Leadership and Management in the Engineering Sector

A Toolkit for SMEs

Leadership and Management in the Engineering Sector – A Toolkit for SMEs

IntroductionEngineering makes up an essential part of the UK economy. 27% of UK businesses are in the engineering sector, employing 19% of the total workforce and generating 23% of the UK’s turnover. The sector faces challenges as it prepares to face the future not only as disruptive technologies begin to impact on parts of the industry but also as the industry’s resilience to adapt and change is tested. Key to this is access to and development of skilled labour. Nationally, there are concerns over the scarcity of skilled engineers to meet demand with 26% of engineering sector employers reporting recruitment difficulties. To be competitive, employers will need to consider the development of existing employees to increase productivity, prepare for replacement demand as older employees retire and respond to changes in the industry presented by new technology or emerging markets.

In a bid to address skills shortages, the government has put strategies and policies in place such as promotion of STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Maths) particularly to women, at GCSE and A-level, the introduction of T-levels in 2020 plus the development of Apprenticeships to include the roll out of Degree level routes. Although the importance of increasing availability of diverse skilled labour to the workforce is clear, there is also a responsibility amongst employers to ensure that knowledge and skills are not lost when older workers leave the workforce. Facilitating the intergenerational transfer of skills within the business should be a priority as should attracting and retaining staff whether it is offering an apprenticeship or introducing ways of working to prolong the years of work available to older staff by providing flexible working arrangements.

Many small engineering employers are engineers themselves and do not have formal business or management skills but have built successful businesses as a direct result of their specific knowledge and expertise. Engineers are required to work in a collaborative manner, with clients, other experts and their teams. However, strategic thinking and planning is not always given as much importance. Managing a business is often a balancing act between preserving a hard won, existing reputation and finding the next job whilst managing day-to-day demands. Improved Leadership and Management Skills would enable you to look critically at your business, staff and resources to identify where opportunities are and how best to address threats or challenges.

This Toolkit is a practical application of proven models and approaches to growing a business and exists to help owners of small and micro-businesses create opportunities to move from being an operational service deliverer to being the leader, manager and owner of an ambitious, growing, engineering business.

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Leadership and Management in the Engineering Sector – A Toolkit for SMEs

This ToolkitTo achieve real business growth, the people in the business must grow!

This Leadership and Management Toolkit has been designed as a practical resource to enable owners and managers of SMEs in the Engineering sector to prepare themselves for growth by developing the capabilities of their employees.

It allows the business to develop their employees’ technical and relationship management skills without having to take too much time away from day-to-day operations. Each Tool is practical in its approach and includes templates, which can be used when it is convenient for the business. Participants are not required to enrol on regular, scheduled courses.

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Leadership and Management in the Engineering Sector – A Toolkit for SMEs

Leadership and Management in the Engineering SectorA Toolkit for SMEs

ContentsIntroduction.................................................................................................................1

This Toolkit..................................................................................................................2

Contents......................................................................................................................3

Getting Results Through the Work of Others..............................................................4

How to use this Toolkit................................................................................................4

Situational Leadership.................................................................................................5

Effective Delegation is Critical to Growth....................................................................6

The Delegation Process..............................................................................................6

Strategic Planning Process.........................................................................................8

Strategic Tools: Strengths, Weaknesses Opportunities Threats (SWOT) Analysis.. . .9

How to conduct a SWOT Analysis using Brown Papering........................................10

SWOT Analysis Guidelines.......................................................................................10

Appendix 1 - Situational Leadership – Developing the Styles...................................11

Appendix 2 - Delegation Tool - Deciding What to Delegate......................................12

Appendix 3 - One-to-One Session Plan....................................................................14

Appendix 4 - SWOT Analysis....................................................................................15

Appendix 5 - Action Planning Tool............................................................................16

Appendix 6 - Useful Resources.................................................................................17

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Leadership and Management in the Engineering Sector – A Toolkit for SMEs

Getting Results through the Work of OthersAt the beginning of your career, most of your work is concerned with performing a hands-on role; for example, constructing things, making deliveries or providing customer service. Your performance is primarily your responsibility and should there be an issue your supervisor will probably want to discuss that with you.

As you progress your role changes and you might become a team leader or supervisor responsible for a small group of people with whom you will probably need to have similar performance conversations.

Over time, it becomes important that you have not just the technical expertise to do the job, but also highly developed relationship management skills to achieve results through the efforts of others.

Your responsibilities increase to the extent that doing a good job depends on having good professional relationships with your own team, with colleagues in other teams, and with your managers just as much as it depends on your technical skills. In fact, it is likely that without good working relationships you will find it much more difficult, and sometimes impossible, to achieve the results you need to grow your business.

