Title: Management Skills for New Managers

Author: Carol W. Ellis

ISBN 0-8144-0830-3

The following review was contributed by Roger E.Herman 

This little book is designed to help new managers better understand the role their new role. A written version of an American Management Association seminar, this publication is essentially a combination of some instructional text and a workbook. The pages are filled with fill-in blanks, check-off boxes, and similar exercises found in a seminar workbook.

This concise work meets its objectives of providing a self-learning tool addressing the fundamentals of management. Readers seeking something more sophisticated than a seminar workbook should look elsewhere.

The book is organized into eight chapters, seven presenting content and a wrap-up summary. Topics of the instructional chapters are Defining Your Role, Effective Communication, Performance Management, the Four Phases of Learning, Motivation, Delegation, and Coaching. Action-step exercises are provided at the end of each chapter to help the reader focus new knowledge on personal performance. The eighth chapter offers another form to re-cast what was written at the end of the chapters to create a big picture of forward movement.

For people looking for a simplified, yet wide-ranging and current, introduction to the basics of front-line management, this book fills a need. The workbook format means that the engaged reader will write answers to a lot of questions and exercises while moving through the pages, rather than simply reading text to grasp the new concepts.