This session was the keynote speech for the business track - I decided to attend it on a whim, and am glad I did, as I found it to be excellent.

The speaker was Mark Horstman, ex-military management consultant and co-founder of http://www.manager-tools.com/. Introducing himself as being someone who is "really good at something that you suck at," Mark's shorter title for the speech was "Do this stuff" - as he explained, he wasn't so much going to wax lyrical about management in general as much as he was going to give us all specific instructions. This is something that he does on a regular basis; his site hosts a series of freely available podcasts that he's recorded with his co-founder Mike, from topics like "how to have an open door policy" to "how to answer questions in a presentation." Chucking us some of the low-hanging fruit - for example, scheduling fixed-length timeslots for checking your email will stop you from losing entire days to it - Mark led up to a discussion of delegation.

A person's job within an organisation is comprised of a set of responsibilities - some of them are big responsibilities, of which we only tend to have a few, and the rest are small responsibilities. Little tasks that need to be done but aren't really a core part of your job. When your manager hands you another one of the big responsibilities, you have to make room for it by delegating some of the little things to your "directs" (people who you are directly responsible for). Giving people your work is the best way to train them to do your job - it's not something they get from weekend getaways climbing trees and playing paintball to "bond as a team" - and what seems like a small responsibility to you is a big responsibility to them.

Good management is invisible - nobody likes working for a manager who is constantly running from crisis to crisis, interfering with everything. To maximize the effectiveness of the company, it's necessary to maximize the effectiveness of each employee's behaviour - and that's not something that you as a manager can directly control. The employee is the only one who can control their behaviour. As a manager, it thus becomes your job to encourage effective behaviour. Mark's "management trinity" of techniques for doing this is comprised of "one-on-ones," "feedback," and "coaching." (He warned us up-front that he wouldn't have time to talk about coaching).

"One-on-ones" refers to one-on-one meetings with each of your directs - that is, meeting with each of them individually. Just a half hour, every week if possible - and it should be scheduled well in advance and rarely missed, a proper fixture of work procedure. The focus of this meeting is the employee - not you, not your work, not your issues, and not just a transfer of what you've been given by your own bosses. Expect to spend about 10 minutes talking about their concerns - or more likely, listening - then 10 minutes talking about your concerns with regards to them, then 10 minutes talking about the future (specifically, of the team and their role within it). Don't check email during it, don't answer the phone, don't suddenly rush out for a restroom break - dedicate the time to them. It may seem like a lot, but you'll find that if you actively give people more of your time, then they will demand less later on. Take notes, and follow up on any action items religiously - if your people see that you're giving them a channel through which things really can be changed, they'll really use it; conversely, if you don't follow through, they'll just see the meetings as another waste of time.

"Feedback" refers to the simple action of telling one of your staff when they've done something right or wrong. It's a fairly simple principle - if they don't know how things are working out, then they don't know whether to keep doing what they're doing or to change things around. Positive feedback is just as important as negative feedback - most people's immediate response to "Can I have a word?" is "Am I in trouble?" and if that happens then you're not giving enough positive feedback. Lots of people are afraid to give negative feedback because they don't want to "hurt feelings" - but your employees are adults and they can take it. If they can't then you probably don't want them working for you anyway. (Mark said that firing someone indicates you have failed as a manager because you have failed to correct their behaviour - I think he needed to add that alternatively you might have hired the wrong person to start with).

Some practical points were given. Instead of simply walking up to your people and spouting at them, ask first - "Hey, can I give you some feedback?" - it ensures that you have their attention, ensures that they're ready to listen, and makes them feel in control of the situation. If they say no, then deal with it. Maybe they're having a bad day and it would be better if you left it until tomorrow.

Once they're listening, start by describing the behaviour you want to change or reinforce ("When you do XYZ...") - don't try to guess at their motivation or their intentions, and don't talk about attitude, because those are things that you can't truly know. Then describe the impact of that behaviour ("...such-and-such happens"). Finally, round it off by discussing future behaviour (might simply be "keep it up!"). Approaching it in this way keeps you seeming reasonable and open to discussing things, rather than laying down the law, and so people are much happier to take your feedback on board.