What I Wish I Knew: Before I Became A Manager

What I Wish I Knew: Before I Became A Manager: Video automatically transcribed by Sonix

What I Wish I Knew: Before I Became A Manager: this mp4 video file was automatically transcribed by Sonix with the best speech-to-text algorithms. This transcript may contain errors.

Speaker1:
All right, everybody, we are. Let us get started this evening. And I think a few more folks are going to be joining, but. We will. We will be just getting underway as we go. And, yes, I have enabled the the eye at the bottom. So we'll be doing some live transcription of this. We'll also be providing a transcript. And after the fact, you can email us for one of those. So. Good evening, everybody. My name is Maria DeFazio. I am the executive director of the Presidential Management Alumni Association. I am also a member of the Class of 2011. Most of you are probably a little familiar with PMMA at this point, but just to make sure we're all on the same page. Pma is a 500 1c3. Our mission is to support the ongoing excellence of PME and PMF alumni and advocate for the current program. We do this through a variety of activities, including networking opportunities, events, advocacy, education and professional development. So we are continuing to grow and expand so that we can serve all of you better and further connect and and grow our community. So tonight, thank you all for joining our What I Wish I Knew series. Session number two. This is the second in a series of six events designed to connect our alumni community and help share the collective wisdom of of coming up on 45 years of PMIs and PM FS. So tonight's topic is what I wish I knew before I became a manager. Just in case you're looking ahead, we're targeting May for our next What I wish I knew session and that's going to be before I went to the private sector.

Speaker1:
So I'm sure a lot of folks have some thoughts about that. We are our goal is to take these events back to or not back to, but to make these events in person events as soon as we're really able to. And we are looking forward to being able to do that soon. Assuming obviously that COVID numbers continue to trend in the right direction, they will still be these things will still be available. I somehow have drawn all over my PowerPoint slide. I'm very sorry about that. These these will still be available online after the fact, though. So a quick look at our agenda for tonight and just some housekeeping before we get started. We'll do our sort of fireside chat with our alums, take Q&A from you all in the audience, and then we'll sort of do our Zoom networking roulette at the end. Please keep your video off until the networking portion comes on comes on at the end. We'll flag that for you. You can drop a question into the chat at any time, and we will take a look at that. And as a reminder, our alumni speakers are appearing tonight in their personal capacities not as a representative of their respective agencies, and we do thank them for generously sharing their time and insights with all of us. So quick word about our sponsor, because we wouldn't be able to do events like this without them.

Speaker1:
The entire What I Wish I Knew series is sponsored generously by Guidehouse. Guidehouse is a leading global provider of consulting services to the public sector and commercial markets. They cover areas like management, technology, risk consulting. They've got tons of both private and public sector expertize, and they focus on helping their clients out with the complexities of the regulatory process. So they have more than 12,000 professionals across 50 locations. They also employ a number of PMI and PMF alums. So a very special thank you to Guidehouse. You can learn more at guidehouse. If you would like some more information on our wonderful sponsors. So let's get to what we're all waiting for tonight's event. It is fireside chat time, so we want to welcome Mark Johnston, Leticia Hawkins and Henry Hensley. Marc focused on homelessness across his 31 year career with the federal government, which he began as a PMI. He served as deputy director for the U.S. Interagency Council on Homelessness and in various positions at HUD, including Deputy Assistant Secretary and Assistant Secretary for his service. Mark has been recognized in various capacities, most notably being awarded a Samuel J. Heyman Service to America Medal by the Partnership for Public Service. Since leaving Federal Service in 2014, he's worked as a consultant and a coach on reducing and ending homelessness. He served as a commissioner and vice chair of the Salt Lake County Housing Authority, and he has advised the Secretary of Veterans Affairs as the national chair of the VA's Advisory Committee on Ending Veteran Homelessness.

Speaker1:
And next month, Mark is going to be departing to the Middle East with his spouse to go direct some humanitarian efforts in Jordan for Latter Day Saints charities. Pretty awesome. Leticia Hawkins serves as a human resources manager for NASCAR at the Ames Research Center in Mountain View, California, overseeing multiple programs. A class of 1990 PMI. Leticia has been with the government for over 30 years. She's also a graduate of Spelman College and the University of Delaware and has spent her career helping Nassar recruit and build a talented, responsive and diverse workforce outside of work. She's active and engaged in public service with her sisters of the Alpha Kappa Alpha sorority. Henry Hensley serves as the deputy director for management at the United States Trustee program, DOJ's Bankruptcy Division. He's responsible for the oversight of operations, including HR, procurement, budget and finance facilities, I.T. Press, public affairs evaluation. So prior to joining us, tpy Henry led three strategic plan cycles for the Department of Housing and Urban Development and established the only Secretary led performance management meetings. He led the 2016 presidential transition at HUD and is the proud dad to Charlotte and Audrey and is married to his wife Tasha. Coming up on, I think, ten years. Henry Awesome. So let's dove right in, guys. We'll get a little more background on everyone as, as we move on. But let's just start with our events. Eponymous question what, what do you wish you knew before you took your first managerial position?

