is being presented by Leigh Bailey, Founder & CEO, of The Bailey Group and airs on Thursday, February 16th, 2012. For more details or to register, please visit our site at www.fxconferences.com
Technical leaders can be defined as those who are experts in a particular specialty (e.g. engineering, nursing, medicine, finance, law, or accounting), and whose career paths have changed from a technical/individual contributor track to a management track. In many cases, they are promoted to management because of their success as individual contributors – partly as a reward for their history of good work and partly because it is assumed they will teach their direct reports to be as gifted as they are at their technical specialty.
In such situations, it does not take long for problems to arise with newly appointed managers. Direct reports often claim that the new manager is a “micro manager” and they cannot do their work well enough to earn his or her praise. Peers may complain that the new manager is condescending, doesn’t listen, or jumps to false conclusions. Most damaging is when the new manager does not think anything is wrong and dismisses the feedback from his or her colleagues. Left unchecked, these situations often lead to the boss deciding that the “collateral damage” created by these new managers is too great and they are returned to their individual contributor role, ego and reputation badly damaged.
These kinds of situations are entirely avoidable, and this presentation looks at how to identify good candidates for technical leadership, how to spot individuals who are less likely to succeed, and how to work with existing technical leaders to maximize their chances for success.
