A Proposal for Small and Medium-sized Companies
This is a Small and Medium-sized Companies (SMEs) board proposal where manager-owners participate jointly –through DIRAS- in the management of their organizations, assisted by an external facilitator.
It is a collegiate body that seeks the managers’ personal development and training and offers managerial advice, assistance and support to the participating companies. DIRAS aims to further professional and personal education, promoting team work to solve problems and improve decision making processes.
| DIRAS participant’s profile |
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Any SME manager within the Alumni community is eligible.
DIRAS: management development joint activity.
The group as change agent
MANAGER’ S PERSONAL DEVELOPMENT:
• Enriches KNOWLEDGE
• Develops MANAGERIAL SKILLS
• Acquires/changes ATTITUDES
The manager as change agent
ORGANIZATIONAL CHANGE AND DEVELOPMENT
• Changes in the MANAGEMENT SYSTEM
• New MANAGEMENT STYLE
• New VALUES
• Changes in the ORGANIZATIONAL CULTURE
Participation, long term commitment and confidence are the essence and give sense to DIRAS. These three success factors are critical for achieving goals and attaining effective results. Attendance to meetings, genuine interest in other peers’ problems, companies’ “openness” and confidentiality are attitudes that reflect the three factors.
1. For the manager
Evolving from a paternalistic and consultative management style to a more participative, pragmatic, realistic, delegative and communicative one.
Achieving growth and balance in managerial skills.
Evolving to a more strategic vision of problems.
Developing a realistic vision of the circumstances around a problem and simultaneously generating alternatives.
Initiating a process of delegation of operational decisions, reserving to himself only those related to the business continuity.
Revaluating his managerial role and acquiring good grasp of the essence of business.
Reaching a better disposition to opening capital to third parties and developing skills.
Willingness to start up traditional and active boards when necessary.
2. For the companies
Organization and consolidation of management teams.
Advancing towards professionalization.
Evolving to a more participative management style and gaining strategic vision and focus on problems.
Introduction of information and management control systems and of new remuneration and incentives systems, as well as strategic plans.
Development of simpler and well-defined management structures where responsibilities are clearly assigned.
As regards economic results, when the expectable competitiveness improvement materializes as a consequence of applying this tool, the participating companies may get results well above the average of their sector.
| DIRAS Functioning Methodology |
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DIRAS operates on the basis of four elements:
I. Board meeting.
A full-day board meeting takes place once a month. Total number of meetings is ten. Each meeting starts with a round of news where each manager gives general information on issues that may be of interest. Afterwards, each company (three per meeting) is analyzed individually.
II. Supplementary activities.
Coffee meetings: May take place informally, once a month, for managers’ mutual interchange.
Company visits: Take place during the first three months and also when DIRAS considers it necessary.
Special meetings: The facilitator or the managers may suggest calling special guests to treat specific subjects or important company issues.
III. Technical and methodological support.
DIRAS managerial instruments are:
A common information and management control system standardizing criteria and certain formal aspects of the presentation of economic and financial information.
Company diagnosis questionnaire.
Strategic planning and operations budgeting system.
Comprehensive questionnaires on group development and the impact perceived by managers and companies.
IV. On-call relationship.
Contacts and bilateral consultations among DIRAS members take place between meetings, increasing in frequency as time passes.
| Innovations Introduced by DIRAS |
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New design
Body of managers participating in the management of their companies.
New philosophy
New focus.
- Primary aim: the manager’s professional skills development.
- Secondary aim: to provide for the organizations’ continuity, making companies more competitive.
Managerial networking
Management level cooperation among companies.
Group activities
Individual learning through group decision-making on real-time, actual, specific situations.
DIRAS’ main mission is to train managers.
- DIRAS acts as a manager’s voice of conscience.
- To give emotional support.
- To evaluate the manager’s work.
- To help the manager objectively judge problems and treat them realistically.
- To help the manager interpret the context.
- To teach to distinguish between governance matters and operations management issues. To afford perspective.
- To supervise and advise on strategy building and definition of functional policies.
- To help analyze the company’s problems not only at the scheduled DIRAS meetings but any time.
- DIRAS commits the manager to plan and keep up to date his information and management control system
When participating in DIRAS, SMEs managers face a challenge: to freely and willingly help one another to identify, study and solve their problems through a committed participation in a mutual process of managerial and personal growth.
ADIRAS members or IAE Alumni wishing to contact our interest group, please refer to:
Ing. Santiago de la Barrera,
ADIRAS – Asociación de Directorios Asociados
Arenales 875, 2do. Piso. Buenos Aires
Telephone: +54.11.4115.1364
e-mail: adiras@adiras.org ; adiras@iae.edu.ar
Executive Director: Ing. Santiago de la Barrera
Cel.: (15) 4069-0645
e-mail: sdelabarrera@adiras.org
www.adiras.org