I'm Sorry I broke Your Company

5. I Am a Manager, and So Can You Why Is the Successful Manager's Handbook 609 Pages Long?

At various times during my consulting career, I've found myself providing management training. The demand for management skills training seems to be perennially high. Having a bad manager or a bad relationship with a manager is among the most frequent reasons why people leave companies, so good management is a vital concern for businesses. Plus, improving employee performance is one of a managers main responsibilities, and that is not an easy thing to do. Fortunately, there are lots of consultants in this business and, with them, lots of management theories and models. I still have a handy-dandy envelope of quick reference cards that I helped develop at Gemini years ago that show a variety of models:

• Coaching for behavior change (five steps)

• Giving effective feedback (seven components)

• Receiving feedback as a gift (six steps)

• PACR (paraphrase, ask, check, respond) listening technique

• AIR (acknowledge, investigate, reinforce) model for dealing with resistance

• Trust formula

• Partners chart

• Stages of team development

• Plus, many more (thirty-six in total)

Since then, I have attended four leadership training programs, including not one but two womens leadership programs, and have become acquainted with many more management models. So what exactly is good management technique? What's more important — coaching and feedback or delegating work or developing employees? To answer the age-old question of good management, I started pulling out all the relevant materials from my bookshelves. For my purposes in this chapter, I am going to use the terms «leadership» and «management» synonymously, fully aware that some leadership gurus (or is that management gurus?) have made a career of differentiating the two. Personally, I've never been able to comprehend how you can be a great leader without being a great manager. How do you get to a position of leadership without succeeding as a manager? How can you be a great manager without knowing how to inspire and motivate people?

Anyway, I pulled out some of the books from these umpteen programs, and the first one that caught my eye was the Successful Managers Handbook. I'm not sure where or when I got this, but it is used as the textbook for Southwest AirlinesTeadership program. It is 609 pages long, excluding the index and appendices, and was written by a team of consultants at Personnel Decisions International, a large and imposing human resources consultancy. PDI is responsible for a number of trademarked models and assessments; perhaps It's PROFILOR 360-degree feedback tool is the most famous. The Successful Managers Handbook is built around the PDI Leadership Success Wheel, which is divided into four categories of capabilities:

• Self-leadership

• Results leadership

• People leadership

• Thought leadership

These four leadership areas are broken down into nine factors total (e.g., a communications factor and a strategy factor), which are composed of thirty-two skills. «Inspire trust,»⁴ champion change and innovation,» «think strategically,» and «drive for results» are some of the skills needed to master leadership success. These skills are broken down further into more detailed tasks or attributes. For instance, «champion change and innovation» has three components — «develop personal creativity,» «encourage innovation in others,» and «champion change initiatives.» Each of these components has It's own set of parts. These skills probably sound familiar because they form the template for many of the leadership competency models used in companies today. Altogether, I counted 433 separate attributes or actions that comprise successful leadership ability. Each of these has a chapter explaining how to accomplish it, hence the 609 pages. The chapters describe the skills and offer tips, how-tos, extensive step-by-step instructions, templates, information on more resources, and even some relevant cartoons. While some of the tips border on the inane, «readily put in extra effort to accomplish important tasks,» the book does give an overview of many business planning tools that may be unfamiliar to a new manager. To be honest, I never used this book. In case you didn't pick up on it, this book is 609 pages long! Every time I open this book I get a headache. I know that it is meant as a reference book, but I find it impossible to even assimilate the table of contents so I know when to refer to it.

Next to it on the shelf, in stark contrast, is Leadership and the One Minute Manager. This slim volume of 107 pages (large print on small pages), was written by another HR consulting powerhouse, Ken Blanchard. This book explains the Situational Leadership model using an apocryphal tale of an entrepreneur looking for advice from a well-known manager. Years ago when I took a Situational Leadership training class, I received this book along with a stack of other material stamped with the model — a wall poster, a wallet card, a white paper, several CDs with e-learning modules, and a cardboard contraption that I cant readily identify the purpose of. The Situational Leadership model, perhaps the most popular management model and certainly the best branded, is based on a theory jointly developed by Ken Blanchard and Paul Hersey. They went their separate ways, resulting in each creating his own version of the Situational Leadership model.