You could find you are leading a team with technical skills and expertise of which you have no experience and management of that team will depend entirely on good working relationships, effective leadership skills and the development of the team as your organisation grows.

Learning to lead and manage is the key to getting your business to grow.

How to use this ToolkitThis Toolkit consists of descriptions of behavioural models and business techniques useful in leading and managing effectively. To get the best out of the Toolkit:

Read the relevant section to understand the model

Use the guides to work with your employees to understand the techniques described (templates are provided where applicable)

Use the techniques and review their impact in the workplace

Carry out extra research to add to your understanding of the model

Constantly review your employees’ progress to ensure that they are using their new skills effectively.

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Leadership and Management in the Engineering Sector – A Toolkit for SMEs

Situational Leadership (Ken Blanchard and Paul Hersey 1977)

The first task is to understand the behavioural tools you need in order to lead successfully. Leaders need to develop their behavioural skills throughout their career.

Consider the four behavioural styles below.

Behavioural Style When to Use

Directing

You are organising and directing the work of your employees, telling them what to do, when to do it and how to do it. Clear instruction, demonstration, observation and feedback are essential. Your standards and expectations are set at this stage so the employee must be closely monitored.

Coaching

You are building on the learning that has already taken place, explaining not only what needs to be done but why. The essential skills in this style are effective questioning and listening to test understanding, aid decision making and building trust in your leadership. Employees remain task focused although there is time for individuals to work some things out for themselves.

Supporting or Delegating

This style is about recognising and praising good work. By now your employees should be at a level where they can carry out the task successfully, but need practice and support to build their confidence.

Enabling

At this stage you give responsibility and let people follow through on their own initiative. Your role is to provide positive feedback and recognition. You are developing people by giving them authority and removing barriers to success.

Look at your teams and think about how you can develop not only what they do technically, but also how they can work more effectively with other team members and customers. Use Appendix 1 to make notes on how to apply the styles in your organisation.

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Leadership and Management in the Engineering Sector – A Toolkit for SMEs

Effective Delegation is Essential to GrowthDevelopmental delegation is a technique that creates time for the founders of an SME to focus on growth.

Effective leaders can achieve growth through innovation, improved responsiveness, adding value to products and services and increasing competitiveness.

Developmental delegation gives responsibility and authority to an employee to carry out a task that would normally be undertaken by the manager or owner. What you delegate is based on your employees’ abilities, motivation and potential. It will be part of a plan that sees them taking on more tasks and opens opportunities for progress in the company as it grows.

You can delegate responsibility and authority but you cannot delegate accountability. You are still accountable for the task until you reach a point where it can be taken over by the employee as part of a change to their principal responsibilities. Effective delegation is vital for effective role development.

The Delegation ProcessThe first stage is to consider your role. Use Appendix 2 to list the different tasks you do that might be suitable for delegation to an employee. They could be administrative, sales related or customer service related rather than those involved in the employee’s regular, technical role.

From this list choose a task that you would like to delegate that would develop the employee’s skills, using the following guidelines.

1. Assess the task. For example: creation of a sales quotation for installation of an electrical distribution board.

Is this task suitable for delegation? Is it a recurring task or a one off or short

term activity? Will new skills or expertise be learnt? Do you have time to train and monitor the

employee to achieve the required level? Is the employee ready for the new task?

2. Detail the task.

What is the task? How does it look when it’s done properly? Detail the required performance and results. Detail timescales, specifications and results

required.

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Leadership and Management in the Engineering Sector – A Toolkit for SMEs

3. Consider the employee. The employee might have the technical skills to build this distribution board, but what training and support will they need to prepare a quotation to sell the product?

Why are you delegating to this person? What are they going to get out of it? What are you going to get out of it? Does this person have the potential to do

the task? Does this person have the required basic

knowledge and skills to do the task?

4. Give the employee context. Explain why the task is being delegated. Where does it fit in the development plan? What is in it for the employee?

5. Create a training plan. Create a training plan with milestones and clear timescales.

6. Check resources. Agree what resources are required to do

the job (people, equipment, materials, budgets and so on).

7. Agree results to be achieved.

How will the task be measured? When is the task to be finished?

8. Be clear on requirements Check understanding by asking questions. Do they know what a good job looks like?

Use Appendix 3 to create a one to one training plan to train the employee in their new task. Inform colleagues that the delegation process is taking place so they are aware of any potential impact on performance or processes directly related to the task.

Feedback and coaching is essential to let the employee know how they are doing. Review their performance, highlighting where things have gone well and performance is of the required standard and addressing issues where things might not have gone to plan.

Remember, you can delegate responsibility and authority but not accountability. The task is still yours so you are accountable for any underperformance and must address those areas promptly.

