Read all about it: Perspective quoted in the FT

Perspective HR has teamed up with the world’s no. 1 leadership scholar, Professor John Adair, to provide advice to a Financial Times reader whose development is being blocked by their manager.

The regular workplace column ‘Dear Jonathan’ penned by Jonathan Black, the director of the Careers Service at the University of Oxford, received a question:

I have a manager who does not support my professional development. I asked other senior managers for feedback and based on what they told me, I have spent my own time and money on professional training and activities to improve my soft skills. When my manager heard about this, she started giving me negative performance reviews, saying I am not “focused”, even though she did not have examples. What can I do? 

Professor Adair, author of over 50 books, is the creator of Action Centred Leadership (ACL), a practical approach to the often tricky subject of stepping up to lead others.

John Adair told the FT columnist: “There’s a strong tendency for managers to be task focused; however, there are three key elements of effective leadership: achieve the task, build the team, and develop the individuals.”

He suggested the reader speaks to their manager about how they could improve and point out that they have come across the ACL model which puts equal emphasis on Task, Team and Individual. John said: “The manager could see this as a partnership between herself and the individual, in this case to help the reader develop her skills within the team and deliver the tasks.”

Trevor Vanstone, of Perspective HR, an accredited ACL trainer since 2010, commented that the manager’s apparent lack of regard for the individual’s progress could ultimately damage the overall team and affect recruitment and retention.

*Perspective HR regularly runs in-house and open ACL course both in person and online and over the last decade over 250 leaders and managers from our client base have attended the two-day Team Leader course or the one-day Strategic Level course. Details here

Trevor commented: “Ultimately all training and development is to deliver the objectives and strategy of an organisation, and it has to pay for itself. However, by not getting the best out of each individual a manager is failing in a key duty and in the end, it will affect the team (if good people vote with their feet) and that detracts from getting the task done – on which most senior folk are ultimately judged”.

Trevor can be contacted on 01392 247436  trevor@perspectivehr.co.uk

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