Managing at UF
Discover the tools you need to be an effective manager at the University of Florida.
About the Program
Managing at UF equips University of Florida leaders with essential knowledge and skills to excel in our unique university environment. The program aligns with the University of Florida’s Leadership Competency Model.
This certification includes a range of workshops designed specifically for UF. Workshops are free and open to all faculty and staff interested in becoming effective managers.
To earn the “Managing at UF” certification, complete ten required workshops and two electives, totaling 12 workshops. Participants can complete workshops at their own pace, with no time limit for completion. Some workshops from the earlier “Supervisory Challenge” certification also count toward the new certification.
Required Courses
Available as an on-demand online course through myTraining
This course provides a practical introduction and guide to fair and legal employment practices at UF. This course is ideal for individuals interested in human resources, serving in supervisory positions, or interested in becoming a supervisor. This course folds in the most pertinent laws and policies involving basic human resource practices and impacting our employees.
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Instructor: Irma Alvarez
Communication is consistently identified as one of the most important tasks of a manager. In this session, we will identify key issues, challenges and strategies to help managers communicate effectively with team members. Topics covered will include:
- Focal points of communication and communication breakdown for managers
- Tools for influencing and knowing when to use them
- Making communication adjustments based on an employee’s preferences
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Instructor: Gwynn Cadwallader
Participants will define “accountability” as a leadership competency and explore ways to incorporate accountability in their interactions with employees. The overall objective of the workshop is to identify ways to positively impact performance and work culture to get great results.
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Instructor: Courtney Moon
Elevate your leadership by mastering the six essential roles of an effective coach. In this course, managers will gain invaluable coaching skills to empower teams and drive performance. Learn techniques like the GROW model for structured coaching conversations and delivering constructive feedback. Practice scenarios to build trust, increase motivation, and foster accountability as a coach. Unlock your potential to inspire growth, and facilitate lasting success for your team.
*This course will replace Power of Feedback and Coaching for Success, effective September 1st, 2024
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Instructor: Rebecca Younglove
In this course, participants will define “Emotional Intelligence” (EI) as a leadership and management competency, building upon a model for emotional and social competency. At the end of this session, participants will be able to identify how emotional intelligence affects leadership and will have generated ideas and “next steps” to leverage their emotional intelligence in the workplace for heightened leadership success.
Available as an on-demand online course through myTraining.
The course covers how to:
- Implement best practices and hiring strategies that help mitigate behaviors that negatively impact the hiring process prepare a job description or position profile that’s free of potential barriers to opportunity
- Advertise the position to attract a pool of competitive applicants
- Establish behavioral based interview questions and anchor answers that support best practices
It also provides an overview of tools such as hiring rubrics and the ideal candidate profile.
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Instructor: Rebecca Younglove
“Thinking Strategically: Using Vision, Purpose and Goals to Get Results” is a workshop for managers who want to learn ways to think more strategically in order to achieve team goals. During this session, participants will learn about the importance of having and articulating a clear vision and purpose for the team. Additionally, participants will learn a goal setting strategy that can help ensure the team identifies and works on the right goals that align with team and organizational vision and purpose.
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Instructor: Rebecca Younglove
The focus of this workshop is on the role of the leader in setting a personal example. Emphasis will be on the leadership competencies of “role model,” “integrity,” and “humility.” At the end of this session, participants will be able to identify the key aspects of integrity and humility and have generated ideas and action items to cultivate these aspects of effective leadership.
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Instructor: Tricia Bachus
Most of us work with well-intentioned people. However, difficult issues surface and require our attention, whether it is about scarce resources, misaligned goals, unpredictable policies, differences in opinions, or unprofessional behavior. These skills are the best way to guard against groupthink, invite multiple perspectives and build trust. In this course you will learn how to prepare for, initiate and conduct difficult conversations that can yield positive outcomes.
*This course is a requirement, effective September 1, 2024
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Instructor: Courtney Moon
Attend this session and learn the basic ways to use your time wisely, the difference between importance and urgency and the benefits of delegation.