Speaker2:
Yeah. So jump out and start from my perspective. And I worked in three different agencies. Managing I certainly learned early on is very different than being a great staffer. I think typically when people get hired, they're hired because of the expertize that people have seen in them as a superb top line staff person. And the job of being a manager is so very different than the job that they had before. That was certainly my experience. Just two other observations. One would be that I found getting formal management training was invaluable. One of my very first positions as a manager, I had a great boss who was a great leader, but he really discounted formal management. He said, skip all the management training stuff and just go to leadership training. And I did not follow that advice. I went ahead and actually tried to learn what the basics were in management, which I think was very helpful for me in my career over time. And then the last thing would be that you need to start looking for developing yourself as a manager and then as leader because your boss may not be looking out for you. And I had that both experience of sort of benign neglect and, and intentional at times where they're not looking out for my best future. And so you've got to own that yourself and try to try to be the best manager you could be.

Speaker1:
Excellent. What about you, Latisha?

Speaker3:
Hey, so I didn't put this in my bio, but as a I served as the branch chief for our workforce development branch at NASA's Ames Research Center. And so I was a supervisor as well as the training officer, which meant that I managed all of the employee development programs for our center. What I wish I knew before I took my first managerial position was that my skill set needed to shift because I was an individual contributor, I was a generalist HR manager, and then all of a sudden I was thrust in a role where I had to have vision and strategy and for an organization. And so I wish.

Speaker2:
That.

Speaker3:
I had a supervisory mentor, somebody who could help me frame my thinking. I had learned a lot about my organization, so I felt really comfortable about what we did as an organization. But I wish that I had began to hone my my, my vision for the organization I was about to take over. I also wish.

Speaker2:
That.

Speaker3:
I truly understood what it meant to be a supervisor and on a management team. And so and once again, it gets to shifting your thinking because as an individual contributor, you're probably down and into that one or two things, maybe some collateral duties that you provide for your your organization, and then you're expected all of a sudden to have a global view. So, yeah, I wish that I had had a supervisory mentor and I wish that I had began the process of purposefully shifting my thinking to what I thought would be my vision for the new organization.

Speaker1:
Great. And, Henry, what about you?

Speaker2:
All right.

Speaker4:
First, thanks for the invite. I'm happy to join everybody here today and enjoy preparing for all this as well. So I kind of sketched out three bullets about this particular question. First one that really kind of struck me over time is that you might think that you're being clear when you're giving out directions, and you'll find that you are being very clear to some people and to other people on your staff. It's like you're speaking another language. So what I've found useful is finding someone that kind of gets it, what you're saying. And then I've heard them literally repeat what I'm trying to get across verbatim. Nobody understood what I was saying, but when they hear it from somebody else, it completely made sense. So it's just one of those weird things. I don't know quite why that is, but it's been pretty consistent. Maybe it's I don't know. If you all figure it out, let me know. But I did find a good workaround, so I'll share that with everybody. Second one that really struck me and probably is somewhat just naivete, but remember that your boss still has a boss and that really shapes a lot of what you're able to do. So you're not going to necessarily come in with your agenda and that's what's going to be done. And it's as simple as that. What you do is going to be shaped by what your boss is asking you to do, and you always have a boss. So there are things that are under your control, things that are not, and it's kind of figuring out where you can make an impact and what you control.

Speaker4:
And then the last one is kind of along those same lines about still having a boss. Even though you're the manager now, it's important that your boss cares deeply, and I'm very fortunate to have that in my current situation. I'll say over the course of my career, that hasn't always been the case. One of the best pieces of advice I received is that you really can't care more than your boss does, and it's a weird kind of thing to think about, but it really is true. And you'll find yourself getting frustrated if you're trying to move the needle on something that just isn't a priority for your boss or they just frankly don't care about the flip of it is it really does put a lot of pressure on you to make sure that you always care more than your staff does. So if you have those super high performing staff, you've got to really show up and be there for them and lead in that kind of way. It can supply a specific task. There's some things that you can. Just show you don't care about to try to get the message across that this is not where we should be focusing. You need to be working on this other thing. And that all sends an important message, I think. I've heard this in a lot of trainings and other places, but you're when you become the manager, your your actions and your messages are very noticed by everybody. And it's a big change having that spotlight on you and kind of understanding that even when you're not saying something, you're saying something.

Speaker1:
Awesome. I am going to depart from some of our prepared questions for just a second because all three of you mentioned training and I think a lot of times we don't think about managers getting training in management or managers getting training and leadership. We we assume that they've been like in a perfect world, they've been made a manager because they'll be good at it. But we all know that that's not how the sort of promotion process always works. And particularly within federal government, you get to a certain point in your career and you really do need to decide are you going subject matter expertize or are you going to be managing people? Because that's how you can continue to contribute and learn new things. But I what what about becoming a manager convinced you that you guys needed to keep getting training and to keep learning?

