Here’s a video I just posted to YouTube discussing how to decide whether or not to hold a meeting.

You have to dress the part, you have to look like a manager, if you want people to perceive you as a manager. Not sure you believe this? Then watch my new video and leave your comment below.

Time management for managers often comes down to an ability to distinguish between tasks that are important, and those that are merely urgent. Why does that matter?

To answer that question, I posted this video on YouTube. Here’s the link:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1uP7O3a8ANk

Watch the video, take a good look at your To Do list, and take action!

Here’s a video I recently posted on YouTube, advising new managers (like you!) to be patient with themselves instead of expecting to learn everything at once. It’s great advice for new managers!

Many new managers feel frustrated because they can’t get on with what they perceive as their work for dealing with interruptions by their team members. In this video, I talk about why you shouldn’t resent these interruptions, and also give you some tips on how to deal with them. Enjoy the video, and remember to leave your comments.

If you look closely at winning teams, you’ll see they have certain characterics in common. And great team leaders work to establish and maintain these team characteristics because they lead to high performance, high productivity and – just as important – to satisfaction among team members.

Here’s a video I made for you describing those characteristics of winning teams.

Team collaboration, extra drive for special projects, stepping up to help other team members, team motivation: all these are automatically increased when you have a team whose members trust one another. Here’s a video I made for you on how to build trust on your team.

I recently did an interview with Tom Cox on his Internet radio program, Tom on Leadership. It was all about how to use the first 30 days of your new position to get you off to a good start. If you’d like to hear some great insights from both Tom and me, here’s the link to the recording:

Guidance for the Newly Promoted

I’d love to have your comments on the ideas Tom and I discussed, and especially if you put them into practice.

Most people I know start each work day with good intentions and a To Do list. Sadly, by the end of each day the To Do list has gone by the board and the good intentions have evaporated in a black cloud of frustration.

Does that describe you? As a manager, you need to have a system that ensures that you get done the things you need to get done, despite the chaos around you. Time management for managers requires a better To Do List.

The traditional To Do list is simply a list of the names of things you want to get done. You sit down and start jotting down, or typing in, all the things that pop into your head that you’d like to get done today — and that list can be dauntingly long by the time you’ve finished. That’s not a To Do List — that’s a brain dump.

The first problem is that there’s no difference on the list between a 2-minute item and a 2-hour item — they’re both just items. So how can you possibly know how many you can fit into your day?

There’s a simple solution to this. Block off the amount of time you will devote to each item. This forces you to really think about the size of each task, and when it totals up to about 15 hours of work, you know you can’t do it in an eight-hour day — it just doesn’t compute and it’s not going to happen.

But this reality check will help you become practical and cull the list so that the block for each item has a place on your schedule. Now all you have to do is put them in order and work through them.

“Huh!” I hear you say, “what about all the interruptions?”

Ah well, that’s a subject for another day — stay tuned!

Problem solving is one of the most challenging skills for new managers. In this new 12-minute video, I give you one model of collaborative problem solving. Try it, on your own or with your team.