Blanchards version of the model (SLII) says that there are four types of management styles: directing, coaching, supporting, and delegating. There are also four development levels of employees determined by their levels of competence and commitment. The main point of the model is that the management or leadership style you use is situational, depending on the ability and experience of the employee. If the employee has a new task, you would use the directing style and basically tell the employee what to do, providing close supervision. If the employee is familiar with but not competent in the task and is experiencing some doubts or confidence issues, you would use the coaching style and provide encouraging feedback as well as specific instructions. The supporting style lets the employee make decisions and complete the task with the manager facilitating the process and providing support along the way. The delegating style lets the employee do the task on her own. You use the model by meeting with your employee and explaining the different styles. Together you decide which management technique is most appropriate for the situation. The model also states that the leader must ensure the goals of the task are clear, observe the performance, and provide feedback. Hersey's version of the model is similar, but he uses the terms «telling, selling, participating, and delegating.» Because he s not the marketing powerhouse that the Ken Blanchard Companies are, when you hear the term «Situational Leadership,» it probably refers to the SLII model.

In contrast, a leadership model developed by Robert Tannenbaum and Warren H. Schmidt in 1958 and published in «How to Choose a Leadership Pattern» advocates for choosing one leadership style to avoid confusion and mismatched expectations among subordinates. This model describes a continuum of management styles ranging from autocratic on one end to laissez-faire on the other end. In the middle are styles that can be described as persuasive, participative, facilitating, or democratic. Choosing a style depends on the culture of the company, the abilities and expectations of the direct reports, and the ability and confidence of the manager. If the gap between the capabilities of the manager and the direct reports is big, an autocratic style is appropriate. If the gap is small, a laissez-faire style is better. The success of a manager is due to an understanding of his own values and capabilities, an understanding of the needs and desires of his subordinates and the necessities of the particular situation, and the managers ability to act accordingly.

If you prefer more recent work, Daniel Goleman, who developed the concept of emotional intelligence, also developed a leadership model. His model is based on the concept of resonance, which is the ability to tap into other peoples feelings and move them in a positive direction. People with high emotional intelligence are able to resonate with others. Goleman believes that the emotions of the leader affect the emotions of the employees and identifies six leadership styles that can resonate — visionary, coaching, affiliative, democratic, pacesetting, and commanding. All the styles are appropriate in certain circumstances; however, the latter two styles are more autocratic and can have a negative impact on an organization if overused.

Are you tired of leadership models yet? I am, though I’ve barely scratched the surface. My point is to give you the context that there are a lot of models and theories out there and that this stuff is taken very seriously. Given this context, in March 2011, Google released the results of a two-year study called «Project Oxygen» to determine what traits make a good manager. Google decided to do It's own research and analyzed thousands of performance appraisals and feedback surveys to arrive at It's own model. It's findings made headlines in the business section of the New York Times as well as receiving countless mentions in business and technology blogs. Here, in order of importance, are the findings of Googles groundbreaking study:

Google's Eight Habits of Highly Effective Managers

1. Be a good coach.

2. Empower your team and don't micromanage.

3. Express interest in employees' success and well-being.

4. Be productive and results-oriented.

5. Be a good communicator and listen to your team.

6. Help your employees with career development.

7. Have a clear vision and strategy for the team.

8. Have key technical skills so you can help advise the team.

This new model received both lots of derision and lots of praise in the press. These golden rules have been the basis of management fundamentals for at least fifty years. Anyone who has read basic management books or attended management training could tell you this. However, this model is pretty simple compared with others, and It's principles are ordered by importance and backed by data!