Speaker3:
I like to go first on that because it was really an easy transition for me because I was already an HR professional going into advocacy for employee training and development. And what I learned is that you have got to take advantage of the different types of leadership development programs that your agency offers even before you become a manager. If you can get into like NASA has a program called NASA's first for early career employees where they can begin to start thinking strategically, managing a project, getting in front of senior leadership so you know how to speak to them, promote to them, and you know how to create decision packages for recommendations and that those are just building blocks. And so also if there's even technical classes, because as a supervisor, I think one of the other panelists mentioned it, you're expected to know everything. Everyone's looking at you for answers. And so for me, even though the presidential management intern program did give me budget training, I still took more budget training once I got to NASA. And it helped because I was managing a center budget and I even took some employee development classes because now I was managing in an employee development area. So I definitely advocate lifelong learning no matter what you're doing because things are changing, you can't stay static. You are always going to have to be ready to be in front of what's new, what's happening, what the current trends are. So yes, training is definitely important.

Speaker2:
Yeah, I certainly agree with that sentiment of not just doing some initial training early on, which is very valuable. I still remember I, I could only sign up for a half day training on how to be a manager. That's all the budget that really was and all the classes that were available. But the the lesson I learned just from that one lesson, which was many, many years ago, was when you're the manager, get that monkey off your back. It was a staffer. You're used to just taking the assignment, owning it. But as a manager, when your boss gives you assignments, you can't own it. By definition, you've got to be good at delegating information and get delegating assignments. And then over time, I certainly agree with Letitia. It's very valuable to always look for more training. One that I found incredibly helpful was a yearlong leadership course from the Partnership for Public Service, where we would fly and learn something for about a week in some part of the country from businesses and different kinds of governments. Fly back and apply it for two or three months. One particular element of leadership and then fly out and learn something else and start adding on to that. It was incredibly valuable. So always pursuing improving yourself as a manager and leader, I certainly could totally agree with.

Speaker1:
Andre.

Speaker2:
Anything bad?

Speaker4:
Yeah, just a slightly different experience. And I think Mark and Latisha being kind of subject matter experts in their field and kind of coming up in that lane. I am more of a generalist. I don't have a specific area of policy expertize. I studied government management and grad school and was attracted to the PMF, partially for those just general management type of experiences. I'm doing general administration type stuff now. So for for coming up through the ranks, I actually had a lot of opportunity to take management type training early on. So I probably have had far less in recent years than maybe I need, but I was able to use the PMF program to really get a lot of broad experiences and great training that I didn't really have the chance to put into practice immediately. But those lessons stay somewhere deep in your mind and have been able to kind of remember some of those things from way back when, stuff from grad school, stuff from the PMF training. So to the extent that there's some PMF still kind of in the program and able to take advantage of those now, I think it's really a great time to kind of broaden out and just take advantage of the wealth of opportunities. I think some of the examples mentioned Partnership for Public Services is outstanding. Some of those leadership development programs, those farther along the the SES development programs are really good as well.

Speaker2:
So I.

Speaker4:
Would encourage you all to take a look at those.

Speaker1:
Now to clarify, are all of you or Marc, were you when you were in federal service SES. Okay? No. So I'm going to talk to you real quick, Leticia. Why not? What did you what was the decision you made to go see this person or to not go in your case, to not go see this? What what helped you make that decision? Oh, you're muted.

Speaker3:
Becoming a supervisor. When I became a supervisor, I learned that that was not my path of mentorship. I enjoyed working with employees to help them be them better, their better selves. And I had opportunities that I saw within my own organization where I could use my skills differently. And so and I knew that it just wasn't supervision for me. And so I just took another position in a different direction.

Speaker2:
Awesome.

Speaker1:
All right, so what what was the hardest part about becoming a manager? Like what? What are the sort of downsides to consider when you're making the decision whether to step up and officially supervise versus not?

Speaker3:
I'll go. I wanted to step up because I thought that I had lost the passion I had for being a generalist or person. I wanted something different, and this was about ten years into my career. I said maybe seven, 7 to 10 years into my career. And I said, I want to do something different. And so I said, Let me take on something that is in my organization. So it was still kind of my comfort zone, but it was something that I had never done before. And so fear was a factor, of course, because it's the unknown. And so. I tried it. I applied for a supervisory position. I was selected and. Yeah, and I feel like everyone should do it. I think everyone should at some time in their career supervise so that they can see that other side of the organization. And even if, like me, you decide I'm not going to make a career of supervising people, I can manage projects, manage programs. I don't want to manage people. I want to offer something different to people. At least you can say you've done it and of course you learn something from that experience. And I think it's made me more effective in my program and project management, because now I have a sense of what senior management really needs to make decisions.

Speaker1:
All right. Henry, how about you? What? What are the cons that what are the sort of the pros and cons you consider when you're making the decision to step up and become a supervisor?

Speaker2:
Yeah.

