Continuing with the difficult thoughts.
Someone I follow on Twitter said this:
“is it possible to “manage” well something you don’t fundamentally understand or know how to do yourself? I doubt it.”
I’m not attributing it because it’s not about them. This is a really common sentiment.
I’ll pair it with a statement a colleague made to me over 10 years ago (the sense is right but the exact words might not be, given the elapsed time), when I told him that I had accepted the position of Deputy Head of the School of Social Sciences. (Imagine this dripping with sarcasm.)
Interesting. Appointing someone with an interest in and aptitude for management to a management position. What a novel idea.
I took this as a compliment. The sarcasm was not aimed at me. This colleague was very active in our union and very well aware of all the bad management going on around the place though.
Identifying the right problem
Thinking of these 2 things together, I realize that the first sentiment is one that responds to a very real problem — poor management. The thing that inspires that type of comment is a situation in which someone makes a bad decision based on lack of knowledge and understanding.
However, I don’t think the problem is the lack of knowledge itself. The problem is how the manager deals with that lack of knowledge.
Option A
If you see management as a role in a power structure and your role as a manager to exert power over the people you manage, then you might see your lack of knowledge as a flaw or something that is going to undermine your power.
Therefore you ignore it. You pretend you have all the knowledge you need. You tell people what to do. You ignore their advice (based on their knowledge) because of their position in the power structure. Often as not, you get bad decisions.
Or, you spend all kinds of time trying to learn what the details are so you can make good decisions but without your team knowing. You might get more good decisions that way but you burn yourself out from working too hard doing all this extra stuff.
Option B
You see management as part of a complex division of labour. Your role is to direct the work of the team and to ensure that the team meets certain expectations, objectives, whatever. Your role also includes liaison between the people you manage and the people above you. That might include protecting them from the bullshit higher up, translating the demands of the higher levels of the institution to your team, or whatever.
A lack of knowledge is not necessarily a problem. You have experts on your team. You consult with them. You take their advice. You may not do exactly what they think should be done because you also have to weigh that expert advice with the directives coming at you from elsewhere. Hopefully you find a way to involve your team in coming to the compromise that you eventually decide on, even if they still grumble about it not being the best way to do things.
Hopefully they also recognize that you are doing a bunch of stuff that they have no interest in doing nor aptitude for. Like going to all those meetings, trying to secure the budget they need to do the work, etc.
I think good management is Option B
In option B you don’t need to be able to do the thing yourself or to have a really detailed understanding. You need to know some basics and some big picture things. Most importantly you need to respect the expertise of the people who do know how to do this and do have a really detailed understanding.
Management skills are often soft skills. Communication is really important. Knowing how the organization works and how your unit fits. Being able to take decisions and take responsibility for those decisions, even when someone isn’t going to be happy about them.
You can’t ignore power
Managers have power. You can’t pretend the system isn’t hierarchical.
Misuse of power is not inevitable.
The pay structure reinforces this better than them mentality, too. It’s really hard to value the unique expertise of members of your team when everyone knows that you get paid more than they do. Personally, I’m in favour of flatter salary structures, too.
Call me a dreamer.
I’d love to hear your comments.
- What is your experience of management?
- What is the image in your head of the type of person who actively tries to get into management?
- What do you think of my Options A & B?
When I do a leadership development program, or talk with my customers who do them, we are often working with shifting the mindset of Option A and trying to get people to see leadership more as Option B.
Leadership development is a lifelong process. Over time. After much deep self-reflection. Learning to be a good manager is part of it. Learning to discern what we are doing when we are in the role of the individual contributor versus manager versus leader is part of what we are developing.
I wish there were more better managers. Unfortunately many are put into roles without regard to how much they know about management, or even their aptitude for it. They aren’t happy and neither are the people who work under them.
I agree it doesn’t have to be that way, but it takes commitment on the part of the organization to not grab any warm body that is available or willing and put them into those roles.
Good post. I went to some leadership training and the instructor said most people don’t leave bad jobs, they leave bad managers. This underscores how much it should be like Option B instead of Option A.
I think many organizations do not give managers the time to manage. They often have a set of duties on top of managing their team and it is expected that they will do both, and do them well instead of ensuring they have the time to manage people effectively. This doesn’t mean they won’t have other duties, but I find many chose the duties over the people because they either don’t have the skills to do the managing or they prefer to avoid it because it does mean dealing with difficult situations like performance management, conflict etc.
In universities, the structure of academic management is one where you don’t get A or B, particularly in units where the head will manage both academic colleagues and administrative staff. Many are surprised at how much managing they have to do (there may not be anyone senior to delegate this to) and may not want to be the one who has to confront a colleague who isn’t performing well, or that staff person who is difficult and makes other staff unhappy. They have terms of 3-5 years and if they can just ride that stuff out, it becomes someone else’s problem.
Also, there is no reward (and much scorn) for taking on these roles. If you rock the boat too much, it may be difficult to go back to the role of colleague afterwards too.
One other thought on what’s required: TRUST. You have to trust your team to do their jobs. You have to enable them to perform well and you don’t have to know every little thing they’re doing (if they’re doing well; performance issues require another strategy). Your job is to lay a foundation for people to do well; not to manage every aspect of their work. It’s a lot like parenting!
You make good points about trust and responsibility. It is a situation where you bear responsibility for decisions that may not please everyone.