If your employer handed you $1 million and said they want you to manage and maximize the investment to its utmost potential, would you take that seriously?
Would you feel the weight and responsibility of that request? How would you proceed in fulfilling that call to action? What steps would you take to ensure you acted responsibly and truly maximized the impact of the investment? Would you just set the money to the side and expect it to grow on its own?
My guess is most would take the responsibility seriously. You would recognize the importance of taking proactive measures to ensure you maximize that investment. Would it surprise you to know that many managers have this level of responsibility already today?
Let’s address some critical factors a manager must consider.
The Role of a Manager
The role of a manager is most often in place to help organize company resources to execute on the overarching business strategies, vision and values, as they pertain to the specific business function they reside within. Ultimately, they are tasked with helping to achieve the organization’s goals and objectives by leveraging the complete set of resources they have been entrusted responsibility. Many managers get this responsibility confused or misaligned and fail to execute. Yet, when a manager enables high performance within their team, their ability to deliver goes up exponentially.
Human Capital is Valuable
No matter what industry you are in, the human capital within your company is generally the most expensive asset. Additionally, those assets hold the most potential for yielding exponential output and gains. It’s also important to note the people within your team are one of the only assets a company has that can grow over time rather than depreciate. This is fantastic news, because if you want to maximize the value of the human capital your responsible for, it is actually possible.
Maximizing the Output of Company Resources
As a manager, you are entrusted with an incredible investment every day. I’m not just talking about the budget you may have responsibility for, but rather, the people you lead. Your team members are in fact a significant investment. So often managers focus their efforts on the tactical tools and the fiscal year budget assignments and forget to hold the appropriate level of focus and prioritization on their people as a means to maximizing the output of the investment they have been entrusted.
Going back to the scenario at the beginning, you may find it is a more current reality than you think. Let’s say your average employee salary is around $60,000. With the additional expense of the offered benefits, that total employee cost will be closer to $80,000. If you have more than 12 people reporting to you, just like that you have over $1 million dollars of human resources.
Take a moment and do some quick math on your team and consider the following questions.
- What is the investment you are entrusted with today?
- What are you doing to maximize that investment?
- How are you working to strengthen your employees’ skills and capabilities?
- What are you doing to develop your employees’ weaknesses and maximize their strengths?
Recognizing the value and untapped potential of your team is critical to maximizing the investment you’re entrusted with as a manager. There is no better way to execute on the organizational priorities than to ensure you offer your people a clear purpose, that ties to the overarching business, while strengthening their output and increasing their value potential.
Do you need to pivot your thinking and perspective on the resources you have responsibility for?
Are you ready to take the investment you have responsibility for seriously?
What do you have in place today to help identify strengths and areas for improvement?
How do you implement a practice of accountability and a commitment to continual development?
If you want help capturing value and maximizing the investment of human resources within your team, The Vantage Group can help.