Supervision and the Art of Supervising

Upcoming dates (1)

Oct. 21-23, 2025

Madison, WI or Live Online

Course Overview

Learn the latest techniques in conflict resolution, effective communication, and team building to capitalize on traditional traits and characteristics of supervision. Participation in multiple case-study-practice sessions will ease implementation of your new knowledge after the course!

Who Should Attend?

This course is encouraged for any professional who hopes to evolve into a responsible and successful leader.  Not restricted to maintenance personnel.

  • Maintenance supervisors and managers
  • Storeroom managers
  • Production supervisors and managers
  • Non-technical and non-production supervisors
  • Safety, quality HR supervisors

Additional Information

Managing and leading are both essential to sustaining team performance. However, are we developing leaders and leadership traits or merely hoping our great managers will also be great leaders. This program makes the distinction between the two disciplines, makes the case for both, and starts the process of building exceptional leaders.

This course is part of the Maintenance and Reliability Management Certificate. Enhance your maintenance skills while earning a recognized credential.

Course Outline

Introduction

  • Welcome and orientation
  • Philosophy
  • Definitions
  • Continuous Improvement
  • World Class

Leaders vs. managers

  • The difference
  • The need for both

Leadership traits and characteristics

  • What to look for
  • What to enhance
  • What to change

Team building

  • Creating empowered associations
  • Developing partnerships

Setting expectations

  • Competency based training
  • True ownership
  • Feedback

The change model

  • Status quo
  • Vision
  • Expectations
  • Metrics
  • Behavior over time
  • Culture change

Goal setting

  • KPIs
  • Goals
  • Means
  • Consequences

Conflict resolution

  • Expectations
  • Roles and Responsibilities
  • Processes

Communication

  • Communication model
  • Communication plan
  • Crafting the message
  • Give it to them straight

Instructor

John Ross

John L. Ross, Jr has been a practitioner of maintenance and reliability for almost four decades. He is a former Captain in the United States Air Force, a Distinguished Graduate of both the Aircraft Maintenance Officer School and the Squadron Officer School. John is a Gulf War veteran.

He is a published author of almost two dozen articles and two best-selling books: The Reliability Excellence Workbook, From Ideas to Action; Cover You’re A$$ets, Asset Management at Your Place and at Your Pace.

John is the President of the international reliability consulting company, Maintenance Innovators, Inc., a global thought leader in equipment reliability. John is the co-founder of the American Reliability & Maintenance Institute; creators and administrators of the Certified Storeroom Manager, Certified Storeroom Technician, and the Certified Professional Reliability Engineer certifications.

John is a certified Lean Manufacturing facilitator, Process Safety Management SME, and a Certified Maintenance and Reliability Professional (CMRP). John holds a U.S. Patent, an A.S., B.S., M.S. and Ph.D.

Upcoming dates (1)

Program Director

Jon Wellik

Contact Us

Create a custom learning experience

We can deliver this course as an on-site learning experience tailored to your organization’s specific training needs.