34. Get it done/work hard

"Genius is 1 per cent inspiration, and 99 per cent perspiration."

Thomas Edison

The fundamental Rule of Management, I'm afraid, is get the basic job done, get it done well and work bloody hard at it. No good being a fantastic people manager if you let the basic job slip. You may have to get into the office earlier than anyone else, earlier than you've ever got there before, but get in early you must.

Once you have cleared your work out of the way you can concen­trate on managing your team. Paperwork has to be done efficiently and on time. This isn't the place to go into lengthy training sessions on time management and the like, but basically you will have to be:

* organised " dedicated

ruthlessly efficient

focused.

No choice I'm afraid. You have to knuckle down and get on with it. Management isn't swanning around issuing orders and looking cool. It's actually about what goes on in the background - the work being done where no one sees it.

And if you want to know if you are being a good manager now -take a look at your desk. Go on. Right now What do you see? Clear space and order? Paper everywhere and piles of unsorted stuff? Do the same with your briefcase, files, computer even. Order or disorder? You have to use whatever tools you have to hand to make sure the work is done, done well, and done on time. Make lists, use pop­up calendars on your computer, delegate, seek help, stay up late, get up early, get up earlier - obviously you still need to refer to Rule 71: Go home, you have to have a life. But get that work done and learn to be ruthlessly efficient.

35. Set an example/standards

"Are you telling me that you built a time machine out of a DeLorean?"

'The way I see it, if you're going to build a time machine into a car, why not do it with some style?" Michael J. Fox and Christopher Lloyd in Back To The Future

If you slouch in late, argue with your customers, are disrespectful and produce shoddy work, chances are your team is going to go to hell in a handcart. If, on the other hand, and 1 assume this is more like the case, you arrive not only on time but early, do your work well and on time (see Rule 35), behave like a decent, honest, civilized human being and use your talent, chances are your staff will go to the top.

Everyone needs someone to look up to, someone they can respect and want to emulate. Sorry, matey, but that someone is you. Tough call I know. If you think heroes are so out of date, old-fashioned and redundant, then think again. Every one of your team has a special relationship with you. You are their leader, their inspiration, their boss (there's a word to make you shudder, but that's what you are), their mentor, guide, teacher, hero, role model, champion, defender, guardian. To be all these things means you have to set an example. You have to play the part. You have to set standards. You have to be that role model.

The bottom line is: if you don't care, why should they? You've got to set an example in everything you do. Think before you speak. Consider how you react. 'Do as I say, not as I do' doesn't work. Be what you want to see in them.

You've also got to go beyond that and raise their stakes. If you're going to build a time machine, then do it in a DeLorean. You've got to give your staff something to aspire to, something to want to raise themselves up to. That's you.

Ideally, you'll have some style, some flair, some spark of origi nality that will set you apart from the herd - we're thinking Lauren Bacall and Gary Grant here, not Meatloaf and early Madonna.*

You've got to look the part, act the part, do the part - method acting here: feel the manager, think the manager, be the manager.