Top ten lessons for managers: How to be heard

The most important of the top ten lessons for managers is to communicate effectively. In this article, I'll focus again on one of the top ten lessons derived from some of the most downloaded articles from the IEEE Transactions on Engineering Management, lessons from Balachandra and Friar (1997), Cooper (1983), Grant and Pennypacker (2006), Pinto and Dennis (1987), and Pinto and Samuel (1990), as well as one of Peter Drucker’s eight practices: to take "responsibility for communicating" (Drucker, 2004). In this article we will focus on group communications and being heard, especially in meetings with your peers. Although the Technology Managers' Notebook articles are for managers, this is a topic that managers should cover with their bright, aspiring young engineers. If you want to help your young engineers to have successful careers, this might be the most important lesson you can give them. We'll cover other aspects of communication in later articles.