The fact that Google, one of the worlds most admired and imitated companies, felt the need to conduct a study of what makes a manager good underscores what a conundrum good management is in the business world. Everyone recognizes It's importance, many companies have mandated manager training programs, yet few companies can say that they have excellent managers. It's a Sisyphean task. It doesn't matter how much time, money, and attention is devoted to good management, no one seems to have achieved it. Even a company like Pfizer, which uses the Situational Leadership model and requires managers to attend two weeks of training, doesn't seem to have cracked this nut. When I was a manager there, I found myself discussing one of my direct reports with a vice president in my group. He commented on how this person's work had surpassed everyone's expectations and how in general, my team performed really well. He then asked if I could share my management techniques with the rest of the group.

At first I was pleased with the recognition implicit in this request, but once I thought about it, I was completely taken aback. I didn't have any management techniques! What was I going to share? At first I felt like a fraud, but then I had a moment of revelation. I liked the people who worked for me, and I wanted to see them succeed. I had good relationships with them. I am still friends with many of my former bosses and subordinates. I care about them, they care about me, and on the job, we worked together to succeed and achieve results. We did this by talking and being honest. In short, we develop good relationships.

During my career, I've helped turn some poor performers into top performers. I'd love to pat myself on the back for an extraordinary talent, but I succeed at this because I like to do it and I put in the effort required. Usually, other managers look at me aghast when we have a problem employee and I offer to take that person in my group. This is contrary to one of the basic tenets of good management — you are supposed to fill your team with the top performers. I know this sounds awful, but taking a poor performer under my wing is similar to taking in a rescue dog. When you give a good situation to an employee who has only known a bad situation, he is yours for life. It's extra work at first, but afterward you are rewarded with an extremely loyal, hardworking, and happy employee. Of course, I choose the people I think have the potential, and admittedly, my track record is pretty good but certainly not 100 percent.

The first time I took a problem employee under my wing was on a large consulting engagement. We were in the selling phase, where we did an initial scoping of the problems and put together a proposal to sell a project. We had a new hire, Frank, who had never consulted before. This project was unusually chaotic, with a very large project team and limited access to the client. Most of us were working from our hotel rooms, but we did have a designated conference room that we used for PCs and printers and checking in with the project manager. A few of us, including Frank, were assigned to review the clients financial reports and benchmark various financial measures with their competitors’. We headed off to the nearest library to use It's databases and divvied up the reports among ourselves. The plan was to reconvene the next day to collate our findings and to report those to the project leader the day after. We convened as planned to discuss our findings, but Frank was missing. We left voice mails and called his room, but he didn’t answer. During the evening, while we were preparing our findings for the project leader meeting, Frank rushed in excitedly to the conference room. He apologized profusely for missing our meeting. He had returned to the library to investigate some information and lost track of time. He had found some very interesting data and had been working on it all day. We told him we were working on the presentation and would help him present his findings, but he begged off. He had everything in a spreadsheet all ready to go. Although we told him that the expectation was to put our findings in PowerPoint, he was really excited about his material and was confident that the project leader would be sufficiently impressed.

The next day, we presented our findings to the project leader, who naturally had questions and asked us to investigate some findings further. Then it was Franks turn. He distributed printouts from his spreadsheets, basically rows and rows of data, and began talking animatedly about each number, his eyes glued to the spreadsheet. After about three minutes of details on financial numbers, the project leader shouted, «Stop.» Still enthusiastic, Frank asked, «Do you have a question?» «Yes,» was the reply, «What the hell is this?» It was not normal to use four-letter words in the course of business, and the whole room burst out laughing. When we all settled down, the project leader shook his head and asked for the next presenter. Frank was crestfallen and humiliated. He also seemed a bit bewildered, and I felt bad for him.