Speaker4:
On the pros and cons side, you know, it's a lot about what struck me most. Coming into it from the con side was just how difficult it is to deal with everyone's personal issues. So that that was a part I was kind of blissfully ignorant about. And, you know, you wonder why things don't necessarily play out the way they should and everybody's working towards the same goal and things like that. And then you are just kind of bombarded with everyone's personal issues that they're dealing with, and it's really a challenging part. It can be incredibly heartbreaking in some instances. Just the whether it's the employee themselves or their family or friends or things like that, you just get the full breadth of everyone's humanity as part of it and the work becomes somewhat secondary. Sometimes it just becomes over so overwhelming that it almost numbs you to it. But you know, what you see in the bigger picture, too, I think, is that people might say, oh, why are you giving so-and-so a pass? They're not pulling their weight. And it's like, well, there's some private things that they don't want shared, that they're not really able to be their full selves while they're here. And it's really just to me, that's been the hardest part of it, and it really does wear on you a bit. You got to kind of thicken your skin a little bit just to get through it. But that was one that kind of I think I still would be a manager if I knew that before joining, but it really is the hardest part of dealing with it. You have this ideal of what you're going to accomplish going in, and then they're just personal realities are often the thing that they get in the way of of effectuating some of those kind of changes.

Speaker3:
Can I add something to what Henry said?

Speaker1:
Absolutely.

Speaker3:
So he brought up a good point that made me think of this. One of the downsides is that you don't realize how your relationships will change when you go from being an individual contributor to a supervisor. You know, the people who you used to head down working on stuff together and going out together, gossiping, talking, all that. Once you transition to another level, your relationships have to change and you try to balance and not have too much of a negative impact happen. But you're now in a position where you might be evaluating your friend's performance, now deciding who gets performance awards, how much you know, your approval, the personal people's personal issues that Henry was talking about you then really not only are you hearing personal issues just as like talk over lunch, but you're now being required to adjudicate some of those desires and wishes from your former individual contributors. So that really it's an adjustment. I don't know whether I would call it a negative, but you've got to be aware that you are not the same in the organization as you were before you went into supervision or management.

Speaker4:
Let's say. Yeah, that's such a great point. I totally just echo that. And your it does change friendships like as a manager, you it's almost nice to start. I moved on to a different job and we're starting fresh there. So no one had that preconceived and knew me and said, You're supposed to do this and do that. It really is kind of freeing and most opportunities are going to be kind of coming up from where you were. But that jump is kind of nice because you get a whole fresh set of people that don't have any expectations for you. Great point.

Speaker2:
Yeah.

Speaker1:
Mark, what about you?

Speaker2:
I totally agree with everything that's been said that I had written down some notes to talk about, but it's very mirrored in their in their comments. You just have so many difficult conversations as a manager. And you have seriously strained relationships of people that were your friends or that that look at you in a totally different way now that you're a manager. And I mean, I'll just give one example. I have a number, but I'm not going to depress you with it. I'll just give one. And that was I had a secretary that was assigned to me from another part of the department, which I knew was a signal, this is going to be a problem. And it was. And I met with her the day before she arrived, and I said, you know, one of my values is that I'll know when you're coming to work. It seems like a basic thing to ask. And I said, I don't care when you come, you could start between 7 a.m. and 9 a.m.. It doesn't matter to me. That's the core working. Time to start. You tell me.

Speaker2:
I'm going to start at 830 every day. Just reinforce that you're coming tomorrow at 830. Is that what you're doing? You're telling me? Yes, I am. She got there at nine the next day and the next day. The day after that was 915, 930. Just kept getting later. I'm meeting with her every day. I'm emailing her. So I have a record now, getting her responses and then she just stopped coming to work altogether and it took eight months to actually fire her. The bureaucracy in government because of unions and because of management and politics can really slow down the process. And this happened to me a number of different times, and that just it really is painful. So you may really enjoy the assignment part of it. Delegation work with people on projects, which I did. I wouldn't give it up either. As Henry said, even if I knew these things, I'd still do it. But you've got to realize when you get into it, you're going to have some really tough conversations with some people over time. That'll be very painful.

Speaker4:
One thing if I could build on what Mark said there to the. You'll get your share of these as a manager. Certainly, and appreciate Mark's comment about plenty examples to choose from. I share that the one thing it took me a while and it really your first one hurts a lot and it feels very personal when you're dealing with one of those kind of issues and you get a grievance filed against you or something like that. But nine times out of ten, unless unless you're really doing something wrong and it does cause you to reflect on it and look back at it, it is not personal. They have other stuff going on in their lives. You are just kind of an outlet for that and you kind of see the other things that contribute it. Maybe they've got it out for the agency. Just remember, you're a representative of the agency or representing something else that's not going right in their lives. So don't don't take it personal, which is incredibly hard to do, especially the first time. But once you get through a couple of them talking about kind of thickening your skin on this stuff, it gets it's still painful, but it's somewhat easier to deal with.

