Hack:
HALT your Managers

By Madhusudan Rao - Solution Architect at NTT Data

September 2, 2010 at 12:05am

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Summary

HALT stands for Highly Accelerated Life Test. It is a stress testing methodology for accelerating product reliability during the engineering development process.

Why not apply a similar approach to Managers in your organization? Put them under rigorous tests that will increase their reliability and make them ready for future challenges.

Problem

Managers in any organization are mostly good at doing whatever they are doing today. But, how do you enable them to grow?
How can you guarantee that they will be able to take on larger responsibilities when they knock on one's door?
Will they be able to stand upto the grind?

How can you help them meet the challenge?

Solution

There should be a set of Managers selected (based on parameters like performance, potential, etc), who will be put a HALT. The period might be 6 months to 1 year, based on the organization.

Basically, these Managers will be given a pie of the action that is happening around the organization - whether it be a crisis or any new product launches or marketing assignments.

All this will help the Manager realize what is in store for him as he grows within the organization. If he/she can cope up with these tasks, the organization stands to gain. If not, the Manager realizes the areas of improvement.

Either way, it is a win-win situation for both the organization as well as the employee.

Practical Impact

The impact this will have will be multi-fold:

The Manager will realize that the organization is planning for his growth and making sufficient moves to help him grow. It can only make him more committed to the organization
The organization will realize whether a Manager with potential growth, has the capability or not - without seriously impacting his morale
The Manager also, has an opportunity to gain insights into his own performance and capabilities.

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