Managing a Diverse Team: How Do You Lead Engineers with More Qualifications?

Hi,

I am a graduate mechanical engineer working as a project manager in oil & gas, steel structures, etc. Sometimes during larger projects, I have to manage a team of more than 1000 people, including engineers from different disciplines and nationalities.

At times, I face challenges in handling engineers in my team who are more qualified than me, such as engineers with an MBA, B.Tech, M.Tech, or those with much more experience than me in B.Tech.

I would appreciate some practical ideas to solve problems and address issues with these subordinates. How should I communicate and lead them without hurting their emotions?

Thank you.

Hi Mr. Nadeem Arshad,

Nice to hear from you that you are handling more qualified people than you, and I also appreciate you. It shows that you must have a cut above the rest, so you have been designated at this post.

Let me suggest that it's a time to prove your leadership ability, a time to accept a challenge, a time to keep yourself motivated, a time to handle such qualified people under you calmly. One thing I will strongly suggest is to never let them feel that you are not capable of handling them. Keep them happy, motivated, and maintain cohesiveness, which means team spirit. Appreciate them when they do their best, guide them when they need help, and even learn from them. Show yourself as part of the team always. It's a time to show why you deserve this post, a time to prove yourself, show that you are really the best.

Okay, best of luck. Hope to hear from you soon. Bye, see you.

Hi Nadeem,

I have a question for you! Does taking an MBA course solve all your problems? Are they not respecting you because you do not hold higher degrees than others? If I were you, I would spend more time understanding their needs, their problems, and addressing them rather than wasting time on an MBA. Practical experience is always beneficial; paperwork can never beat it.

Importantly, do not spend too much time managing politics. Just ignore them; do what you are supposed to do! This means you are responsible for the project, so focus on activities related to that. Taking a personality development course is good.

Being emotional is always good, but you should not be an emotional idiot!

-Dongan

Dear Nadeem,

Your apprehension is a bit misplaced. The acquisition of qualifications is one thing, and the execution of knowledge in the workplace is another. Please remember, Bill Gates, as well as the respected late Dhirubhai Ambani, were both undergraduates. However, IIMs and IITians also worked under them. Managing knowledgeable individuals is a prerequisite for 21st-century leadership.

You can manage more qualified individuals by:

a) Acquiring all the soft skills that you know.

b) Encouraging them to put into practice the knowledge they gained during their B Tech course or MBA course. My experience shows that very few B Tech professionals utilize more than 25% of their knowledge in practice. Once someone starts doing it, it will set a competitive standard, and others will follow suit.

c) Never forget the age-old idioms and proverbs of your language or any languages that you know. Management science or any other science, for that matter, is not above proverbs. Designing your work style while keeping in mind all the proverbs is a significant challenge. Once you do that, observe how your juniors start respecting you.

d) Lastly but not least, you must improve your verbal and written communication skills. Many tech professionals may possess sound technical knowledge but lack these essential skills. With your communication skills, you can bring them to heel.

Ok...

Dinesh V Divekar

Dear Nadeem,

I don't think we would be able to provide valuable suggestions unless you let us know if there were any situations where it was obvious to you that they were feeling bad about it. If you could help us know if anything like that existed, what was the situation, and how they reacted to you, I guess it will be worthwhile in providing some ways to tackle this situation.

If this is your perceived notion that they "might" feel bad in the future, I guess it's better you continue working the way you were doing things until this day.

Regarding the following points you had mentioned above - "received a best performance award after completing my first project, but some people think this is due to buttering and spooning. Now, 5 years have passed, and it is well known that I can handle big projects."

What matters to you? Your job and financial hike, or others' feelings? (and these others are people who don't really matter much to you in your personal life).

You know how you reached here, right? Please note that every successful person will have at least 10 people pointing their fingers at him/her. Actually, this is what pushes him further. Leave behind all such thoughts. Even if you try being good to them - what's the point? They are plainly jealous. Just make sure you don't treat them back that way; that's the sign of a person with strong leadership skills. You should always treat them back positively and do your best to help them (when requested alone).

"I am lagging behind in emotional control; when I hear some false gossip about me, I am getting disturbed, and some are taking advantage of that."

I am pleased to know that you are aware that you lack emotional control. If you have reached this stage of understanding, then it means you have reached the level to change it. Don't let emotional issues worry you. After all, gossip exists everywhere. If no one gossips about you, probably it means that you are not doing well. When someone is "going to great heights," it's the general tendency to find faults... why care? You have the proper direction ahead, don't look back, in fact, don't react... people will then gradually lose interest in gossiping because after a certain point, even they should think of growing up the career ladder.

"Now after 5 years, I want to move one step ahead, but it doesn't seem to be possible due to internal politics."

