Succession Syndrome

Why both technical and soft skills training are vital for first-time managers

The old cliche continues to stand the test of time, “…we don’t plan to fail, we fail to plan.” As it pertains to the plan for you and your workforce, the paradigms continue to change and the threat of failure continues to lurk in the forecast.

“Nearly 60% of frontline managers underperform during their first two years in the seat, driving performance gaps (abroad) and (costly) employee turnover across the entire frontline.” – Business Wire, September 27, 2007

Every year thousands of employees are hired or promoted into their first management role, and every year an astounding number of them fail. Why?

Is it because we’ve become a microwave society; throwing our younger generation workforce into the management/leadership fire before they’re ready? Is it because we spent too much money on “hi-tech” and forgot the real demands for “hi-touch”? In the wake of GM and other corporate bankruptcies, maybe company profits were spent on pleasures and perks rather than on the one true asset of the organization – the people.

Whatever the reasons (and there are many), it appears to be a serious question that only a few are willing to try to answer and solve. Why are so many frontline managers failing?

Department of Labor Study
In 1990, the Secretary of Labor appointed a commission to determine the skills our young people need to succeed in the world of work. The commission’s fundamental purpose was to encourage a high-performance economy characterized by high-skill, high-wage employment. Although the commission completed its work in 1992, its findings and recommendations continue to be a valuable source of information for individuals and organizations involved in education and workforce development.

Jamie Taylor, EH&S director for a Fortune 500 company, was preparing an upcoming two-day safety managers meeting when I contacted him for his insights on the topic. He is developing a busy agenda for more than 60 safety professionals from across the country all gathering in Baton Rouge, La.

The priority items on his agenda are soft skills and leadership training. In the midst of an economic melt down he stands confident in “spending” the money, a $100,000 events budget. When challenged, he commented, “I have to spend (correcting himself, invest) this money! This is the only way to ensure my people are making good safety decisions while on my projects. They know safety,” Taylor remarked. “Most of them can read you the regs word for word. I need to invest in their ability to think, feel and behave well with others. And yes, we may be a Fortune 500 company, but we feel the financial pain like everyone else. My clients are demanding we do more with less; but there are some costs that you just do not cut. It’s a balancing act, but you had better have your priorities straight when developing your people if you want to stay in business.”

Taylor went on to talk about the total training budget he manages and how the dollar is typically allocated for different types of training. “Without doubt, $0.85 to $0.90 of each dollar goes to ensure compliance and regulatory training. More and more craft training is now including safety content so we’re able to get two birds with one dollar.” He adds that although the annual budget reflects a high percentage of the training dollar going to compliance training, other budgets allow for soft-skill development during special retreats or management meetings.

As is the case with most intellectual property owners (owners of training material), the training material not only includes the knowledge, skills and ability of the craft but also the required compliance training. Intellectual property owners like NCCER (National Center for Construction Education and Research) and T&D PowerSkills are good examples. These two companies that offer craft training are developing content to enable individuals and organizations to maximize their training dollars (technical/craft and regulatory/compliance).

T&D PowerSkills offers a complete training curriculum to support instructor-led training to apprentice line mechanics. Throughout the entire curriculum there are dozens of compliance training topics meeting OSHA requirements in 1910.269 and 1926 subpart V that deal with safety training required for lineworkers.

Types of Training
Over the last 30 years we have seen too many business leaders blur the lines and lose sight of the value of different types training. Training serves the same purpose as every other function of the business—to improve shareholder value. Ironically, the return on the training investment is an indirect effort that should ultimately improve workforce performance. This brings up another point regarding a proper gap analysis to identify performance gaps prior to prescribing a training agenda. When business leaders understand the critical function of training, performance gaps are measured and then training is prescribed.

Many business leaders have the same mindset today as they did before OSHA showed up in the 1970s about the continual battle between production, schedule and “oh-yeah, we believe in safety.”

The function of training is to increase shareholder value. Training is not a necessary evil; it should not be something that you do because you are told or regulated. It is an investment into your workforce—for today and tomorrow, regardless of the type of training”.

I am reminded of the words from a general foreman I once met at a construction project: “Every safety rule that exists today is because someone spilt blood.” It is a sobering fact to remember; the only reason we have compliance/regulatory training is because the profit became more important than the producer. Our priorities are out of focus when you estimate a job based on the number of fatalities you expect. Compliance and safety training are required because your predecessors did not view the project or priorities properly. In order to survive in today’s world of work, you must comply with safety as well as invest in the personal development of your workforce.

To help understand your return on the training investment, we can break down training into three different categories of interest. All three are designed to improve performance, production and ultimately shareholder value, yet each is uniquely different.

1. Technical skills
Knowledge and proficiencies required in the accomplishment of engineering, scientific, or any specific task. Craft and compliance training can be combined to maximize time and dollars. Most trainers attempt to include both inside a lesson plan and to include orientation training.
2. Compliance/Regulatory
Compliance training refers to the process of educating employees on the laws, regulations and company policies that apply to their day-to-day job responsibilities.
3. Soft skills
A soft skill is a sociological term that refers to the cluster of personality traits, or social graces, needed to use these skills. For this reason, soft skills are increasingly sought out by employers in addition to standard qualifications. “Soft” issues include leadership, team building and other topics like time and stress management, adapting to change, dealing with difficult people and delegation. All of these topics must have concentrated efforts of development when learning to survive in today’s changing marketplace.

Soft Skills
Compliance and regulatory training is for the most part outlined by governmental agencies based on your occupation. Craft training has been refined over the years by industry experts and those who have studied the tasks for the job. Soft skills training still remains vague and in most cases has no clear definition or training track. Rather, “topics of interest” are identified by an individual’s performance. To assist you in understanding soft-skills, the list below provides a summary of the abilities:

Personal Qualities
• Being responsible
• Possessing self-esteem
• Possessing sociability
• Ability to self-manage
• Possessing integrity and honesty
• Identifying the truth
• Problem solving
• Time management

Interpersonal Skills
• Participates as a member of the team
• Teaches others
• Serves client/customers
• Exercises leadership
• Negotiates
• Works with cultural diversity
• Motivates others

Five Basic Soft Skills (as taught in the Maturity Matters Safety Track)
• Communication—self primary focus, self-talk; others secondary
• Concentration—ability to focus the mind; block out distractions
• Organization—structure to thoughts, emotions, values
• Innovation—new thoughts of the mind
• Discrimination—prioritizing thoughts and emotions

Personal Responsibility
In summary, we can conclude that there are no problems unless leadership identifies with the problem. You may want to take matters into your own hands in this case. As for compliance and regulatory training, neglect it long enough and you will no longer find yourself in operation. God forbid anything worse happens. As the old wise man once said, “Silence is permission.”

As for craft and technical skills, technology continues to drive change in our equipment, procedures and work environment. This demands continual efforts to train and develop; couple this with a retiring work force and you will soon find the need to spend money on training. After all, you do not see anybody driving with whips and buggies anymore; even grandpa has a computer these days.

Soft-skill development is much like safety; it is a personal commitment. As safety professionals, we all expect and promote personal awareness and self-accountability regarding safety. The same is true for the soft-skill development. If your organization does not wish to invest in your soft-skill success, you must take up the responsibility and make the necessary investments on your own.

About the Author: Parrish Taylor is the author and instructor of the soft-skills instructional program Maturity Matters. You can learn more about the “Mature Safety Track” at www.parrishtaylor.com. A veteran in the field of workforce development, Taylor has invested the last 20 years to improve the quality of life (personal and professional) for his clients. To learn more about his consulting and client projects, please visit www.TMCtraining.net.

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