Employees – ManagersMag

June 5, 2023June 5, 2023

Navigating the Gig Economy: The Rise of Managers in the Digital Age

Kenya Institute of Mass Communication

As a student of online journalism at the esteemed Kenya Institute of Mass Communication, I have witnessed firsthand the impact of the gig economy on the media industry. Journalists, content creators, and broadcasters are increasingly embracing gig work, with managers playing a pivotal role in ensuring seamless operations and the delivery of high-quality content.

The Gig Economy has revolutionized the way we work, transforming traditional employment structures and opening up new opportunities for millions of individuals worldwide. As freelance and remote work continue to gain momentum, a new breed of professionals has emerged – the managers of the gig economy. These individuals play a vital role in shaping the future of work, bridging the gap between freelancers and clients, and ensuring the smooth operation of this dynamic ecosystem.

In this article, we delve into the intricacies of the gig economy and shed light on the growing significance of managers in this ever-evolving landscape. As a junior management writer at Kenya Management and a student at the prestigious Kenya Institute of Mass Communication, I have had the privilege to explore this phenomenon in-depth, analyzing its impact on both the workforce and the business world.

The gig economy is characterized by its flexible, project-based nature, where independent workers offer their skills and services to clients on a temporary basis. This structure enables individuals to pursue diverse opportunities and achieve a healthy work-life balance. However, the gig economy also poses unique challenges. With a fragmented workforce and limited direct contact between freelancers and clients, efficient management becomes crucial for the success of projects and the satisfaction of all parties involved.

Enter the gig economy manager, a crucial link between freelancers and clients. These managers are adept at overseeing projects, coordinating resources, and maintaining effective communication channels. They possess a unique set of skills, including exceptional organization, negotiation, and interpersonal abilities. Their role extends beyond mere project management; they act as facilitators, ensuring that freelancers understand the client’s expectations while supporting clients in navigating the complexities of engaging with a remote workforce.

One of the primary responsibilities of gig economy managers is to match freelancers with suitable projects. They carefully analyze client requirements, evaluate freelancers’ skills, and determine the best fit for each assignment. By utilizing platforms and technologies designed for the gig economy, such as freelance marketplaces and talent management tools, these managers streamline the matchmaking process, maximizing efficiency and minimizing errors.

Moreover, gig economy managers play a vital role in fostering effective communication. They act as intermediaries, ensuring that freelancers and clients have a clear understanding of project objectives, deadlines, and deliverables. By nurturing strong lines of communication, they enhance collaboration and minimize misunderstandings that may arise due to the remote nature of gig work. Effective communication also plays a significant role in managing expectations and maintaining high-quality standards, ultimately leading to the success of the project.

The rise of gig economy managers also highlights the growing need for specialized knowledge in this field. With the gig economy rapidly expanding across various industries, managers must stay updated with the latest market trends, technological advancements, and regulatory frameworks. They should possess a deep understanding of the specific demands and challenges faced by freelancers and clients, enabling them to provide valuable insights and guidance throughout the project lifecycle.

In conclusion, the gig economy has ushered in a new era of work, offering unparalleled flexibility and opportunities for individuals worldwide. In this dynamic landscape, gig economy managers have emerged as vital facilitators, connecting freelancers and clients, and ensuring the smooth functioning of projects. With their specialized skills, they bridge the gap between remote workers and clients, enabling efficient project management and fostering collaboration.

April 21, 2023

WORK WIFE MODEL’ HELPING WOMEN ENTREPRENEURS BREAK NEW GROUNDS

By Steve Ireri.

The ‘Work wife’ concept emerged a long time ago, when workplaces were beginning see the importance of having secretaries, who helped managers be more effective in their chores. Since then, the concept has greatly mutated to infer to unique, platonic friendships, between female work colleagues characterized by close emotional bonds, high levels of disclosure and support, and mutual trust and honesty.

Women should lay aside the unnecessarily tumultuous pursuit for equality and positively engage their fellow female colleagues to build better versions of themselves.