It's your mind that is blocking you - treat your mind to not react to such statements from people, you will very soon start seeing only the path ahead. Be this person who has a goal and will fight until he reaches it.

"I am planning to take a short break and make myself prepared for the next step. I already joined an MBA for professionals; I will take some courses on personality improvement."

Everything will be fine if you can train your mind to just look at work as work and not life. It's just a means for you to go to the next step. Have a bigger dream and use these jobs only as steps to go higher. People will try everything to pull you down - ignore... keep moving.

Regards,

Hi Nadeem,

First of all, you are leading 1000 people, so you are not a supervisor or manager. You are a leader. Therefore, you must develop leadership skills. Please go through some leadership techniques books. Also, identify the talented persons in your group and assign them responsibilities.

Regards,
N. Srinivasan

Hey Nadeem,

Excellent suggestions already given by experts.

I am also working as a project engineer consultant, and guess what, the project manager here is just a BE and has been handling a staff of more than 50,000 for the past 20 years. All experts in their own field.

His skills are in "Managing Human." He never misses an opportunity to let them know how important they are to the company because of their qualifications and expertise and that the company is counting on them.

Everybody in the company wants to resolve their issues only through him. What draws them in are his "Listening skills, reasonable delayed management tactics for any problem, and Human Management Skills, meeting them often on the site, having lunch or dinner with them on the site, etc." It's all about employee relations.

In fact, I am having a tough time now due to his good attitude, as the staff are still approaching him rather than me. I am learning all these skills and am sure you will too.

All the best,
Regards,
ukmitra

[QUOTE=Ash Mathew; 917313]

Dear Nadeem,

I don't think we would be able to provide valuable suggestions unless you let us know if there were any situations where it was obvious to you that they were feeling bad about it. If you could help us know if anything like that existed, what was the situation and how they reacted to you, I guess it will be worthwhile in providing some ways to tackle this situation.

If this is your perceived notion that they "might" feel bad in the future, I guess it's better you continue working the way you were doing things until this day.

Regarding the following points you had mentioned above - "received a best performance award after completing my first project, but some people think this is due to buttering and spooning. Now 5 years have passed, and it is well known that I can handle big projects."

What matters to you? Your job and financial hike, or others' feelings? (and these others are people who don't really matter much to you in your personal life)

You know how you reached here, right? Please note that every successful person will have at least 10 people pointing their fingers at him/her. Actually, this is what pushes him further. Leave behind all such thoughts. Even if you try to be good to them - what's the point? They are plainly jealous. Just make sure you don't treat them back that way; that's the sign of a person with strong leadership skills. You should always treat them back positively and do your best to help them (when requested alone).

"I am lagging behind in Emotional controls when I hear some false gossip about me. I am getting disturbed, and some are taking advantage of that."

I am pleased to know that you are aware that you lack emotional control. If you have reached this stage of understanding, then it means you have reached the level to change it. Don't let emotional issues worry you. After all - gossip exists everywhere. If no one gossips about you, probably it means that you are not doing well. When someone is "going great heights," it's the general tendency to find faults... why care? You have the proper direction ahead, don't look back; in fact, don't react. People will then gradually lose interest in gossiping because after a certain point, even they should think of growing up the career ladder.

"Now after 5 years, I want to move one step ahead, but it doesn't seem possible due to internal politics."

It's your mind that is blocking you - treat your mind to not react to such statements from people. You will very soon start seeing only the path ahead. Be the person who has a goal and will fight until he reaches it.

"I am planning to take a short break and make myself prepared for the next step. I have already joined an MBA for professionals, and I will take some courses on personality improvement."

Everything will be fine if you can train your mind to just look at work as work and not life. It's just a means for you to go to the next step. Have a bigger dream and use these jobs only as steps to go higher. People will try everything to pull you down - ignore... keep moving.

Regards,

Thanks to all for your valuable suggestions.🤔

Dear Ash,

You asked for an example, so let me explain one to you.

During one of my prestigious projects (as a project manager) that is already entered in the Guinness Book of World Records, I found a qualified and talented engineer, Mr. Xyz (B.E Mech & MBA), working as a supervisor in our company. So, I offered him to join my project team, gave him the responsibility as a project engineer, and after looking at his interests, I upgraded his position and sent recommendations to increase his salary.

Our client for this project was a German company, and the project manager was a very experienced German guy. During a visit to our premises where the project was under progress, he had an argument with our supervisor and later with the other guys, shouted, and expelled them from the work.

I considered this a serious issue and interference in our work, and wrote a serious letter to the project manager and cc'd to the projects director, that not to repeat this again and in case of any problem, just communicate with the project manager and project engineer.

Mr. Xyz saw this as an opportunity and spoke to the client (project manager) that Mr. Nadeem doesn't know how to handle these situations because he is simply a B.E. If I were in his position, I would handle this by communicating on the phone.

