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As an entrepreneur, it often feels like all tasks depend on you. They don’t have to. It’s important to hire manager-level employees who can help relieve some of that tension and execute on strategy for you — so you can keep making decisions that move the company forward.
You can’t trust just anyone with your business, though.
That’s why we asked 13 successful entrepreneurs the following:
Q. What do you believe is the most important trait for a manager-level employee?
Their best answers are below:
1. Confidence to Make Decisions
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Manager-level employees are paid to make decisions, yet many don’t have the confidence or maturity levels to effectively do so. Front-line employees are counting on their manager’s ability to make effective decisions.
– Andrew Schrage, Money Crashers Personal Finance
2. Ability to Delegate Tasks
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When you’re promoting a star employee to a manager, you need to make sure he is comfortable delegating tasks. Many managers might worry about giving tasks to others, fearing results won’t meet the standards they set for themselves. However, delegating is the only way for a manager to truly be effective and lead a team without being a constant bottleneck.
– Bhavin Parikh, Magoosh Test Prep
3. Ability to Explain the Vision
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The CEO is often the one who employees expect to sell them the company’s vision, but managers are also responsible for selling the same vision to those they manage. Why is this important? Your tech guys speak a different language than your marketing team, and each group needs a manager who can explain how the vision relates to them so they can do their jobs exceptionally well.
– Danny Wong, Blank Label Group
4. True Passion
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When a manager believes in the team and the company’s goals and missions, that passion will trickle down to the employees he manages. The manager will give direction, and it will be backed by a true love for the job and the business. Hopefully, that becomes contagious.
– Michael Patak, TopstepTrader
5. Ability to Listen
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He or she should be able to listen because managing is about working with people. As a manager, your job is to understand the needs of the people you manage and come up with ways to help them. It starts with listening.
– Michael Seiman, CPX Interactive
6. Resourcefulness
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The most important trait for a manager-level employee is resourcefulness. Managers are expected to see challenges from a higher level, allowing them to keep tabs on multiple issues simultaneously without letting any one item slip through the cracks. This way, managers can source the most effective members of their team to focus on and attack problems with the level of detail required.
– Ted Murphy, IZEA
7. Ability to Relate
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Managers need to be able to relate to the jobs of the people they are managing. The most crucial trait managers can have is to truly understand who they are managing. They also need to have an intimate knowledge of the jobs of everyone who works under them, and there is no better way to capture that knowledge than to actually have done those jobs themselves.
– Danny Boice, Speek
8. Compassion
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To be a successful manager, you must have compassion for your team. This involves being able to listen with an open mind and having patience. When you have compassion, you will be able to help your employees reach success.
– Heather Huhman, Come Recommended
9. A Knack for Reading People
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Managers are responsible for the motivation and productivity of their team. Doing this comes much less from multitasking or organizational skills than it does from being able to accurately read the people working for them. Employees have both instances of ingenuity and moments of lost focus. Great managers know how to spot both, encourage employees and ultimately make use of each.
– Vanessa Nornberg, Metal Mafia
10. Empathy
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For manager-level employees, skills and competence are necessary components to success. But the most important trait that differentiates a good manager from a great one is the ability to empathize, connect and influence others: peers, reports and managers. Empathy makes them better listeners and problem-solvers.
– Shradha Agarwal, ContextMedia
11. Ability to Give Feedback
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Too many managers, and even more senior leaders, reserve giving feedback for yearly or semi-annual reviews at best. When a manager waits until a problem has risen, it’s usually too late for the employee to change. The habit has been formed. Managers must start giving employees feedback on the behaviors they want to solidify as well as those that need to be reshaped.
– Alexia Vernon, Alexia Vernon Empowerment, LLC
12. Self-Awareness
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Being a manager requires a combined sense of confidence and humility — often directly a result of being self-aware. Having the self-awareness to identify when you need to delegate, provide direction and motivate are all about being in-tune to not only those you manage, but also how you respond to their needs and attitudes. Ideally, you’ll be able to foster self-awareness in them, too!
– Melissa Pickering, iCreate to Educate
13. Ability to Manage up (and Down)
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The most elusive trait to find in managers is the ability to manage up as well as down! A good manager has to not only support and anticipate the problems of upper management, but also empower and grow the confidence of employees under their supervision. Balancing these two important roles is essential and usually can’t be taught.
– Kim Kaupe, ‘ZinePak
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About Young Entrepreneur Council
The Young Entrepreneur Council (YEC) is an invite-only organization comprised of the world's most promising young entrepreneurs. In partnership with Citi, YEC recently launched BusinessCollective, a free virtual mentorship program that helps millions of entrepreneurs start and grow businesses.
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