How Well Can You Manage Yourself?

There are wide variety of reasons to become a manager: take charge of your life, have more influence, be the manager you always wanted, do things the right way, etc.

I also tell those that want about the other side of management - delivering bad news, firing people, etc.

Another aspect of becoming a manager I ask aspiring managers:

How well can you manage yourself?

This is an important consideration, why?

When you are in charge of others, the expectation is you will manage them. If you cannot manage yourself well, how well will you be able to manage others?

Before thinking of managing others, think about how well do you manage yourself. Are you operating at peak efficiency? How well can you pass your learnings and experience onto your team?

Why is this important? When the company trusts you to manage others, they will expect you to manage them - if you can’t manage yourself, well, how can you manage others?!

The toughest questions I received as a manager was my own productivity - getting things done, keeping track of my calendar, delivering at a high level that I set for myself.

These are the minimum things a company will expect you to do - as well as anything else.

Before you want to manage others, manage yourself!