Management, Accountability, and Compliance
By Brianne Burr, Marketing –
Mangers are responsible for their employees’ productivity and compliance.
Many employees view management roles as desirable because they afford higher status, better salary, and more authority and power. However, many current managers would disagree that it’s a desirable role to fill.
As the saying goes, with great power comes great responsibility, and people in management positions are responsible for more than just their own actions.
Duties
Due to their supervisory role, managers find themselves responsible for not only their own duties and tasks, but also for the completion of everyone’s work on their team. If a member of the team fails, the manager will be held accountable.
An additional burden for managers rests in their role as the communication go-between for team members and upper management. This requires exhaustive interpersonal skills and organization on the part of the manager.
Finally, compliance with regulations, both governmental and organizational, adds a layer of complexity to the job description.
Even if a manager manages to maintain the unlikely balance of pleasing both upper management and their team, it’s still a tough job. And most don’t have it so easy.
Failing Compliance Standards
In the managerial world, supervisors do everything in their power to avoid the dreaded “failure to supervise” mark; these come from situations where members of the team act at odds with company standards.
The most common scenario comes into play with regulation compliance. Upper management finds compliance violations easy to assign, hard to forget. If a customer complains, for example, the manager may receive a “failure to supervise” mark on their record, because they didn’t control their staff member according to that customer’s desires.
How to Create a Culture of Compliance
To deal with these challenges, managers should foster a specific skill set to help avoid problems. As a manager is accountable to both supervisors and employees, they should take the time to get to know each personally. Regularly check-ups with employees need to happen so the manager can see how team members behave, and determine how to encourage quality work and foster good employee relations.
Most importantly, the manager should develop the skills necessary to speak openly with a team member if an issue arises. That way that can take care of problems before they become a compliance violation.
As managers employ these skills, they will enjoy greater success as they combat the challenges of the job.