Later that day, I asked Frank to join us for dinner, and he started to decline the invitation. He wanted to do more work on his spreadsheet and redeem himself. I told him rather firmly that it would be a better idea if he joined us. He got the message, and at dinner that night, I learned that this was both his first consulting engagement and his first business experience. He had been in the ROTC program and had a few years in the military but no business or consulting experience. He had excelled as a student and then as an officer and was certain that he would excel as a consultant. His failure earlier in the day was a huge shock to his self-esteem, and he was determined to make amends. I mentioned that his mistake was missing our meeting, where we consolidated our findings and put together the presentation. We knew what was expected, while he obviously didn't. After dinner, we all agreed that we would do our additional research in the morning individually and meet in the afternoon to rework our presentation. This time Frank showed up, and it turned out his finding was something we already had, but we added his supporting evidence to the presentation to make a stronger case. He was disappointed that he hadn't found an amazing revelation, but he had a section to present. In a flash of insight, I asked him to rehearse his section, and he started to delve into the details of his numbers. After a few tries, we worked out exactly what he would say.

Our final presentation went well, the project leader presented it to the client later in the day, and we sold a sizeable piece of work. The next week, the project leader held a meeting where he assigned team leads to different portions of the work. The team leads then started divvying up the consulting resources. When Frank's name came up, the project leader shook his head in consternation. All eyes were suddenly on me. Would I take him on my team? I was pretty new to managing other people, this would be only my second time leading a team, and Frank was going to need a lot of management. However, he was very eager to succeed, worked hard, and responded well to coaching. Plus, I knew that I really didn't have a choice, so I agreed to take him.

Over the next few weeks, I met with my team, and we put together outlines for the client deliverables. After each team meeting, I met separately with Frank and reviewed what I needed from him. On several occasions, he put together something different from what I expected, so I learned to communicate more clearly and also urged him to ask me for clarification whenever he had any doubts. I often drafted what I thought his final product should look like. With a lot of direction, Frank started to get the hang of the engagement. In his favor, he did have an infectious enthusiasm and great people skills. However, every time I had him present his work, he got absorbed in some detail he found fascinating and diverted from the agenda. Because he was well-liked, the client was able to forgive this transgression at our informal meetings, but Frank was not allowed to present his work at the formal client progress meetings. This is a big issue for a consultant and potentially a career ender. Although I coached him repeatedly to stick to the agenda and to summarize, he continued to delve into details. He saw the need to change but just couldn't help himself. He was fascinated by the details and thought we should be, too.

Exasperated, I realized that my coaching was ineffective, and I needed to do something different. I arranged for some of the clients senior management to attend our informal team presentation and explained that their role was to complain vehemently whenever Frank went off track or got too detailed. Frank was unaware that I was setting him up. Surprised at the senior-level attendees at our meeting, he got up to present. After a few minutes, he got lost in the minutiae and received some feedback from his audience. He refocused, excelled for a while, and then got sidetracked again. He received some stronger feedback. After he strayed the third time, the comments got loud and derisive (the client was having fun with this). His audience had become hostile. He was shocked, but suddenly he became aware that he was boring everyone and wasting important peoples time. He may have found the details interesting, but we clearly didn't. And we mattered more than he did. I saw the glimmer of realization on his face. He turned to us and said, «I get it. You don't think this is interesting and really don't care. You probably just want to know the highlights."

After that incident, he was a completely different consultant. He stayed focused on the task at hand, and he tailored his work to what others wanted, not what he wanted. He also became my go-to person. He volunteered for everything and overperformed even the smallest tasks. His performance was no longer just about succeeding. It had become very personal. I had shown faith in him, and he was going to make sure he never disappointed me. Although at the beginning of the project, he took a lot of my time and energy, by the end of the project, he was doing the work of two people.

The culmination of the project was a big client presentation where we reviewed all our accomplishments. This was an extremely important presentation because part of our fees were based on realized cost savings. Therefore, the client would have to agree with our results. Frank had fifteen minutes on the agenda to present his work. Many of the consultants who knew Frank only from the beginning of the project asked me to reconsider his involvement. Fortunately, two of the clients who partook in my learning experiment were also at the final presentation, and they expressed their support for Frank. Interestingly, clients usually look to poke holes in consulting presentations and make us dance, but these two were really vested in Franks success. When his turn came, Frank was a little apprehensive, knowing what the other consultants thought of him, but I had told him to look at me and our two friendly clients. Seeing our positive body language, his confidence grew. He was polished and professional and, even better, engaging. His infectious enthusiasm, which had in the past thrown him off track, was now directed at charming his audience. And he succeeded. I had a hard time keeping my eyes dry; I felt so proud.