Speaker1:
Awesome. I mean, not awesome, but that is it. It is comforting to know that that is that is not an outlier that like everybody who gets into some level of supervision, some level of management is going to have that kind of an experience. So while it's not pleasant, it's it's not uncommon. So anybody in the audience now, please go ahead and drop some questions in the chat. We'll try to get to some of those while we're waiting for those to come in.

Speaker2:
I wanted to point out something. You I think you've kind of merged a couple of questions that we were thinking about. And so I didn't address fully one of them. And that was when you mentioned pros and cons. I had talked about a con, but I just wanted to underscore a couple of the pros that I experienced as a manager in different agencies. And one to think about. And I and I'm glad Latisha brought it up. It's really important to be thinking through do you want do you enjoy being a manager or not and becoming a team lead, taking on assignments, volunteering to be that manager for a while while your boss is out are great ways that you can learn what it might be in a small sense. Not the personal side, but the work side I found found those very, very valuable. And you just want to really think through to what extent it's something you'd enjoy doing. Certainly the compensation will tend to be higher if you pursue the managerial route. For instance, if you looked at a GS 14 step ten non supervisory, it's about as high as you can get and compared that to an SDS that's been around for a couple of years and is getting a nice bonus, that can easily be a difference of more than 50,000 a year.

Speaker2:
And then that starts compounding when you look at retirement for one case. So the compensation is going to be quite different. But if you really don't like to manage, it's not worth going through it. I also think it would be to. I really enjoyed being a manager to see lots and be parts of lots of different projects, developing projects that had national implications, national consequences. I worked on, for instance, reducing homelessness and saw these massive reductions because the great work that people are doing on that, and it's very exciting to be part of those kinds of things that you could get as a staffer to some extent. But when you help develop the policies, create the programs, it can be very satisfying as well. And yeah, let me just leave it at that, but I just want to underscore that lots of wonderful things for becoming a manager and a leader.

Speaker1:
We are definitely going to touch on more of those good things too, because we don't want things to be all gloom and doom and sad. But we we we did get a couple of questions in. Did you find that being a PMF or PMI put you in a more competitive position for supervisory opportunities? How did how did the PMF program set you up or not in that regard?

Speaker3:
I want to take this one. So back in the Stone Age, the nineties, when I was a PMI at my agency coming in, people who are in this program sort of had it was like love, hate, because the image was, Oh, these PMIs are going to come in here and think they know everything and they're hot stuff and everybody's like, Ooh, we got a PMI. So on the one hand, it was great that the program said a lot, I think, for the quality of person that was coming into the agency. But there was also this kind of stigma of arrogance that came with it. And so one of the things that I had to just, you know, I had to just be myself, you know, I'm going to I'm me, you know, and I'll let my self speak for who I am. And so but I think because of that expectation that we're getting a quality person that you're expected to excel. So yeah, and I really do think the PMI program really helped me because of the the cohort I was in, the training we got, the development meant we got the rotational assignments that I was able to participate in and even the special activities around Washington, D.C., that I got to participate and I got to go places and meet people, you know, senators, Congress, people, you know, all types of wonderful people who gave us so many great career nuggets and management nuggets that it was a very worthwhile experience and program.

Speaker4:
And on that question, I would say. What was helpful in my career was being surrounded by other PMCs. And part of the reason I was hired in my in my initial placement was that my boss was a PMF. So kind of staying within the network that knows the program well, I think is is a huge advantage to kind of moving up. You have to have some flexibility and hope that the positions you're interested have folks that are familiar with the program. But I would say for me, it was it was definitely a net positive and partially because I was working for with people and for people that were very familiar with the program.

Speaker2:
Yeah, I would agree. It's definitely a plus. People know that to get into the program, you've got to be pretty sharp. And I'm just thinking about even today where I used to work at HUD and all of the offices around where I used to work at HUD, all of them. The directors are former PMF. So yeah. I would ask.

Speaker3:
I'd also like to add that one thing I learned by being in the program is that if I am in a room, I belong in a room, and so I don't have to be shy and sit on the sidelines, you know? I've learned confidence. I learned to listen. And I learned to contribute when I had something sound to say. And so I think I might have skipped a lot of the insecurity that I may have had if I hadn't started with the SMF program. So that helped a lot as well.

Speaker1:
Right. We've got a really interesting sort of somewhat not technical, but I guess very like calling calling on your experiences here. Everybody, any advice on becoming a supervisor to team members with more historical knowledge of an agency or division than you like? Like in this particular instance, this person is talking like minimum 15 years more experience doing the particular thing than them. How do you how do you come into that as a supervisor?

Speaker3:
I've totally been in that position when I went from individual contributor generalist HR. So I was doing that big, fast paced employee and labor relations and training to us was that other organization over there. We didn't do organizational development, we didn't do leadership development. So I really knew almost nothing about the training area. And so when I went into it, I had mentioned earlier I took classes to help bring me up to speed and I admitted from the jump, I said, you know, a lot of you here have been in this field and know more than I do, but I can. I did let them know that I was willing to learn. I was open to learning and I'm going to learn on my own as well. And so I think I think that was well received. And I think it helps allay any fears that. Not only was a new person coming in and probably going to change everything, but a new person who didn't know anything was going to come in and try to change everything. So I was just really upfront about my plans and who I was and acknowledging the fact that I know that there is a higher level of expertize in others than is within myself.