Electives
Available as an on-demand online course through myTraining
This course is designed to increase institutional awareness so that employees at the University of Florida may be more effective in their jobs as they navigate the complexities of our large university and serve as resources for others. This course reviews UF’s overall organizational structure, its managerial structure (deans, directors, department chairs, etc.), and other relevant university relationships, including the University Board of Trustees and Board of Governors. Other key resources and facts about the university also are introduced.
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Also available as an on-demand online course through myTraining.
Clarity + Compliance = Good Stewardship! The University of Florida is a complex place with various funding sources. This workshop will introduce UF’s sources of funds along with the accompanying rules, or directives, that govern how each type of monies may be spent. Participants will learn about “allowable expenditures” for each funding source and have a chance to practice applying the rules to ensure uniform and consistent application of associated directives. The overall objective of this workshop is to ensure UF employees with fiscal responsibilities understand how funding sources can be used when completing financial transactions.
This class qualifies for CPE credit for Florida CPAs.
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Instructor: Rebecca Younglove
Being a new manager has its challenges—whether it’s a result of being new to a work unit, shifting from peer to supervisor, or just being new to management in general. Attend this workshop to learn how to manage that transition successfully. The workshop also will provide a useful framework for establishing your role as a UF manager, including tips on how to avoid common mistakes.
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Instructor: Shannon Powell
Things change rapidly and continually at work which requires us to address unanticipated, uncertain, time-pressured and complex problems and decisions. In this session we will consider how critical thinking, along with self-awareness and understanding of the mental shortcuts we often, and unknowingly, take can be integrated into a process to help cultivate good judgment.
This class qualifies for CPE Credit for Florida CPAs
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Instructor: Gwynn Cadwallader
Effective managers create and cultivate collaboration and teamwork in order for their unit to reach its full potential. In this session, we will discuss tactics managers can use to build a collaborative team. Specifically, we will look at team development from a manager perspective and how to facilitate decisions that everyone can commit to by building consensus.
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Instructor: Courtney Moon
Participants will discuss why change is difficult, what they can and should expect when implementing change, and how they–as leaders or “change agents”–can make changes more effectively by taking employee response into account. By focusing on normal responses to change, along with the impact of resistance to change and employee resilience, this workshop will provide participants with an opportunity to reflect upon their roles as “change agents” so that they may more effectively implement change or guide their work unit during times of change. Practical and interactive, this workshop will provide essential skills useful in navigating the complexities of change management in today’s workplace.
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Instructors: Robert Cancellieri and David Fox
Difficult employees take up a lot of their supervisors’ time and can create serious morale problems within departments. Supervisors who need to analyze and manage problem employees will learn how to get the workplace back on track to productivity.
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Instructor: Angie Brown
Why should leaders care about mindfulness? We’ll explore what research on leadership effectiveness tells us about the ways the mind shapes our behavior and ripples out to affect the teams we lead and our organization’s overall effectiveness. By cultivating self-awareness, we can become more conscious of our automatic reactions, assumptions and actions, which can help us make more skillful choices. You’ll gain practical knowledge and tools to help you manage everyday stress and lead with authenticity and compassion.
Instructor: Nicole Stedman
No matter where someone’s role lies in an organizational chart, every person has the capacity to influence others around them. Every person can wield the power of influence to make change if they understand how influence works. In this course, you will learn what influence is along with what it is not, which builds into an understanding of how to apply your influence in many different settings. In other words, you will be able to use concepts of influence to create positive change in your environment.
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Instructor: Sarah Hanson
The research is overwhelming—our brains aren’t built for multitasking. When we constantly juggle various cognitive tasks, we experience decreased productivity, impaired cognitive ability, increased stress, and diminished creativity—all of which reduce us to fractions of the effective professionals we are capable of being. Many professionals surrender to a frantic and unfocused workstyle out of the belief that there is no other way. The modern-day workplace simple demands us to function in this manner, right? Wrong. In this course, you will learn how to recognize and squash your multitasking tendencies and recalibrate your approach to work. By setting clear priorities, increasing your focus, managing your time and effort, reducing physical and mental clutter, executing on what matters most, and giving yourself space to be innovative, you can elevate your performance and put yourself on the path to greater productivity.