So, the client project manager approached our higher management with recommendations to remove Nadeem and make Mr. Xyz the project manager for this project. After all, nothing happened, and Mr. Xyz was sent back to his original position. But I came into the highlights due to my non-managerial qualifications. (Hope you all understood the story as well as the problem)

The suggestions I received from all are very impressive, especially from Ash Mathew, Ravi Ranjan, and N. Srinivasan.

Mr. ukmitra, I am really excited to hear something more about your Project Manager.

Mr. Dinesh V Divekar (Management & Behavioral Training Consultant), could you please guide me about any personality enhancement courses in Delhi, as well as some online courses?

Ash, you wrote something about emotional control as well, but believe me, it is my drawback that during the meetings, if I don't like something, everyone can read it from my face. Actually, my face is like an open book, and everyone can read that I am angry, excited, tired, unhappy, confused, not agreeing, feeling bored, not interested, etc. How to control this, I really don't know.🤔

Thanks and Regards,
Nadeem Arshad

I think it is important to remember that many people are leading others they may be more qualified in certain areas. It is important to remember that a team is made of all types of individuals - one with a great amount of experience and knowledge, ones that are just starting, and ones that have the ability to lead and help move a task along.

You should make sure you always allow your leadership abilities to show and never allow yourself to be publicly frustrated, especially regarding rumors. You do not want to publicly scold, but make sure that you address the problem causers in private. You should work closely with their department managers for support. I assume you are in a matrix-type environment.

Overall remaining collected is the only thing you can do. You don't always have to have the answer, but make sure you can get what your team needs and give them the praise in public they deserve. Don't try to make them feel like you know everything. They will respect you for your willingness to gain from them.

Dear Nadeem,

I can now understand the situation more in depth. It's plain - people working to get to higher positions. Please understand that an added MBA will not help in "a great way every time." Managerial skills come with practice.

To control the expression is to be aware of that first. Once you are aware - practice having a smile on your face, don't talk. Drink water and count from 1 to 10 in your mind. These words mean more than just being asked to do so. Don't wait to respond at that point... Respond only after some time.

Because of someone else trying to act smart and put you down, if you react, then it means that they have won in their effort to make you feel low. Take it as a challenge. This is not difficult - you have seen much more difficult things in life, right? and you have made it a point to succeed in everything, so why not in this too. Just try.

Thank you.

Hey Nadeem,

This discussion is getting really informative. I am copying all the suggestions given by experts and making notes for a case study. It seems like I am becoming a book writer. :-P

More about our PM. He treats each of our experts and learned engineers just like a baby. He pampers and listens to them every time they cry while keeping the final decision in his own hands. He is always there for staff's personal needs but never lets go of his objective of business needs. He interacts with staff very often, not only for work-related activities but also for personal issues. He even has his secret team of two persons (birbal) among the staff to give him feedback so that he never misses any staff's problems, issues, or potential dangers for the business.

All in all, it's just Human Relations. I feel that this is a skill that no one can teach you but is inherent in every human being in abundance and needs to be triggered by you and used.

All the very best... I am doing it here... I am sure you can also.

Regards,
Ukmitra

[QUOTE=ukmitra;920952]
Hey Nadeem,
This discussion is getting really informative. You know what, I am copying all the suggestions given by experts and making a note of a case study...he he he....seems I am becoming a book writer. :-P

Well, more about our PM. He treats each of our experts and learned engineers just like a baby. He pampers and listens to them every time they cry and at the same time keeps the final decision in his own hands. He's always there for staff's personal needs but never lets go of his objective of business needs. He interacts with staff very often, not only for work-related activities but also for personal issues. He even has a secret team of two personal (Birbal) among the staff to give him feedback, so he never misses any staff's problems, issues, or potential dangers for the business.

All in all, it's just Human Relations. I feel that this is a skill which no one can teach you and imbibe in you. But it's there with every human being in abundance and needs to be triggered by you and used.

All the very best...I am doing it here...I am sure you can also...

Regards,
Ukmitra

Nice to hear that you are getting these soft skills from your project manager. Let's discuss some more details. If you can prepare a progress chart for him like:
1. What was his first designation after completing his education?
2. After how many years did he get the 2nd (after how many job changes and how many steps he reached to this level)?
3. If you can ask him what his next goal is and how he is going to achieve this.

The same research I made for my General Manager at that time and now Managing Director, who is presently one of the best-paid in the industry. I found that he started his career as a sales engineer and in 6 steps, with changes in 4 companies and a duration of 28 years, he is now MD for the past year.

One thing I will tell you is that they are not our idols, but we are trying to learn something from their history. Any suggestions I received are appreciable. Hoping to hear from you again.

Thanks and regards,
Nadeem Arshad
nadeem3arshad@gmail.com[/EMAIL]