Speaker4:
I would say my my current job with the trustees program, I literally knew nothing about bankruptcy coming in there. And along the lines of what Latisha is saying there, just don't fake it. Don't try to make believe. You know, they're the experts. You're not. Generally speaking, if you're in one of these roles, you're not being hired to be an expert. You're being hired to manage them and kind of distribute the work and just no general things, knowing enough and knowing when to turn to them. I think I think they generally like having someone that is not going to question them or challenge them on certain things because that's that's where they they are the expert. So having the healthy interest, I think one of the things I asked for was a lot of briefing books before I started. So just showing the interest and learning and reading up on it I think goes a long way. But if they're going to be more excited for what it is that you bring that they don't have, and if you don't step on their toes too much and just let them be the smart ones, you know, great. Give me all the smart people. They can make us all look good and do the do the harder stuff. You're there to kind of organize and keep things moving along.

Speaker2:
Right. I was always trying to be humble when I became a new manager, openly saying, I am not the expert. I realize there's a lot of depth in this room. I really am going to be leaning on you to get this great work done so that they can feel respect for them.

Speaker1:
Great. So. I think another another area I want to circle back, because let's talk about some good stuff. What what is the best part about becoming a manager for you? What was either the best experience or the best the best change? Talk about something. Give me a really positive aspect about going into management. Mark, you're up because you called me out on this before.

Speaker2:
So I loved being at the decision making table in creating the policies at HUD for this relatively new thing called homelessness. Back then it was where we were getting staff input, but in the end the managers had to sit at a table and decide, what are we going to Congress for? What do we go to the White House for? How do we approach this subject? And it was just wonderful to be part of something that became very, very meaningful.

Speaker4:
For me, I'd say the breadth of the challenge is kind of along those same lines as you're when you're kind of a line employee, you're really focused on two or three things that you're repetitively doing. And that's your that's your role. But it's somewhat cliche. You don't know what problem is going to hit you every day coming in as a manager. And that's been a lot more interesting to me. I think I get bored if it's I'm one of those mile wide entity kind of guy. So having those different kinds of experience and things to tackle, even if you are a policy expert in one place, when you take on the managerial responsibility, it's just so, so many different things that you're going to be dealing with and exercising different parts of your brain.

Speaker1:
You're still muted, Leticia.

Speaker3:
I loved being in the position to be an advocate for the people in my organization. It might not always work out, but I just liked being able to show my organization that I was there for them and that I was willing to go to bat for them. I also enjoyed meeting getting a broader view of not just my center but my agency. I got to meet a lot of different people that I wouldn't have gotten to meet and be in circles that I wouldn't have been in had I not been a supervisor. And even when I'm not a supervisor now, I still have people know me from when I was a supervisor. I still can build on those relationships I had built when I was a supervisor. But most of all, I think I learned my own strength. I learned more about myself. I learned what was sustain me best in my career. And I learned.

Speaker2:
That.

Speaker3:
To stand up for myself.

Speaker1:
Wonderful. That's all really great stuff, guys. So how did you make the case that you were equipped to become a manager or a supervisor like the first time when you've got this body of work, what you've been doing as sort of an individual contributor or or having maybe been a team leader, managed a project. But like, what was the key for you to make that case or to decide, I can do this. I'm, I'm going to apply for this? What was was it like a switch that flipped or was it a slow build of confidence? What what how did that how did you navigate that?

Speaker4:
I think some of the things you mentioned there are critical. So coming up through the team lead was was a big part of my progression. So it's taking those opportunities. I think working groups, if you can get on those, particularly those that maybe are somewhat pesky to your boss and they they just want somebody to competently run it and give them results. But it's not necessarily the thing they're most interested in. You learn a lot from building up that, and if you can show good results, you'll build that confidence. But I think it is just if there's an opportunity to be acting within your office, I think that's another great opportunity and kind of building off that. It's frustrating when the previous boss was making more money than you for some time, but that experience is invaluable and it looks really helpful on the resume once once you're ready to apply for the full time gig. So I grew a lot of what was in the question I think is is part of the path there.

Speaker2:
Yeah. For me, it was unusual. My first managerial position was the deputy director of a federal agency, a very small but a federal agency. So as my subject matter, expertize that people realize, well, he's like one of the few experts around, but we might as well just use him. So. So that's a very unusual thing. So I do want to underscore that something that might be more relevant is and it's been mentioned by me and a couple of people so far, and that is this example of just grab every opportunity you can to be a manager type person. I remember I was overwhelmed in an office with way too many assignments and I got to brand new assignments coming in. They were White House assignments that I had to have interagency programs created with different agencies, and I had no staff persons to give them to. And I assign them to a PMF and an intern, a federal intern. And I said, I have all the confidence in you because I've seen your work. I know you can pull this off. I have your back. When people say, I don't believe she's competent. They're both women and they just were awesome. And that experience just helped them in so many ways. One became the I think she was the deputy chief of staff of HUD just a couple of years later, in part because they could see that she jumped onto assignments, own them and just excelled. Awesome.

