Who wouldn't want to work from home? Whether it's once a week or every workday, the option to telecommute is considered a huge benefit to employees. But what happens when you're the one responsible for supervising those virtual employees—how does that change the situation?
The Association for Talent Development's ACCEL model defines the five skills necessary for managerial success as accountability, collaboration, communication, engagement, and listening and assessing. It's difficult enough to accomplish all those when you're in the same building as your staff; however, I imagine it's even more challenging when your team members have rarely—if ever—met in person.
Yes, of course, there's videoconferencing, Google Docs, instant messaging, and several other tools to help simulate less distance. But as Benjamin Bisbee and Kathy Wisniewski write in the cover story, there's more to it than having the right technology. "At the end of the day, technology cannot save a bad manager," they write. "New software doesn't make you more accountable if you're already struggling with managing your team." In their article, the authors offer four requirements "for a flourishing, successful, well-balanced, and well-organized virtual manager."
And regardless of whether you're a manager who works in or out of the office, there are certain financial skills you need to know. Starting on page 32, Lianabel Oliver Bigas outlines the specific competencies around which talent development professionals should develop financial training programs for managers. So, with your manager hat on, read up on the financial knowledge you should have, and then with your talent development hat on, think of the ways to create training content that will help managers in your organization to attain that knowledge.
If you haven't picked up on it already, managers are getting the love in this issue. Even if you're not a manager, there are certainly some takeaways from these articles, as well as a variety of other topics to dive into among the remaining content.
Vanessa St. Gerard
Editor
