Most people work because they need to earn a salary, but money isn’t the only motivation or reason why people work. People get job satisfaction from different factors, such as social interaction with colleagues. Status, that is your professional position, and achievement, doing something well, can be important. Many companies really value their employees and see them as the company’s main asset. Managing people well can lead to better results and higher productivity for the company, but this can be difficult to do. An individual manager is a person who directly supervises people in an organization. He has to take the initiative and bring fresh, creative ideas to old problems. He is responsible for sorting out any problems and has to deal with complaints. People respond differently to different styles of management. Some organizations give their workers freedom to develop their roles and others don’t.
The recruitment advertisements appear in all the media including radio, TV and Internet. However, newspapers and magazines are usually the main source for vacancies. When choosing our job we consider a lot of facts which are important for us. Very often we want to work for a well-known, respected company; to have job security (no worry about losing your job); to find the work stimulating; to have an opportunity to take professional qualifications and to receive training; to have a good social life and not have to work overtime or at weekends; to have a position of responsibility and be passionate about the industry we work in. Status is very important because we want to be respected for what we do. We also want freedom to develop our role and don’t want being bored. People often want to have an inspirational (motivating) boss, they like him/her to be fairly hands-off, yet available and supportive.
While working in the company, people often have an appraisal. It is a regular meeting (usually every 6 months) between the employee and his/her manager at which performance is discussed and goals are defined. The aim of a performance appraisal is to look at how the employee is doing and to identify areas where he/she needs to make some changes. People often enjoy their work if they understand their role in a project. It’s great when a project team communicates well within itself and motivates people outside the team to work with them and to learn from them. And there is always a room for improvement because people often get difficulties with their time management. They are too optimistic about how much they can do in a day. To organize their time better, they must try to prioritize more, to deal with the things that are really important and to set themselves more realistic deadlines.
In many companies the focus is on management style. People are not discriminated on grounds of gender or race. But these days we often attend courses for men and women working together because in the workplace men and women have different styles. It’s sometimes dangerous to generalize, however we can note some specific differences between men and women’s style.
Men. 1. The male approach to business is competitive, direct and confrontational.
2. Personal status and focus on the individual are important. (The end justifies the means = success is the only important things; it doesn’t matter what methods you use.)
3. In tackling problems they go to the heart of the problem, without taking into account secondary considerations.
4. Male body language tends to be challenging. Male behavior can include forceful gestures for example banging a fist on the table for effect.
5. The male way of speaking does not encourage discussion.
6. Men like to talk about their personal experiences, successes and achievements or discuss ‘masculine’ topics such as cars and sport.
7. Men’s humor can be cruel – a man’s joke has a victim.
Women. 1. The female approach to business is collaborative. Collective action and responsibility are more important than personal achievement. Lateral thinking (thinking in a creative way, making unusual connections), as well as goodwill and the well-being of the individual, are also of great importance.
2. In tackling problems the female preference is to look at various options.
3. Female body language tends towards self-protection. A stereotypical female pose is sitting cross-legged; the male sits with legs apart to give an impression that he is in control. The female style does not usually include aggressive gestures.
4. The women’s way of speaking tends to welcome others’ opinions and contributions.
5. Women tend to talk about staff problems and personal matters.
6. Women tend to share or pass on the credit for success.
7. Female humor is less hurtful.
So, if you want your company to be a successful one, you should take into consideration a lot of facts, including the role of people and the fact that men and women have different styles but both can adopt the other gender’s way of working.