Speaker1:
So let's. I want to pull on that just a second before we switch back to some of the sort of how do you balance that life as a manager but. As a manager, how do you view your role in setting people up to succeed, particularly when you've got a standout employee who may not have the GS level for the work that they're producing? How what what do you view your role as when when you're the manager in terms of building up others?

Speaker2:
If you don't mind, I'm going to jump in because I want to use this example I just provided. Those two people I picked were the lowest rated people in my division. There was in my office. There was nobody lower graded and I picked them because I knew they were competent. And there were some they were like, Jeez, nine and a GS seven I think. And the GS 13, some of them were not happy, but. They've got assignments. They were overwhelmed. They couldn't take anything more on. And so I was always looking for who was hungry for work, who really wants to be developing and who wants to own work and excel. And it's kind of like the 3070 rule. My experience was about 30% of the folks in my division or my office or whatever were just incredible performers that would pull it off no matter what I asked them to do. And the other 70 were just a mix of just kind of content or I'm going to pull the union card if if you add Give me one more assignment and just weren't looking for more challenging work. And so you get to know who those people are. And if people want to move over and take on more assignments, I was always willing to give it to them. But I think for me, it seemed pretty clear usually who wanted and who wanted more assignments, and I'd be more than happy to develop those skills with them if they didn't have them.

Speaker3:
Yeah, I agree with that. And also, if I. And looking at staff and you see people might not even people who always make it known that they might want to do something. But still, as a supervisor looking at the work that they have done to approach people and say, you know, I have something that I think you do really well on or, you know, let's try this out to see how it goes. I think also to set an environment where you make it okay for people to come forward and talk about what their career goals are, what where they want to see themselves, and maybe start to be able to parcel out assignments that help them learn those skills that they want to do. Because you have some people who are just like it was mentioned, Mark mentioned that are just they're just doing what they're doing and they're content. And you even have some people that are malcontent that all they can do is complain about the work that they have. But even. And now I think. Knowing that people learn differently. They have different personality types and their productiveness. Certain ways that it is the responsibility of a supervisor to try and equitably see to the the needs and the development of their employees.

Speaker1:
Any thoughts, Henry?

Speaker4:
Yeah, I'm peering at the chat, too, and I'll. I'll pick on the other Henry out there. So he's always got to look out for Henry. But I think related to this question, how do you deal with those that are just doing the bare minimum? You know, I think part of it's defining if they are doing the bare minimum good. How are you asking about the bare minimum? There are certainly those that are not even doing the bare minimum and that's the hard part to deal with. But I probably over rely on my best performers and I think for the most part they're okay with that. There's certainly times where I know I've leaned on them too heavily and it's just really showing the appreciation there for them. And you know, there's people are on different paths, those that are kind of always looking to get better. And no matter what point they are in their career, they're going to appreciate it and want those challenges. And as long as they are doing the bare minimum, that's good. And it's you know, we have the ratings and it's successful. If you're successful, that's good and you just kind of live with it. It's not. Is it fair? No. But is it how you're going to get the best results? I think so. And, you know, you're going to pick a lot of fights and probably not get forward on it. But you have those that that want to get better, just kind of lean into them and don't kind of manage to your lowest common denominator.

Speaker2:
I would certainly I appreciate all these comments and they resonate with me as well. I really enjoyed I enjoyed and hated the that the semiannual the annual sit down where you're really talking about progress and detailed ways. And it's stressful. It's really stressful because you have six, seven, eight, ten different people coming to you, all very anxious in their own right. And you've got to handle all of those different conversations. And for the people that are really, you know, just barely performing. And if I would give them just a barely performing rating, it was always useful to see how that reaction would really take place. And if they were sincerely interested in proving it was great, because I would go into great detail about if you want to get to a high league or an outstanding, these are the very specific things you need to do and you will get that rating. So in the end, it's I think it's so important to be clear in those tough. Candid conversations during the reporting period where there's no doubt. So you don't want to wait until the end for them to realize they're not getting the rating they expected. They should know that way in advance so you can be managing expectations, expectations, and not have a really frustrated employee on your hands.

Speaker4:
Mark makes just a fantastic point about those. They're the performance plans because I'm guessing just about everybody on this call is a PMF. You're you're used to the outstandings and maybe they sprinkle in one. Excellent. So it doesn't resonate to you until you're really managing others where you see that you have some that are successful might even be a stretch there, but they really are impactful. And to the point, as long as you're doing it along the line, you don't want to surprise them at the last minute. You've been harboring all this internal angst against the employee, and now you're going to let them have it at that performance review. It's got to be kind of over time, and they won't be surprised. You make it clear that things aren't going great and successful is good. I mean, there's great inflation, no question, across the the federal government. We've looked at the stats around it, but those that thought they were excellent, they get knocked down to successful marks. Absolutely right. It's a great tool because some really want to be excellent or they really want to be outstanding and they will go above and beyond. And maybe they've just gotten kind of complacent and you can turn people around by using that tool.

