15-Minute Guide to Greater Effectiveness – Managers in Banking and Financial Services Firms

15-Minute Guide to Greater Effectiveness – Managers in Banking and Financial Services Firms

Banking and financial services sectors are on the upswing in many countries after months of making redundancies following the 2008 global financial crisis. Recruitment firms and head hunters are reporting more requests to fill mid-level and senior management roles and advertisement abound for many posts. After reducing the number of potential candidates for mid-and senior level roles in the past 18 months, firms are finding increasingly they are appointing many first time managers who are required to take up roles even before they have had adequate time to prepare to become their most effective. Such new managers include those managing large teams for the first time -more than 100 staff often in several locations and others having their very first role as a Team Leader.

For newly appointed managers -both at the mid and senior levels in banking and financial service firms, the challenge is how to be effective when faced with low morale among team members and fast moving changes in the regulatory landscape for financial services.

To be more effective in leading your team and make fewer mistakes in the first 100 days, here are six key questions you should ask of yourself. Allow yourself 1 – 2 minutes to reflect on each question, identify additional considerations and make a note of two possible options for which you will take action.

What are my priority/most urgent tasks this week and what specifically will I be working on today? Better still plan for today for tomorrow, do not wait.

What skills do I need for this role? This means you should consider skills you need to improve OR new ones I should learn so I can do a better job and be more effective?

How do I overcome personal biases to work with people with various personalities? This may require you to adjust your communication style and apply your persuasive skills in a sensitive way.

How will I deal with managing my friends who are now part of my team and those with whom I worked at the same level previously?

Where are the greatest risks to attaining a high level of performance by everyone in my team? In the process, you may identify existing conflict in your team or those who are resisting change, either directly or in subversive manner.

What can I do the make my team more prepared to deliver a higher level of performance for the business, especially in light of changes over the next year?

While you may not have all the answers before you start managing your team, through thinking about these issues you can begin find answers and exploring various options in the first 30 days of assuming your managerial role. The answers you provide to those questions would go a considerable way to helping you get greater depth of clarity in understanding the demands of your role as a team manager. This will enable you to better able to manage the talent in your team, improve your own personal effectiveness and raise your creditability as a manager.