Nobody Ever Teaches You How to Manage People. They Just Make You a Manager.

One of the biggest misconceptions in business is that good managers are created through promotion, but in my experience, they are not. Often it’s the classic case of the best teacher being made headmaster, even though the job roles are fundamentally different.

For example, most of my early promotions came because I worked hard and was good at my own job, but then, with no training whatsoever, I suddenly found myself responsible for other people's careers, motivation and performance, whilst still trying to work out my own. Looking back over nearly forty years in business, I can honestly say that some of my biggest career breakthroughs came not from getting things right, but despite getting management spectacularly wrong.

I was fortunate that my formative years as a manager came before today's far more structured HR environment. Back then, if someone had done an outstanding job, you took them to the pub on a Friday evening and bought them a few drinks. If someone needed a serious telling off, you closed the office door or went for a walk rather than documenting every conversation. I'm certainly not suggesting we should return to those days, but it was a period where relationships often mattered more than process, and young managers were allowed to learn through experience rather than policy manuals.

What still amazes me is that schools and universities spend years teaching mathematics, history, economics and science, yet almost nobody is ever taught how to manage people.

At just twenty-three I found myself managing the finance department at Global Holidays without the slightest clue what I was doing. Fortunately for me, my first recruit was Stuart, a thirty-year-old New Zealander who had years of accounting experience and was simply spending a year travelling around Europe. In reality, Stuart probably managed me far more than I managed him. Instead of being threatened by somebody older and more experienced, I discovered the enormous value of surrounding yourself with people who know things you don't.

Not long afterwards, my next deputy became Menzo Bymolan, a wonderfully laid-back Dutch accountant who perfectly balanced my youthful intensity. We worked hard, laughed even harder and, like so many ILG staff in those days, usually ended the week in the Jasmine Wine Bar.

Looking back now, I realise I wasn't building a department; I was building relationships, and those relationships created loyalty, trust and a culture that no management textbook could ever properly explain.

Like most young managers, however, I made almost every classic mistake.

I believed the boss should be the first person into the office and the last to leave. I kept the interesting work for myself because I assumed nobody else could do it as well, while handing everyone else the repetitive tasks without properly explaining either what success looked like or when I expected it to be delivered. Unsurprisingly, I ended up working ridiculous hours and convincing myself that I was indispensable when, in reality, I was simply failing to delegate effectively.

The irony is that if you met me today, you would probably describe me as the complete opposite. I have become an obsessive delegator, genuinely believing that my role is to create ideas, build strategy and remove obstacles, whilst giving talented people clear objectives and the freedom to achieve them in their own way.

Quarterly objectives, accountability and empowerment produce infinitely better businesses than one exhausted manager trying to do everything themselves. Sometimes I wonder just how much faster that learning curve would have been if I'd had an AI co-pilot sitting beside me in the early 1990s.

Another lesson arrived slightly later.

Early in my career, I naturally recruited people who thought like me because it felt comfortable, but the result was a highly driven, highly entrepreneurial team full of Mavericks, including lifelong friend Seamus Conlon, who also went on to become Managing Director of Airtours Holidays at an exceptionally young age.

The team achieved remarkable things, but they were rarely balanced. It took me years to understand that great businesses are not built by hiring more people who look like you, but by hiring people who compensate for your weaknesses, challenge your assumptions and bring skills you simply don't possess.

Stuart unknowingly taught me that lesson very early on by showing me that there is nothing to fear in employing people who are brighter or more experienced than you. In fact, the higher I climbed through the travel industry, the more essential that became.

The final lesson was about managing upwards.

Early in my career, I would proudly walk into Peter Long's office carrying lever-arch files full of detailed budgets, forecasts and supporting schedules, convinced he would be impressed by the sheer volume of analysis.

However, in reality, he just wanted a one-page summary containing the key numbers, the biggest movements, and the decisions that needed to be made. It was only years later, when I found myself leading much larger organisations, that I truly appreciated why. The higher you rise, the less time you have, and the more valuable clarity becomes. Senior leaders rarely need more information; they need better summarised information.

Looking back, I wouldn't change a single mistake I made because each one became a lesson that proved invaluable later in my career.

Management isn't something you learn in a classroom. It is learned by making mistakes, listening to people who know more than you, surrounding yourself with different personalities, trusting others with responsibility and remembering that whether you are managing downwards or reporting upwards, success nearly always comes from making other people's jobs easier rather than making yourself look clever.