The phrase ‘work wife’ emerged a long time ago hence the struggle with most people to accurately understand it. There before, it was used to refer to secretaries upon whom male bosses mainly depended on. However, even with much fluctuations that have significantly seen the workplace become modernized, the idea did not disappear, but evolved in some incredible ways, to now relegate to, alliances between female colleagues who due to their close ties, commit to help each other out, so they can become better workers. For this, while secretaries have become widely popular ‘work wives’ can only correlate to relationships between work colleagues, more specifically, females ones, as they are more inclined to building lasting relationships that are more likely to spur progress unlike with their male counterparts.

The ‘work wives’ idea can be of a considerably big implication in this century given the much battles that women have found themselves into in the midst of their pursuits to uncover equality. While even the highly heated campaigns by women to fight for equality, alongside the influence of already successful women to prove that women truly have what it takes have become popular in the recent days, the progress towards equality remains quite uneventful.

Hence the answer to this imbalance lies not in seeking an outright equality against men but rather on women seeking to achieve the most in their areas of work, by endorsing each other, through the understanding that each of them can act like a secretary to the other and easily tap into bigger heights of productivity, akin to their male counterparts. The work wife’ concept was for the very first time, highlighted in publications in a book called, Work Wife: The Power of Female Friendship to Drive Successful Businesses. Although the book to a big extent delved much on explaining the history of the concept, it partly elucidated that because the idea has gone out of existence, it can presently be remembered with the reintroduction of ‘work wife’ and “work husband” to refer to anyone who serves as your go-to, can’t-live-without partner, in the workplace. This work spouse relationship is not a real marriage, but a platonic partnership with powerful prospect for innovation.

So far the many challenges women are facing continue to necessitate the urge of reinventing the work wife concept. For instance one of the commonly known challenges is that of funding for their startups, where they get a lot less investor funding unlike with their male counterparts. Ever since the late year’s, problem has on several occasions given women a headache. Early-stage investors who have female executives has increased from 5% to 15% since 1999. Their constant woe however has been that these women aside doing other errands so well, struggle when it comes to securing funding. According to reports, even though women-led enterprises bring in approximately 12% more revenue than companies run by male CEOs, less than 3% of venture-backed companies are run by women.

To overcome the funding gap, some women, have committed to become spouses of their fellow women through the ‘work wife’ idea and launched their own VC firms so as to not be left out. This, unlike when they are manning these startups solo or when they are working freely without accepting the fact that they need to lo join hands instead of struggling with equality campaigns, easily empowers them to garner the much needed skills on how to win funding opportunities with big companies or by allowing them to learn how to effectively apply for business grants and loans from organizations committed specifically committed to furthering the advancement of female entrepreneurs.

However, the biggest disadvantage is that the existing traditional corporate culture promotes a dog-eat-dog atmosphere in which female coworkers see each other as rivals. In the past few decades, however, huge shifts in teamwork and leadership belief are signaling a new—and by some measure more feminine—approach. The work wife books writers say that slow but steady progress toward dismantling male dominance at the office has carved out space for women to collaborate instead of compete professionally which sets the stage for change. Among other things, work wife favors women and especially entrepreneurs to succeed with forming healthy partnerships, because it highlights how balancing responsibilities supports individual “superpowers.”

Because women have a bigger tendency of being cooperative unlike with men, the new business reality built through work wife collaboration has taught them the need of supporting individual strengths toward a common goal—on a professional and emotional level.

Role models challenge.

One other major challenge barring the success if the work wife idea, is the fact that women face the scarcity of female role models especially entrepreneurs who can easily bestow the advice ‘don’t be afraid to make mistakes’. Truly women don’t get to higher heights over fears that embarrassments might come their way, if they made mistakes. However, although mentors would easily instill this lesson to them, women need to follow their passions so possibly they can become their own mentors.