Speaker1:
Awesome. All right. So I've got one more question for you guys before we turn to our sort of networking groups, but talk to me a little bit about what you'd wish you'd known about work life balance before becoming a manager, or conversely, what you found out about that balance once you became a manager. I know, Henry, obviously you've got young kids. How how do you how do you balance the fact that a lot of times when you're up for those early managerial or supervisory positions, you may be managing a young family as well. How does that work?

Speaker4:
I think a lot of it is the type of jobs that you're interviewing for. So I think that is for me personally, that was a big part of kind of sussing out something I'd be interested in if it was going to give me a level of balance. Personally, I just and I have nothing but the utmost respect for the people that that do those 24 seven type jobs where you're constantly on call, working 9100 hours a week, certainly working more than average. But. Stuff. Still waiting for you tomorrow. I'm rarely on something that's an emergency or crisis kind of thing. And what I love to do some of those jobs. Sure. Am I going to trade it off my family time for it? No. So it really comes down to the type of things as you're interviewing and job search and to kind of suss out how much of a commitment is going to be entailed there. I did get scared away a little bit in my current job with some of the bosses, some of the questions my boss asked about time commitment. But overall he's been very respectful and I think the flexibility with the max telework and all that has really been helpful in dealing with that too, because, you know, if you put in your time at the office and then come back and log in on the computer after your kids go to bed, those kind of things make it work and keep you keep your head above water. But I have nothing but energy for those with the critical emergency jobs that are on call 24/7. I need sleep so I can't do it.

Speaker3:
I did have small children when I was starting out as a manager. And you know, I love that my spouse helped out when I just needed to do work. And this was before we were teleworking and remote working. You know, those may be flexible work schedules was implemented, but you know, I was at work all the time. Luckily there was a childcare center on site. And I remember having you know, I had a management team that was very accommodating because I nursed my daughters while I was a manager. You know, they would page me on my to tell you how long ago this was. I had a beeper, and they would they would beat me and I would go feed my kids and I would sometimes be in meetings and have to leave. So I think an organization's culture is very important. You need to be in an environment that's going to support you. And sometimes I remember bringing my kids, I pick them up from the day the childcare on site and bring them back to the office, you know, maybe run and get them something to eat. But so it takes a lot. It really does. And that's why having an organization that supportive and will allow you the space to get your work done the best you can is really important.

Speaker2:
I have five children. My wife did not work outside the home. I wanted to be around my kids, though. And so one of my very first managerial assignments, my boss just told me flat out, if you don't work overtime every single day, I will never give you an outstanding rating. And I didn't I don't care then, because my family is actually a lot more important to me than this job. And over time, because of the number of kids we had, we had to move outside of the D.C. area right away. So as an hour and 20 commute each way to get to work. So I'd work a lot. In fact, the last few years when I last seven or so years, I was working overtime, you know, like a regular basis, but not crazy. But then I just get on the train and work on BlackBerry and just keep on doing it. And most managers I saw really could appreciate that balance. I think I had one just fanatic when I looked at his own lifestyle, his own personal life, I realized that's just not what he ever valued. So I think that's fairly atypical. I think most managers really do appreciate your own bosses would really appreciate having some decent work life balance.

Speaker4:
Just to add on what his point on the daycare stuff, my younger daughter Audrey was at the HUD daycare when I was there, which was just great. It was fantastic to be able to hop in at lunchtime and, you know, get you through a lot of difficult times in the office when you get to see their smiling faces. And so if you're lucky enough to have an agency that has that service, it's a great one. And I recommend that it really it's really a nice way to break up your day.

Speaker1:
Awesome. All right. So, first of all, thank you, Mark, Henry and Latasha so much. You guys are phenomenal. And thank you for for sharing all of these insights with us. We would love to have you hang around. We're going to break out now into some smaller networking groups to give folks a chance to talk. I know, Henry, you mentioned something about potentially having job openings.

Speaker4:
Yeah, we're we are always, always interested in delis. We are hiring. Although I will say our budget wasn't as generous as I hoped it would have been a couple of days ago. But we are, if not in a growth mode now, we will be in the future. So yes, I am always happy to talk to good PMS that would be interested in learning more about bankruptcy or even better yet already experienced in it somehow.

Speaker1:
Excellent. So we are going to flip over to our our networking smaller groups to give you all a chance to chat, get to know each other and thank you all so very much for coming. I will say before we go, if you enjoyed this program, please visit our Web site. Ww Upmarket US, volunteer with us, donate to us, get connected, help us continue to grow this community because we're here for you. So I'm going to go ahead and put us in some breakout rooms. Enjoy chatting, folks.

Speaker2:
Okay.

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