Transitioning from Operations to Management

Remember when we all were in Uni and had this conviction that we were going to retire rich in our 40s and live the rest of our baby boy/girl lives in luxury? Well, reality hits different after diving into the job market with all that energy and focus, and after a couple years, seeing that drive gradually disappear from our eyes as we grudgingly drag ourselves out of bed on a Monday morning, wondering why we have to do this everyday of our lives and when does it actually end.

If you can relate to the paragraph above, then you are in luck, we dey here together and trust me, “we” are actually a lot 😊 and it’s completely normal to feel that way. But indeed, when does it actually end? Well, no one can really answer that question for you but the chances of you retiring rich in your 40s, 50s or 60s as an operations staff is slimmer than my choice of women (I like lepa girls but I digress)

You see, when you first start your career journey as an intern or trainee (now the educational system prepares you for complex situations, problem solving and self researching but not the actual job, that you have to learn on the job, so yay internships!), you start as an operations staff, meaning, there’s a process, you follow that process and get things done; compiling reports, filling and signing POs, filing documents, posting on social media, designing graphics, getting things done, being supervised by someone else who’s a bit older in that system than you.
You are the foot soldier, and that is great for your first 5 to 8 years, for experience and learning, as all these will be beneficial to your career in future (now this is assuming you have actually chosen a career, if you haven’t, that should be your first step, asap!)

Your working culture and skill development should be your priority for the first 2 years of your career, so I can’t over emphasize the need to take solo projects and even some pro bono because you still have that passion and drive to make a difference, and that weird happiness that you are doing something with your life (lol scam), so it’s advisable to gather as much experience as you can in different sectors, but relating/beneficial to your career (hence, it’s imperative your side hustle and your main hustle aligns) while you still have that fire burning.

For techies, starting your career in an agency is the best (it’s basically slave trade for peanuts most times but…). The experience and diversity is unrivaled, for accountants audit firms are the equivalent and so on.
Experience, skill and diversity, summarizes everything this article has been saying for the past few paragraphs. But why? Because these are fundamentals for managerial positions.

Now, a little bit of reality check. Not everyone can or will transition to management roles, obviously, to have managers, there has to be operations and there are also lots of high paying operations roles in different industries, so this piece may be informative, but it may not be for everyone however and that is okay too.

Back to the subject, yes! transitioning to management from operations, what do you actually need?

1. Business Admin/Development knowledge (take business management courses)
2. People management skills
3. Pro-level skillset in career path
4. Some years of experience
5. Presentation skills
6. Innovative and strategic thinking
7. Ability to position/sell yourself

I believe that, no matter what career you may find yourself in, business analysis, administration and development is a core necessity, as well as people management; because as a manage, you are expected to manage an arm of the business and group of people.
So take courses, experiment with scenarios, ask questions, get feedback from consumers/clients, build that knowledge base!

Bringing us to number 7, which has be the most important requirement, because without it, no one will know your posses the remain 6.

But then again when do you know you are ready and should apply for a managerial role;

1. When you’ve perfected your craft and are comfortable innovating in your space
2. When you are lowkey already running your unit in your company with no extra pay
3. When you are more productive/effective with strategy and decision making than routine work
4. When a team lead role opens up in your company
5. When you see an ad for a managerial position opening in your prospective career with 15 years experience requirement but you have only 5 years

For people like me, you’d notice that your speed at work reduces at a certain point, projects you’d have willing spent sleepless days and nights fighting till you deliver become herculean tasks that you start 2 weeks to deadline, and this is not because your are no longer skilled, if for anything you are better skilled and experienced, but have become weary of that routine work, discovering that you have more value to add in a supervisory role, innovating with new ideas, preparing presentations with new strategies for the business, running business analysis.

This is the time to transition and this may be scary at first, but trust me, it is a whole new wonderful experience and you’d love it all the way. Considering that the pay is reasonably higher as manager, the chances of early retirement now seem achievable and you get a clearly vision of what your industry really looks like.

So basically what am I saying?

Don’t skip your formative years, give yourself time to grow if you need more than 5 years, don’t be scared to transition when the time is right, don’t be scared to switch stacks, don’t limit yourself to one industry, apply for that job if you know you are qualified and forget about work-year requirements. Take that step to being the adult you envisioned you’d be in Uni as you transition from operations to management and perhaps, your own business.

You deserve it!

I’m a bit rusty because I haven’t written in a while, so I love forward to writing more now and remastering this skill. You can share your thoughts in the comment section.