He wasn’t the only one who learned something important. I learned a great deal. People have very different ways of perceiving the world, for one. What is fascinating to one person is extraneous detail to another. Also, sometimes coaching and feedback aren’t enough. You may have to show people their problems rather than talk about them. Plus, I learned something about myself. I never considered myself a «people person.» I would describe myself as more interested in intellectual matters than emotional ones, but when Frank got up to speak at the final client presentation and did an excellent job, I felt the biggest sense of accomplishment of my career — even more so when Frank went on to be successful in his later projects.

I had my greatest success as a manager before I learned any management models. This was what I learned from managing Frank, and it so happens that these lessons apply to other areas of my life:

1. Show you care. I want my direct reports (and my peers and my family and my friends) to succeed. I really do. I don’t understand frenemies. When my employees succeed, I succeed. I feel great. Because I care about my team, I like to get to know them. I want to know about their home lives, their interests, and their dislikes, not so that I can manage them better, but so that I can have better relationships. I get to know people because I want to get to know people, not as a «technique.»This is what makes my life interesting — having relationships with interesting people.

2. Communicate. No one knows what is in your head, not your spouse, not your kids, and certainly not your employees. This was an important lesson I learned with Frank. At the beginning, I would communicate clearly and specifically what I expected, and he would give me something different. Then I would review it again, and again he gave me something different. I was exasperated. However, I am an intelligent person and realize that if something isn’t working, you must try something else. Even though I thought I was being very clear and specific, obviously I wasn’t to him. That’s when I had my own «aha» moment. It was not in my power to make Frank understand me. There was no way I could get inside his mind and change it. However, it was in my power to make sure Frank understood me. I could always ask him what was in his head. I changed my approach. It is one I still use today, and it goes like this: «I just gave you a list of instructions that was probably not as clear as it could have been. What do you think you should be doing?» Aha! Now I know what's in the other persons head, and I can try again!

3. Be flexible/adaptable/responsive. I’m not sure what the right label is for this rule, but this reflects my number one complaint about the universe. Basically, if something is not working, try something different. Do not keep trying the same method over and over and over and expect that one day it will magically work when it has failed every other time. If coaching doesn't work, try coaching again but in a different way. Perhaps obtain feedback from someone else. Talk with the employee about the causes of the behavior. If that doesn't work, try setting up an experience, like I did with Frank. But don't try the same thing repeatedly and expect it to work!

4. Think and plan ahead. This one isn't so much about managing people as it is about managing work and workloads. Map out what needs to be accomplished and by when and share the information with your team. Meet with stakeholders and find out what they need you to do. Develop a final work plan with your team. This sounds very simple, but I know managers who delegate work without getting input from their team and some who keep their employees in the dark about future projects. They don't want them to worry about what's coming. Put all the work out there, let the whole team see what it is so they know what everyone is working on, and so people can volunteer to take on new tasks and share the workload.

Okay. How does my acquired wisdom stack up against Googles research and the research and models of the academics? Without studies, without extensive data mining, without scholarly credentials, how did I fare? I have only four things, so I win the simplicity category.

Lets return to the Google list. I've reordered it to compare it with Stephen Covey's seven habits of highly effective people in table 1.

It's not a perfect match, but considering one is about good business management and the other is about success in life, they have a striking similarity. If I reworded the Google list to make it more generic, wouldn't it be pretty close?