Entrepreneurship or running a business is risky and entails unforeseen circumstances. But because women have the advantage of building very deep connections with fellow women in the workplace, they are more edged to reap the most from the ‘work wife’ model. Possibly the messages they should pass around everyday should pertain how they should never fear failure; and that one will never try if they keep on fearing failing. The fact that each of them dreads failing eventually introduces toxicity creating workplaces of hatred and envy. As a result, they will fail in business even when they were meant to succeed.

Work Wife was jotted down with the idea of such feminine dilemmas in mind. Avoiding burnout or even fearing that your startup won’t make it out alive and you will have to suffer the embarrassment of closing it down, will call for incompetency of women even in some skills they were built to handle way better than their male counterparts. Work wives are demonstrating that this is possible in myriad ways. Work Wife “is advocating for a reimagining of work.” If women in business can find their perfect business partner, it will not only help them realize their own career goals, but perhaps disrupt the greater business world for the better. Says the concept.

April 21, 2023April 21, 2023

When Micromanagement Fails to deliver.

Think of it when your enterprise isn’t taking that much needed stride, supposed to toss you into the world of incomes even after investing in it heavily. While at times executives in promising companies assume supervision of some of it’s slightest tenets and departments, these presumptions significantly accumulate into big mistakes, creating loopholes critical for the firms downfall. Assumptions like these often provide a breeding hub for concealed errors to expand, eventually marking the onset of the firms relentless hardships. With micromanagement however, administrators are able to realize the full benefits of their sweat as the majority of the problems are handled at a firsthand perspective and solved in real time.

Micromanagement seemingly offers a firm a sort of a facelift which even upon the tempest of other big hurdles, greatly oversees the prosperity of a firm. Business failure which is certainly the diagnosis of a business that is registering minimal profits, often comes along due to a variety of reasons including this notorious assumption that the smallest tenets, the ficklest of issues, are not detrimental to your dilemma.

However micromanagement is a double-edged sword and despite this extremely appealing perspective, has a shortcoming with extremely lethal and far reaching impacts. In business management, micromanagement is a management style whereby a manager closely observes, controls, and or reminds the work of their subordinates or employees. Micromanagement is generally considered to have a negative connotation, mainly because it demonstrates a lack of freedom and trust in the workplace. Rather than giving general instructions on smaller tasks and then devoting time to supervising larger concerns, the micromanager monitors and assesses every stage of a business process and evades delegation of decisions. Micromanagers are usually annoyed when a subordinate makes decisions without consulting them, even if the decisions are within the subordinate’s level of authority.

Micromanagement also frequently involves requests for unnecessary and overly detailed reports. A micromanager tends to require constant and detailed performance feedback and to focus excessively on procedural trivia (often in detail greater than they can actually process) rather than on overall performance, quality and results. This focus on “low-level” trivia often delays decisions, blurs overall goals and objectives, impedes the cycle of information between employees, and guides the various aspects of a project in different and often opposed directions. Many micromanagers accept such inefficiencies as less important than their retention of control or of the appearance of control.

It is common for micromanagers, especially those who exhibit narcissistic tendencies and micromanage deliberately and for strategic reasons, to commission work to subordinates and then micromanage those subordinates’ performance, enabling the micromanagers in question to both take credit for positive results and shift the blame for negative results to their subordinates. These micromanagers thereby delegate accountability for failure but not the authority to take alternative actions that would have led to success or at least to the mitigation of that failure.

The most extreme cases of micromanagement comprise of a management pathology closely similar to workplace bullying and narcissistic behavior. Micromanagement resembles addiction in that although most micromanagers are behaviorally reliable on control over others, both as a lifestyle and as a means of retaining that lifestyle, many of them fail to concede their dependence even when everyone around them observes it.

Because a pattern of micromanagement suggests to employees that a manager does not trust their work or judgment, it is a major factor in stirring employee disengagement, often to the point of fostering a dysfunctional and hostile work environment. Disengaged employees invest time, but not effort or creativity, in the work in which they are assigned. The impacts of this phenomenon are worse in situations where work is passed from one specialized employee to another. In such a situation, disinterest among upstream employees implicates not only their own productivity but also that of their downstream colleagues.

