Managers bring assumptions about how work should be done into their everyday management. Some of these assumptions were never consciously decided by them – they were inherited with the role or have simply become established ways of working. With the introduction of AI, some of these assumptions are becoming outdated, but this often goes unnoticed as long as the process still appears to work.
This training gives managers the space to identify, distinguish and test their assumptions about managing work before deciding whether they need to be adjusted. The training is based on participants’ own management routines – including meetings, approval processes, and the way they assign and review work.
- Strengthen the ability to recognise which assumptions about managing work are no longer valid.
- Learn a process for testing an assumption before making decisions based on it.
- Improve the ability to navigate ambiguous situations where multiple interpretations are possible.
- Learn how to use AI as a challenger of one’s own thinking.
- Support open-minded thinking within the team by modelling it as a manager and creating space for colleagues to do the same.
- Transfer one specific change into the manager’s own routine and evaluate its impact.
Management on Autopilot: When It Helps and When It Holds Us Back
- “Six Decisions” – participants work through a series of issues awaiting a management decision and then compare how they approached them
- Established management routines: what they save us and what they cost us
- When is it worth reconsidering a routine, and when is the established approach still the right choice?
- Mental anchors: what do I continue to do simply because it has always been done this way?
Assumptions About How Work Is Managed in Our Organisation
- What does a testable assumption look like, and how is it different from a complaint?
- Where did the assumption come from: what did I decide myself, what did I inherit with the role, and what is maintained by the process?
- What can I change myself, what requires a conversation with someone else, and what is maintained by my own behaviour within the team?
- Why does the first number we hear influence our estimates more than we realise?
- How we seek confirmation for our own opinions
Testing Assumptions
- Asking a question that tests an assumption instead of simply trying to “be objective”
- What would have to be true for my assumption to be wrong?
- Asking AI to challenge our own conclusions – and deciding what to take from the result
- What does nobody in our organisation question simply because “this is how we do things” – and how can we open up that conversation?
Alternative Ways of Managing the Same Work
- How could the same work be organised differently when the original reason for doing it no longer applies?
- Looking at the same situation from another manager’s perspective
- Tool or agent: what do I keep as part of my routine and what do I delegate?
- When two people interpret the same data differently and both have valid reasons for doing so
Applying the Learning in Practice
- Action plan: one routine, one change, one deadline
- What could prevent the plan from working, and how can the plan be made smaller and more achievable?
- Where is the mental anchor in my colleague’s thinking, and what can I change to help them recognise it?
- What will I say out loud about my assumption and how I am changing it?
- Personal checkpoint: how will I know that the change has worked?