Management Style

When I first accepted my current position as a MIT, I was very excited! My coworkers were also very supportive of the change, which made me think it was going to be easy. I didn’t exactly expect the position to be too difficult until I realized that I needed to actually boss everyone around daily.

I expected that things were going to run smoothly, and that I would be able to dance around confrontation by being nice. Wrong. I was quickly thrown into situations where I had to try to change some people’s attitudes or actions in the work place.

I thought that managing employees who were older than me was going to be most difficult, but it turned out that it was a bit more difficult to manage people who were very close in age with me. I had a hard time being taken seriously.

Before starting as a manager, I was set on figuring out which management style would work best for me. I decided early on that I wanted to manage by example and treat my coworkers with respect, in order to gain respect from them. I wanted to take this approach because I think that I respect managers who lead by example, rather than just ordering others around.  This did work out well, but not all of the time, so I realized that I had to also become more assertive.

(Photo from: https://nvsr.files.wordpress.com/2015/07/how-to-be-assertive-1.png)

I believe that becoming more assertive is the most difficult thing I have had to do while being a manager. I do truly care about my coworkers and consider myself to be very empathetic, but sometimes people may notice and take advantage of this.

I think that realizing being assertive does not technically mean you have to be rude or overbearing really helped me become a better manager. You can still be nice and assertive. I know that I can be a pushover at times, but I found that, as a manager, you must be confident in your decisions. I also found that you need to admit when you are wrong or have made a poor decision, and figure out how to correct it.

I think that I have been able to become more assertive by becoming more confident with my decision making skills. I also think that becoming more confident and assertive can take time, so taking small steps to improve your management style can go a long way!

--Morgan