Stephen Covey breaks his habits into three categories:

• Private victory/personal effectiveness, kind of like self-mastery

• Public victory or working with other people

• Renewal or taking the time to improve yourself

I like this breakdown because being a good manager really has three parts — being able to accomplish work, being able to manage others, and helping to develop others' skills. So essentially, being a good manager is very similar to being a good person. An essential part of being a good and effective person is being able to have good relationships. Good management is having good relationships with the people who work for you — listening to them, coaching them, and having open and honest communications where it is okay to clarify any misunderstandings and okay to give feedback (Google rules 1, 3, and 5). These are all components of having a good relationship. The funny thing about having a good relationship with your direct reports is that you trust them; therefore, you don’t need to micromanage them (Google rule 2). You also tend to care about their future (Google rule 6.)

Let's revisit the Goleman model based on emotional intelligence (visionary, coaching, affiliative, democratic, pacesetting, and commanding). In essence, Goleman is saying that good leaders need to be empathetic and flexible. The Tannenbaum-Schmidt model specifically states that choosing a leadership style is dependent on the manager's own self-awareness, the needs of her subordinates, and the demands of the particular situation. So again, good leaders need to understand themselves and be empathetic and flexible. My point is that these aren't leadership skills or management skills or business skills. These are life skills.

Revisiting the Situational Leadership model, a manager is supposed to choose a style that matches the needs of the subordinates. A manager does this by meeting with his direct reports and discussing their needs and the appropriate leadership styles. Gemini Consulting, years ago, had a practice of conducting an expectations review between the project manager and the consultant at the beginning of a project. During this meeting, you met with your project manager to determine your goals on the project and your expectations for how you would work together. The goals were the «what» of your work, while the expectations were «how» you liked to work. You talked about how you liked to be managed and what kind of support you needed. Your manager talked about what she needed from you regarding information updates and communications. This was when you both figured out how capable and confident you were of doing the job. I found these meetings incredibly useful because the two of you discussed how best to work together. The greatest value of using the Situational Leadership model is having the conversation between the manager and the direct report. The model forces you to communicate, gives you language to communicate with, and forces you to be flexible in your approach.

This is my point: good management technique is not rocket science, people. Why are we overcomplicating this? To be a good manager, first, you have to be able to manage yourself and get things done, and second, you need to be able to have good relationships with those around you. You should also think about the future, yours and your teams, but that's a lower priority. Good management skills are good relationship skills. That's it. End of story. No need to overthink this. It's not a technique or a science at all. It is knowing how to have good relationships.

I’ve read a couple of management advice books that strongly caution against being friends with your direct reports. The advice is illustrated with an anecdote along these lines: we used to be friends, then I got promoted, and then my friend turned in a piece of work that was garbage and expected me to be okay with it. Or he didn’t turn in the work and expected me to cover for him — or to do it myself. My reaction to such stories is, What kind of friendship is that? My friends would never take advantage of me that way. Those aren’t friends. Those are enemies.

My own experience is that when you have a boss you love, you do anything for her. You do this because you know that she would do anything for you. I’ve been lucky to have that kind of relationship both upward and downward. I’ve often had to beg my team to go home and warn them that they were taking their jobs much too seriously. If I got too involved in their work, they told me nicely to back off, and if they needed help, they came into my office looking for it. This is what people do. This is how people naturally act with other people. The reason some managers don’t behave this way is because they’ve been taught by experts that management is a science or set of rules or a methodology whereby you must act unnaturally and follow guidelines instead of your own judgment.

The world does not need any more management models or methods. The ones we have work just fine, or don’t work just fine, because the models are not what have the real value. The conversations with our employees about how to work together are what have value. So does gaining the wisdom that there is more than one right way to work with people. If you are spending your time reading 609 pages of how to manage your people, then you are not actually managing your people. All these devices are just ways to avoid what you really should be doing. The only right way to deal with people is to actually deal with people, not to read about dealing with people, to prepare a checklist on how to deal with people, or to study how to deal with people. The more time we spend figuring out how to deal with people, the less time we spend actually dealing with people. And if I'm at a loss with how to work with you, I can seek advice from all sorts of places and books and classes, but the most effective method is to seek that advice from you.