April 21, 2023

How managers transgress employee rights in bid to micromanage .

In a workplace governed by far, by authoritative managers who never allow their employees let out a word, leave alone transgressing rules crafted by these managers to gauge how people work, it might be easily to forget whether one has a right to anything particularly when the workplace is mired in some never ending tasks.

Although one is employed and often experiences fear that demanding for something might be seen as nagging or might easily bring back memories of probably when they underperformed creating a precarious situation for them

The pursuit for productivity often places workers at a precarious situation – beneath their managers, hence making it so hard for them to make demands or even take action when one of their rights are violated.

But truly, is there something like violation when one doesn’t understand what can be or is worth being violated? employees need to understand their rights very well and even have the much important knowhow on how to wield these rights in shaky situation like when 5their relationship [s with the manager is not so smooth.

April 21, 2023

Intellectual Health. Minding The Welfare Of Your Intelligence.

“My brain is my garden. If I feed it – it will grow; if I nurture it – it will thrive; if it thrives – so will I.” – Jen Chastre.

Many people think the key to being well is focusing on physical wellness – that you need to eat right and exercise to be healthy. While that is true, there are actually multiple factors that affect your overall well-being.

Intellectual Health defines the quality of your mind at a particular time of your life, be it while you are young, during old age, or at any other age. It includes the ability of your brain to change, adapt, learn and grow with time. Intellectual health emphasizes the importance of having regular intellectual activity, taking care of your mental fitness, and practicing life-long learning

Intellectual health is essential for overall good health and life. Diseases like Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s are the result of changes in brain chemistry and function. Taking care of your intellectual health can keep your brain functioning well for longer. This is also why it’s so important it is to be well-informed about education and intellectual wellness overall

The International Wellness Institute defines wellness as an active process through which people become aware of, and make choices toward, a more successful existence. This aligns with the six dimensions of wellness model, which includes physical, social, emotional, spiritual, occupational, and intellectual wellness. Though unlike with others like spiritual or emotional intellectual wellness mostly concerns with being open to new ideas, thinking critically, and seeking out new learning opportunities and challenges. It’s being creative and promoting mental stimulation, and involves commitment to lifelong learning.

Mostly activities like the learning of a foreign language, reading for fun, working out puzzles such as jigsaws, crosswords, or Sudoku, Playing a board or card game, writing a journal or even playing a musical instrument are very core to keeping someone’s intelligence in good shape. In some other ways, participating in these activities has been shown to stimulate the brain and increase the connections between brain cells. According to the latest findings in Neuroscience, your brain reaches its peak performance at age 16-25 years, and thereafter, cognitive functioning declines. Exercising your mind gives you faster thinking and reaction time, increased focus and concentration, better memory, less stress, sharper vision and hearing, and a more positive mood.

However the activities that involve building someone’s intelligence like working out puzzles or reading books are deemed by far as hobbies hence the negligence by most people who argue that their hobbies are elsewhere. However given the much benefits the habits have on someone’s intellectual Wellness one can’t keep on avoiding them. To clearly gauge that you have greatly began to chart a good path towards intellectual wellness you should be able to a discern a development of good study skills and time management, an ability to challenge yourself to see all sides of an issue or even when you notice yourself becoming a critical thinker.

Others signs that mark good progress with development of intelligence include an advancement of your own ideas, views, and opinions and more appearance of situations where you are exposing yourself to new ideas, people, and beliefs that are different from your own

How To Improve Your Intellectual Health

However because it’s not a walk to develop intelligence through habits that hinge on innate factors like passion here are some ways to improve one’s intellectual health. The listed notes underpin how one can maintain Healthy Levels Of IQ And Intellectual Function.

For example, boosting your Intellectual Health By Learning a new Language, bonding with your family, keeping good track of time and ensuring that your physical health is okay can really come in handy in maintaining healthy levels of IQ and a human being’s intellectual function. Nonetheless, someone who is up to improving their intelligence will more often practice curiosity and will try to engage In discoveries if not proposing to safeguard all the aspects of their health for the entire days they live on earth.

