Key Management Practices that Improve Performance
Clinton O. Longenecker and Jack L. Simonetti are two professors from the University of Michigan Business School who want to help leaders focus on results and practice continuous improvement while creating positive working environments. In Getting Results, they transform input from more than 5,000 high-performing managers in numerous types of organizations into a helpful leadership and management guide.

Five Practices
Competition is increasing and the many pressures bearing down on businesses are not lightening up any time soon. Improving performance is the route to success, and the authors have developed a new guide to take managers to their goals of making the most of their jobs and furthering their careers through five key management practices. These are:

1. Get Everyone on the Same Page: Focus on the Purpose of Your Organization. Creating a clear sense of purpose and direction will combat the frustration, confusion, alienation and eventual withdrawal that will set in without it. This can be accomplished by developing a succinct mission statement that is transmitted to all employees and executives. Once this is done, then your own value-added role as a leader should be clarified within it. Then, those in your work unit can help you develop clear goals and measures to track goals. A balanced performance scorecard will help you do this. The last step toward getting everyone in your organization on the same page is flexibly framing everyone else's role, goal and actions in your organization's operation.

2. Prepare for Battle: Equip Your Operation with Tools, Talent and Technology. Getting the right people, skills and resources together requires systematic planning. An effective plan will keep chaos and unexpected crises at bay. This plan begins with progressive staffing that puts people first. Selection practices and human resource planning must be first-rate, and work schedules must be effective to place the right people with the right skills into position at the right time. The authors present a step-by-step blueprint of hurdles and candidate-rating methods to give managers an edge in their recruitment efforts.

Organizational Performance
3. Stoke the Fire of Performance: Create a Climate for Results. Effective leaders know how all parts of their organizations are performing on an ongoing basis. Monitoring and measuring the behaviors and results of individuals and work units help them achieve this. A work force that has a sense of ownership and accountability for desired results will get results easier if it has a motivational leader. If employees do not know they need to change or do not know how to change, they will not be able to change their performance. Successful leaders remove performance barriers, such as personnel policies that are not conducive to top employee retention, and bad communication, to allow people to get their work done.

4. Build Bridges on the Road to Results: Nurture Relationships with People. The authors write, "No one wants to work for or with someone that they consider to be a jerk!" Successful leaders build bridges to all their people, and keep the lines of communication open. This requires honesty, mutual dependency, mutual support, and fostering effective 360-degree working relationships with all people who are important to getting results. Arrogance, contempt, posturing, politicking, lying and power trips keep managers from achieving results. Competency and character allow leaders to develop long-term success. A systematic communication process will help managers meet people's communication needs, and the best leadership creates cooperation and teamwork that speed up results.

5. Keep the Piano in Tune: Practice Continuous Renewal.Finding better ways of doing things is a crucial part of leadership, and these ways can be TQM, Six Sigma, ISO certification or any plan that improves processes. Leaders who put the time and effort into creating improvement teams that continuously look for ways to make things better are investing in success. These teams turn the expertise, creativity and problem-solving skills of employees into results. Performance appraisals are another way leaders can help to improve their employees' personal performance. Effective managers also find ways to appraise and improve their own performance.

The authors explore how these puzzle pieces fit together and affect each other in numerous combinations and directions. Using worksheets, tests and charts to demonstrate the effectiveness of their "absolute truths," they are able to clarify the essential nature of each point, and illustrate how managers can put them together for the best results.