Benoit Lamouche

Manager Toolbox & Resources

Management is not a science — one size does not fit all.

[Note: This page is WIP, personal and non-exhaustive]

About management

We are not born managers, we become managers. Management is not for everyone and it’s OK. Management is not a science we can learn at school or in books, it requires practice, experience and mentoring/coaching.

My key values & principles

  • People first
  • Lead by example
  • Do what you say / Say what you do — Be honest and transparent
  • By taking care of my team, I take care of my projects

There is always something new to learn, there is always something to improve. Keep yourself open-minded, challenge yourself, and be aware of your improvement areas.

Share feedbacks

Do's

  • Improvement feedback must come with an action plan
  • There is always space for improvement.
  • Replace the “negative” feedback with “constructive” feedback. Keep in mind, that constructive feedback must come with an action plan.

Don'ts

  • Share “false” feedback or things you don’t mean.
  • “Sandwich” feedback: Put negative feedback between two positive feedbacks.
  • Evaluation and judgment are not feedback

Create trust

Creating trust is a long and slow process. Destroying trust is a quick and fast process.

Don’t confuse trust with friendship. Trust ≠ Friendship. You can trust someone without being a friend. For some people, being friends is a blocker for sharing “negative” feedback because they don’t want to “hurt” their friends.

Do's

  • Share constructive feedback
  • Ask for feedback about yourself
  • Be honest with your team
  • Respect your engagements

Don'ts

  • Take engagement you are not able to make
  • Say something you don’t mean
  • Make yourself friends with your team, if it can affect your managerial role & responsibilities.

Team motivation & Empowerment

I decided to merge the two topics together because the relationship between the team motivation and the empowerment is strong, and most of the Do’s and Don’ts are the same.

Do's

  • Empowerment
  • Make the team accountable for their work
  • Share the sense & value of the work
  • Define clear roles and responsibilities (make a RAM/RACI matrix if necessary)

Don'ts

  • Micromanagement
  • Unnecessary processes and paperwork
  • Cancel a decision your Team took with your approval (or it must be exceptional and explained)

Conflict management

There are as many ways to resolve conflicts as there are conflicts. More than ever, one size does not fit all, each situation requires its own solutions.

Do's

  • Communication is the secret
  • Always manage conflicts with a small group of people (1/1 or 1/1/1).
  • Take some time to assess & understand the situation

Don'ts

  • React spontaneously
  • Expose the conflict in the open space

Continuous improvement for yourself as a manager

Everything is continuously changing: yourself, your environment, your company, your team, other companies, your projects, the market, the ways of working, the culture… It’s necessary to always keep learning.

Do's

  • Read books and articles
  • Sharing sessions with other managers
  • Request for feedback + Action plan
  • 180/360 analysis of yourself + Action plan
  • Behavioral training (communication, conflict management, culture, diversity…)

Don'ts

  • Think you are done with training because you are an experienced person
  • Think you already know everything

About work from home & work from office

Pandemic & lockdown changed everything about people’s aspirations for work from home. It got a deep impact on personal work/life balance that managers must not under estimate.

Do's

  • Share clear rules of what is allowed or not for work from home
  • Give room for flexibility
  • Make the most of your face to face time with your team by encouraging high added value meeting and workshops
  • Share your managerial needs with your team members
  • Monitor your team’s work/life balance and mental health

Don'ts

  • Set the work from office rules as a constraint
  • Drop top-down work from office rules without context

Tips & Advices

Make a good presentation

What sets the best presenters apart? It all comes down to understanding the difference between giving a presentation and telling a story. Here are five storytelling strategies to help you stand out the next time you give a presentation.

  • Craft a narrative. A story is a connected series of events told through words and pictures. It has a theme, attention-grabbing moments, heroes and villains, and a satisfying conclusion.
  • Pair your text with images. Researchers have found that your audience will recall about 10% of your message if they simply hear information. But if they hear information and see a picture, they’ll retain 65%.
  • Humanize data. Data is abstract until it’s put into context that people can understand. So make your statistics more memorable by putting a face to them.
  • Surprise your audience. The human brain pays attention to novelty — twists and turns and unexpected events. Our brain perks up when we detect something that breaks a pattern.
  • Rehearse — out loud. Practice your vocal delivery, adding perfectly timed pauses and varying the pace of your speech. If you plan to stand in front of a group, stand during your rehearsal. If you’re going to be seated in a Zoom call, take a seat, and deliver each slide as though you’re giving the real thing.

(Source)

Identify the 5 Types of Problem-Solvers on Your Team

To set your employees up for success, start by categorizing them into five profiles, recognizing their unique strengths and weaknesses. Then you can pair them accordingly to optimize their performance.

  • The adventurer. This employee confidently and optimistically follows their intuition, making decisions quickly — sometimes too quickly.
  • The detective. This thorough coworker is methodical, driven by data and evidence. As such, they may undervalue intuition and collaboration.
  • The listener. This collaborative and trusting decision-maker works well with their colleagues. However, they often find it difficult to tune into their own opinions or express viewpoints that might be at odds with others'.
  • The thinker. This is your colleague who thrives on identifying multiple paths and possible outcomes. They’re thoughtful, cautious decision-makers who like to know their options. The downside? Their desire to understand the “why” behind a decision can slow things down.
  • The visionary. This creative coworker sees pathways others don’t. They have a big vision, but may fall prey to scarcity bias, overvaluing outside-the-box solutions and undervaluing the obvious ones.

Leading Your Team Through Uncertainty

Whether it’s inflation, rising interest rates, supply-chain disruptions, or geopolitical tensions — there is a lot happening in the global economy. How can you make sure you’re successful as a leader through uncertain times? Here are some strategies.

  • Create a humble, “company-first” culture. This entails leading by example and doing what’s right for the business and your people, instead of driving individual agendas or objectives. It also means recognizing that your role extends beyond the individual unit you manage and requires communicating across teams and units.
  • Focus on reinventing the business. When things aren’t “business-as-usual,” it’s time to look for opportunities to innovate. Be sure that the right minds are assigned to this reinvention — and that the more routine, day-to-day work is delegated to employees you trust to execute it.
  • Be more inclusive. This means prioritizing not only the diversity of your team in terms of gender and ethnicity, but also in terms of viewpoints, backgrounds, and skill sets. The more diverse and inclusive your team is, the more adaptable it will be through uncertain times.

Want to learn more?

On the web

Books