April 17, 2023

The rise of connections: Where incompetent folks rule the workplace.

On June 2021, Terry Gatugi 20, (not her real name) left the Kenya Institute of mass communication to pursue pleasure from a love trip in Mombasa. At this moment of her two weeks trip, school was ongoing but she was not intimidated. Her esteem had vanished when her brother in one of the countries premier media stations promised to connect her to a job. And her passion to toil in the mastery of skills was killed, so the promised chance waits upon a Terry with no skills.

As she confidently advanced out of the azure gates leading to the countries premier media institution, her final utterances would thereby alert me of a trend in the job sector where incompetent folks like Terry, reign. For her, the precondition that you must have certain skills to earn a job have been replaced by family linkage, which those who don’t have are left to tarmac searching for jobs.

It has never dawned on her that taking her studies seriously, would ever be rewarding. She firmly believes that university education is meaningless if one has no connections to the job sector.

Despite the solid facts that sacrifice and patience are the major beginnings in finding a job, connections have affected the validation of that adage. The Kenyan employment sector once a niche for only eligible employees, is devoured by the rise of incompetent folks hired through what is commonly known as connections.

Prominent organizations in the country have turned into safe havens for incompetent people to not only thrive but reap a living. The passion from a relationship easily confuses the managers decisions as the make their recruitment. As a slight misstep, the consequences cause collapse of some very promising enterprises in the country.

They introduce uncouth habits that slowly consume the organization. On their personal life, you find they are the type of workers who flaunt their job on social media- aiming at announcing their new reputation. In the office, they loiter sightlessly, easily engage other employees in gossips and are always up to date with transformations in the office. Players in the game are also blinded by the dismay of watching their allies struggle with the brutal process of job seeking and result falling prey to their feelings. Hence wield their chances to convey relief.

Although students at this premier media school work zealously to remain at the top, likes of Terry are wholly nonchalant. But not disturbed by what her response will be when called to deliver a task, she will join a procession of folks in a lot other organizations in the country, who’s nonexistent skills, were not the hiring factors in their absorption into the job.

the disgrace that that arise due to intake of incompetent workers encourages hiideous way that affect the workplace.

In the majority of bureaus the practice has growed and has become sort of acceptable.

The trend is also touching on the objectives of the organizations through family love conventions in some cases where over four relatives unite in one workplace. In a rare case reported in one of the countries premier organizations, a manager engulfed in family passion had over a certain period in time of agreement , hired workers of the same tribe- his deputy, senior workers and junior workers and even to security guards. At the final days of the organization’s deterioration, it was learnt that the majority workers were unskilled and had been hired for their close relations with the senior workers.

It’s participation in weakening a workplace

For some mistaken facts, family ties are believed to have the most affection. Built on firm poles like having shared a big part of life with him or her, it can be sickening to watch a brother or a sister get desperate with search for work while you bask in a comfy office seat. For the sake of the individuals sentiments, family is family .and the workplace should not change that..

But as the family passion is made unrealistic by the fact that one shouldn’t accept employees based on relationships, the workplace too becomes unrealistic once employees are obtained based on relationships. If the passion is avoided, the workplace survives and thrives. But if it’s retained it submits it the organization for failure and inconveniences. The connected fellow is not beneficial to the workplace as they don’t have skills needed to improve the workplace. They receive payments for minimal contributions and proceed to bring downfalls as a result of unfinished dealings in their transmissions.

Given that they don’t have skills needed, their biggest task in the office is scheming fraudulent measures to hide their incompetence. Upon being given tasks they either deliver crappy work or get it done by other people. Their wo is mostly one that is submitted days after the deadline yet accompanied by a thousand excuses to justify their void.

In their pursue to not be marked as pathetic, they engage in hideous habits as their survival stunts. When this creepy occurrence allegedly fates the workplace a decline is recorded.

Some time this year the institute which is so strict upon students mannerism learnt about her absenteeism and expelled her.