László Károlyi - Business Chameleon - A practical guide to success for managers

Business Chameleon

A Practical Guide To Succ Ess For Managers

Copyright 2014 Lszl Krolyi.

All Rights Reserved. No Part Of This Book May Be Used Or Reproduced By Any Means, Graphic, Electronic, Or Mechanical, Including Photocopying, Recording, Taping Or By Any Information Storage Retrieval System Without The Written Permission Of The Publisher Except In The Case Of Brief Quotations Embodied In Critical Articles And Reviews.

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Isbn: 978-1-4917-5341-5 (Sc)

Isbn: 978-1-4917-5342-2 (E)

Library Of Congress Control Number: 2014921667

Iuniverse Rev. Date: 12/23/2014

CONTENTS

We gladly accepted Lszl Krolyis invitation to introduce his book, which will undoubtedly be profitable reading for anyone taking on a managerial position. We are sure we can draw inspiration from this series of practical examples forming the chapters of a management story and so many real-life situationssome successful, others less sooffering tips and suggestions of some kind.

Management is a difficult art that allows, over time, across the seasons of the year and of each of our lives, teams to move forward toward improvement and success, while giving each and every member the possibility of growing and maturing.

In these few words of introduction, we would simply like to highlight a handful of parameters that we consider important to remember in the management of people. First, though, we need perhaps to get back to basics for a moment, just to remind ourselves of what it is we call manage ment .

While the English term management has been adopted by the French Academy, which recommends a French pronunciationwe are unsure of the rule in Hungarianit is interesting to note that the words manager and management are actually derived from the French words mnager and mnagement , which according to the Collins Robert French Dictionary mean handling with care.

A manager is someone capable of using the means available to achieve the best possible results. Lszl Krolyi focuses on the management of human resources, and this is clearly where a true managers real added value lies. We would like briefly to highlight just a few key ingredients of these considerations on management:

• It seems to us that to manage a team effectively, you need to acknowledge a variety of personalities and often cultures and therefore to encourage both individual and group expression to foster both diversity and tolerancein other words, to facilitate coexistence. This has become all the more essential now that travel is so much easier today that people, especially within Europe, can very easily move from one country to another in pursuit of work. Facilitating coexistence therefore also means mixing new recruits and experienced staff on the same teams, where each will be able to contribute specific added value.
• We might add that a team needs optimism, objectives, and vision, though it is not always easy to provide such a perspective. A good manager will focus efforts on specific objectives, inspiring trust and confidence in others by setting them challenges that can be met successfully. This way, the loop of success becomes a virtuous circle that generates progress.
• Effective management requires an ability to provide meaning and give bearings by clearly situating each decision in time and in its context, by telling the story that led to these decisions, relying on the intrinsic need for meaning, transmission, and cultural enrichment.
• Effective management requires relating ones action to the outside world, to society, to the economic and sometimes political background, and trying to anticipate potential developments. Though by no means always easy, thinking ahead to the future can be a key to supporting ones decisions.
• Effective management requires listening and being attentive to what your team is sayingand also to what they may not be saying, being able to decode silence and the unspoken word.
• Last but not least, we should like to stress the need for managers to be recognized for their ethical and exemplary behavior. You cannot expect others to do what you do not demand of yourself. Consistency in what you say and do is essential. This is called congr uity .

There is of course a lot more to say on this topic, but we shall leave that to the author of this valuable book. The above is merely a glance at some of the aspects we wished to highlight, which you will find addressed in more detail in the pages that follow.

Enjoy your read.

Gilles Schnepp

Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Legrand G roup

Edith Dumas

Former Legrand Group Vice President, Internal Communications and External Relat ions

All life battles teach us something, even those we lose.

Paulo Co elho

You must learn from your battles if you want to reach your goals. In my opinion, in todays dynamically changing world, its more important than ever to expand our knowledge base and promote good decision-making by acquainting ourselves with the experiences of others and by analyzing and evaluating them. This book presents the reader with thought-provoking stories and experiences collected at the frontier between theory and practice, between the global and local, with advice drawn primarily from business life. Given that it focuses on people, teams, and efficient cooperation, I think that it may help readers make good decisions not only in the business sector but also in other areas of life. According to an old proverb, a wise man learns from someone elses mistakes. Turning that into the positive, I would say lets learn also from one anothers successes.

Many management gurus have described their own approaches as to what to do and how to do it in order to make an enterprise prosper. In the global world, at times of crisis, one must often venture into new hunting grounds or find a new way around a familiar hunting area thats changed. Any idea may be useful at such times, and whats more, it is almost risk-free to draw on the experience and ideas of others. Experience obtainable that way is obviously badly needed while facing protracted economic uncertainty and a foggy, uncertain business environment. Reliable planning is limited to the short term, and one is often forced to make decisions based on partial information, but nevertheless, there are and there will always be good ideas to help develop companies.

In recent years, I have often seen assessments from analysts sounding the death knell for the future because of the difficulties of the economic environment. These difficulties notwithstanding, I think Franklin D. Roosevelt had a point when he observed that there are as many opinions as there are experts. In many respects, economic developments resemble the changing of the seasons, with inconvenient and more popular periods alternating. Were all entitled to our opinions, but we have to make decisions and develop activities in all seasonal conditions.

Transition is slow sometimes, as if time had come to a standstill on a sweltering summer day or a humid late autumn day wetted by soft rain. At other times, however, a gust of stormy wind suddenly turns everything upside down. That is how it is in the economic environment too. Farmers may note sadly the damage caused by an unexpected storm; nevertheless, they start anew each year. Of course, they learn the lesson and try whatever they can to protect the crop with new solutions against changing environmental effects. And if such guarantees take into consideration the environmental impact and do not exploit nature, the cycle can be assessed as one that represents a development system sustainable in the long run.