Journal: News & Comment

Earning your suit

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As I mentioned a few days ago, the Manager Tools podcast is perhaps the most useful bit of digital audio I've ever found. It provides a weekly half hour (or so) of specific, step-by-step advice for anyone who's a supervisor, or who works with one (i.e. anyone at a company) to improve staff working relationships, make meetings run on time, delegate tasks properly, coach people to improve their performance, handle email better, and give effective feedback. The meeting suggestions alone could save you hours and hours each month, regardless of whether you're a manager or not.

Considering what blather many management training books and seminars include, this podcast is pretty much miraculous for something free. It's run by Mike Auzenne, who used to be a senior IT executive at MCI and now runs a bunch of Italian restaurants in Virginia, and his business partner Mark Horstman, who's been a management consultant for Fortune 500 firms for many years. The two met at West Point. They know what they're talking about.

I'm going to start using some of these techniques, especially the one-on-one, meeting structure, and delegation tips. If they work (and I think they will), I expect other people at my workplace will want to try them as well.

You can subscribe to the podcast in iTunes or using the RRS feed address. I really do recommend listening to the shows. I've been doing it on my commutes to work and at home in the evening. If you'd rather just download the episodes directly, here are the first 13 (from June 2005 through this week) as MP3 files:

• Jump Starting a Tech Career
• One on Ones Part 1
• One on Ones Part 2
• Q&A on One on Ones
• Effective Feedback
• Who Are These Guys?
• Effective Meetings Part 1
• Effective Meetings Part 2
• Effective Meetings Part 3
• Delegation
• Coaching Part 1
• Coaching Part 2
• Get Out of Email Hell

Useful documents and templates:

• One-on-One Intro Email
• One-on-One Template
• Feedback Model
• Meeting Agenda Template
• Outline of Effective Meetings
• Delegation Worksheet
• Coaching Card

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