results with your one-up manager, a trusted adviser or colleague.

The assessment is really an inventory of best practices that will make you and your team better leaders. We encourage you to take each of them to heart. How you choose to practice these is up to you—pick one a day if you’re feeling up to, or one a week. Whatever your cadence, do your best to take the practices off the pages of the assessment and into your real-world leadership roles.

While you should be proud of being a leader, the ego is an expensive liability, so get rid of it, and start investing in getting better.  

Practice! Practice! Practice!

“Everyone wants to be on a championship team but nobody wants to come to practice.” 
                                                                                          ---B. Knight

To your greater success and fulfillment,

Peter Mclees, Leadership Coach, Trainer and Performance Consultant

SMART DEVELOPMENT

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