In summary:

Agree clear timescales and other relevant performance criteria Focus on what must be achieved, that is, the outputs of the task Have regular contact both formally and informally Provide necessary resources Acknowledge tasks that have been carried out well.

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Leadership and Management in the Engineering Sector – A Toolkit for SMEs

Strategic Planning ProcessThe key to growth is to raise the focus of the business from delivering short-term operational goals to the creation of strategic plans delivering increased sales and growth opportunities. Strategic planning can sometimes be overlooked by small businesses in favour of day-to-day operational needs; there are always products to make, orders to deliver and services to provide. This can become a routine which, without taking time to look at the overall business, can lead to organisational issues, which are a barrier to growth and may ultimately affect the viability of the business itself.

Every organisation exists in an environment governed by rules and legal regulation, which can appear stable but is, in fact, subject to change. Occasionally businesses miss important changes in the environment while competitors seize the opportunity to take advantage. For example, improving sustainability, reducing carbon footprint or developing technical skills in alternative energy sources, all of which the engineer can promote to customers. Engineering companies must adapt to a changing world.

Strategy is about being aware of the environment in which you operate and making sure you maintain relevance and adaptability. Strategic models can be useful for businesses of all sizes in applying structured thinking to make sense of the complex world.

Here are three critical questions business owners may want to ask themselves.

What business are we in? Where do we want to be in 3 years? Why do we want to be there?

To answer these questions, you will need to understand your environment and internal issues by considering your current situation and conducting a structured analysis involving essential people from across the business. You can then identify the principal themes that need to be addressed or investigated further and develop actions that will address them. You can do this using the Strengths, Weaknesses Opportunities Threats (SWOT) Tool described below.

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Leadership and Management in the Engineering Sector – A Toolkit for SMEs

Strategic Tools: Strengths, Weaknesses Opportunities Threats (SWOT) AnalysisUse the guidelines below to help you identify the strengths and weaknesses of your business.

Strengths What are the things we are good at doing? How well have we carried out our most recent projects? What do our achievements tell us about our strengths? What type of customer is our main source of revenue and why?

Weaknesses What we could do better? Are we still making products and delivering services that are relevant?

Your strengths tell you what you and your employees are good at. Your weaknesses tell you where you need to develop. Together these are your distinctive competencies. They provide the basis for deciding what services you will offer or products you will make and sell.

Opportunities What current trends work in our favour? What are the trends in the engineering sector for our products and

services? Is there anything we have yet to achieve that could present itself as an

opportunity? Threats

What current trends (for example, in technology, the environment and the political arena) might work against us?

What do our customers say? Are we meeting our customers’ needs? What are the major high risk threats to the business?

Opportunities and threats tell you what you must do well (essential success factors).

To grow your business, you must develop skills that help you to exploit opportunities that present themselves and defend against threats.

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Leadership and Management in the Engineering Sector – A Toolkit for SMEs

How to Conduct a SWOT Analysis Using ‘Brown Papering’‘Brown papering’ is a visual technique using three metre wide brown parcel paper stuck to a wall. It is used in group facilitation to visualise business topics, for example, action plans and timelines. It is particularly helpful where an organisation needs to clarify the big picture and differentiate the primary details.

Many large companies use this method very effectively and small businesses can gain even greater advantage using this technique and including their entire workforce where possible.

SWOT Analysis GuidelinesConduct your own SWOT analysis by following the guidelines below and completing the table in Appendix 4.

Prepare your session location by sticking the brown parcel paper to a wall.

Mark the outlines and headings shown in the example below on your paper.

Consider the statements in the example in the context of your own business, by writing responses on sticky note slips which are fixed to the brown paper in the appropriate box.

Consider ways to address the gaps between your competencies and the critical success factors.

Develop action plans with clear objectives to address the key areas identified by using the Action Planning Tool (Appendix 5).

StrengthsTechnical skills and capabilities.Can work on industrial and domestic jobs.Required legislation, compliance, certifications all complete and up to date.Principal products and services that generate the most revenue.Sub-contractor availability.Specialist services.

WeaknessesTechnical skills and capabilities missing.Balance between industrial engineering and domestic work.Add on work or upgrades.Adjacent services, for example planning and design as well as build.Customer complaint issues.Service failures, for example delays, faulty parts.

OpportunitiesNew products or services needed by customers.Environmental driven changes in the marketplace.Energy innovation, for example solar power, energy walls, electric car home charges.

ThreatsExternal factors impacting on the cost of materials and people.Economic impact and downturn.Takeover by larger company.Not big enough to take on larger commercial work.

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Leadership and Management in the Engineering Sector – A Toolkit for SMEs

Appendix 1 - Situational Leadership – Developing the stylesLook at your teams and think about how you can develop not only what they do technically, but also how they could work more effectively with other team members.

