We’ve spoken many times about how businesses turn to Six Sigma to streamline operations, especially in a recession. That is why Six Sigma training is becoming every more popular as businesses look to ensure maximum productivity and profit. This guest post looks at the advantages of hiring an Interim Manager, and what they can do for your business. Many interim managers have Six Sigma qualifications as they show their credentials for implementing a successful, streamlining process. We provide Six Sigma training of all levels, including Green Belt training and Black Belt training, to individuals and businesses. Whether you want Six Sigma as a personal skill or your business is looking to implement it, we have the course for you.
In these tough economic times, good value is more important to many people. And that doesn’t just apply to your lifestyle or what you can afford at home.
Good value has a major impact on business, especially when you’re considering the recruitment of a new member of staff and you need to justify the expenditure to your organisation.
Why use Interim Management?
Interim Managers provide businesses with competent, informed guidance on how to make significant changes to service or direction. Strategic changes are becoming more commonplace as companies try to streamline or adapt to the harsher economic climate and, as key facilitators of this change, Interim Managers are becoming a more popular hire.
But hiring an Interim Manager costs money, which seems a little counterproductive. What you need is to make sure you’re spending money to make money, and not just draining revenue on an additional resource that ends up counting for little.
So what’s the best way you can ensure a good return on your investment to justify expenditure?
Planning the Project
Hiring an Interim Manager is all about addressing an issue. Do you have big plans for change but no way of implementing them? Are you looking to become more streamlined, more productive, or to shift the focus of your product or service delivery? The right Interim Manager can help you with each of these projects, but you must know what you need first.
To address an issue you should have a certain number of desired outcomes or key performance indicators in place. These will dictate the change, how it’s made, and whether or not it has succeeded. Then it’s simply a case of laying these out for your Interim Manager.
But it is equally important not to enforce your idea of success too much. Of course, the rule of ‘your business, your rules’ applies, but consider the benefits of hiring an Interim Manager.
Skills of the Interim Manager
Interim Managers bring (or should bring) expertise, a winning portfolio and a background that means they know your industry at least as well as you do. If they are experienced in interim management as well then they will have their own way of working, their own idea of how your success ties in to theirs, and while an Interim Manager should expect a full working brief from their new employer they may wish to create their own strategy.
Yes, an Interim Manager may go his or her own way and, as such, might feel like a bit of a risk. But the career of any Interim Manager is built on a portfolio of success, which it is important that his or her work with you becomes a part of. Allowing the project to fail could potentially have as much a negative impact on your Interim Manager as it could on you.
For this reason and for many others, Interim Managers usually prove good value for businesses undergoing a change. But to make sure you get the most out of hiring an Interim Manager, be very clear on what it is you want and exactly what qualifies as a return on investment.
Outcomes is a resourcing company specialising in interim management consultancy