Behavioural Style What this Style Requires How to do it

Directing

Clear instruction, demonstration, observations and feedback.Clarity on the standards expected.Detailed plans of how an employee would be trained in a new task.

Coaching

Questioning of the employee to test their understanding and build on their learning.Allowing time for individuals to work some things out for themselves.Preparation of examples of questions which would test the employee’s understanding of a task.

Supporting or Delegating

Building confidence by recognising and praising good work.Consideration of how employees’ performance can be appropriately recognised and praised in word and action.

Enabling

Giving employees responsibility and authority to work on their own initiative.Preparation of what would be said and done to communicate this to employees.

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Leadership and Management in the Engineering Sector – A Toolkit for SMEs

Appendix 2 - Delegation Tool - Deciding what to delegateDelegation is an essential Leadership and Management Tool that allows businesses to grow by developing employees’ skills beyond their initial technical ability. Delegation, if used effectively, can have a transformative effect on the skills set of individual employees. For example, an electrical fitter, given the right support, can be developed to become a customer account manager, looking for sales opportunities, an area of work usually done by small business owners. This process can be used to delegate the work to a suitable employee.

How to use the Tool:

List all the tasks you carry out at present Consider which tasks are suitable for developmental delegation Consider what level of delegated responsibility you are prepared to permit Consider to whom the task can be delegated.

Tasks Team Member 1 Team Member 2 Team Member 3

Task 1 Details

Task 2 Details

Task 3 Details

Task 4 Details

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Leadership and Management in the Engineering Sector – A Toolkit for SMEs

Once you have decided which tasks to delegate and to whom you are going to delegate.

Create a training guide for the task. (A sample one-to-one session plan is included below in Appendix 3)

Show the employee how to carry out the task step-by-step

Remember your session should include all steps clearly, with explanation

Get the employee to complete the task under your supervision several times until they feel comfortable

Be available to provide feedback and support on their performance

When they are ready hand over the task to the employee making sure they understand that they are now accountable for this task.

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Leadership and Management in the Engineering Sector – A Toolkit for SMEs

Appendix 3 - One-to-One Session Plan

Trainer DateLocation

Task Time Duration

Aim

Timing Objectives Resources Trainer activities Learner activities Assessment

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Leadership and Management in the Engineering Sector – A Toolkit for SMEs

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Leadership and Management in the Engineering Sector – A Toolkit for SMEs

Appendix 4 - SWOT AnalysisMark this template on a horizontally mounted piece of brown paper, around three metres wide. Place sticky notes from your SWOT on the grid in the relevant area and record important points and issues.

Strengths Opportunities

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Leadership and Management in the Engineering Sector – A Toolkit for SMEs

Weaknesses Threats

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Leadership and Management in the Engineering Sector – A Toolkit for SMEs

Appendix 5 - Action Planning Tool

Date Action and Steps By When By whom

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Appendix 6 - Useful ResourcesThe following organisations provide a range of useful resources and advice to support the professional development of leaders and managers of SMEs.

Engineering Council http://www.engc.org.uk

Engineering Industries Association http://www.eia.co.uk

Institute of Mechanical Engineers http://www.imeche.org

The institute of Engineering & Technology http://www.theiet.org

Federation of Small Businesses https://www.fsb.org.uk/regions/yorkshire-and-the-north-east

How’s Business http://howsbusiness.org

Make it York http://www.makeityork.com/what-we-do/business-support

York and North Yorkshire Chamber of Commerce https://york.wnychamber.co.uk/

York Professionals http://www.york-professionals.co.uk/ Yorkshire Enterprise Network https://www.yorkshirenetwork.co.uk/

Business support units or equivalents at District Council Level:

Craven https://www.cravendc.gov.uk/business/business-support-advice/

Hambleton https://www.hambleton.gov.uk/info/20029/business

Harrogate https://www.harrogate.gov.uk/info/20001/business_and_investment/

Richmondshire https://www.richmondshire.gov.uk/business-and-economy/

Ryedale http://www.ryedale.gov.uk/business/business-development/business-advice.html

Scarborough https://www.scarborough.gov.uk/home/council/business-panel

Selby http://www.selby.gov.uk/business

North Yorkshire County Council https://www.northyorks.gov.uk/business-support-and-advice

Leadership and Management in the Engineering Sector – A Toolkit for SMEs

“Grow your People –Grow your Business”

A series of Toolkits developed by Associates of Calderdale College on behalf of York, North Yorkshire and East Riding Local Enterprise Partnership to support leaders and managers of SMEs in the following priority sectors and groups:

Construction Engineering The Visitor Economy The over 50s Women in Leadership and Management.

This Toolkit was designed by the College as part of an ESF funded Skills Support for the Workforce programme.

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