I have a good friend who started a new job less than three weeks ago, and he’s considering quitting. So are the other staff that work there. Their workload is fine, their working conditions are adequate, their boss is intelligent and creative, they’re being trained effectively by a business consultant who makes weekly visits, and their customers are no different than yours or mine. They get paid on time… so what would drive them all out?

Simply put, their boss has a mercurial personality. The same person who praised you yesterday may go for your throat first thing in the morning. His mood swings are making them all crazy. Those of you who are pet owners know that training a puppy requires consistency and patience. If you cuddle and pet the pup most of the time, but randomly assault it unexpectedly, you’ll make it nuts. And that’s what’s happening to the staff in my friend’s office.

I’m sure this manager tells himself he’s “keeping them on their toes” or “motivating them”. What he’s doing is making their work life horrible, and he’ll never retain staff for long. If he can’t retain staff, recruiting costs will be high, productivity will be low, and his customers will see the constant turnover and hesitate to do business with his company.

Not Everyone Can be a Direct Manager

A Gallup poll of more 1 million employed U.S. workers concluded that a bad boss or immediate supervisor is the Number 1 Reason people quit their jobs.

“People leave managers not companies…in the end, turnover is mostly a manager issue,” Gallup wrote in its survey findings. The effect of poor management is widely felt. Gallup also determined that poorly managed work groups are on average 50 percent less productive and 44 percent less profitable than well-managed groups.

In May, Report on Business reported that a Canadian survey of more than 1,600 respondents  suggested a lack of trust in senior leaders is the main factor in people quitting their jobs.

It’s My Company And I Can Do What I Want

There’s no doubt that some people running businesses place more value on feeding their egos than making a profit, but unless you are one of them, it’s worth asking yourself a few honest questions. Your head may lie about the answers, but your heart won’t, if you really listen. Your profits will thank you.

• Is my staff turnover higher than typical for my industry?
• Do my staff trust me enough to criticize or disagree with me?
• Do I treat my staff with respect, consistently?
• If my staff could fire me and replace me, would they?

If you need improvement in this area, work on it. Read a book. Take a course. Get a coach. If direct management of staff is really not in your skill-set, have someone else manage your staff who can do it effectively. That will allow you to learn from them, if you choose, and cushion your staff from you. Go do what you do best, and let someone else do what you don’t.

See Also

The Report on Business related story

“I hate the office politics here”.

Whether you are in a management or staff position, the taint of office politics can sour an otherwise tolerable, or even pleasant job. Office politics breeds back-stabbing, power-brokering, brown-nosing, favoritism and information silos within an organization. Surprisingly, reducing these behaviors can be fairly simple once you understand the cause, particularly if you’re in a senior-enough decision making role in the organization.

The Cause

Widespread office politics are bred by secrecy – usually organizational and management secrecy. The behaviors are closely related to and usually accompanied by gossip. The cure for both is eliminating secrets and broadly disseminating information throughout the organization. Information on operations, profits, human resource decisions, organizational goals, bad news, anticipated new markets, marketing strategy should all be available to every employee interested. You don’t need to give out corporate secrets – the recipe for the “secret sauce” can stay inviolate, but all executive decision-making must default to sharing information. That means that unless there is a good reason not to tell, you make the information generally available throughout all levels of the organization. A culture of secrecy makes organizations sick.

And It’s Just Good Business

Particularly in times of extreme change or market pressure, excellent information flow cushions organizations and makes them more resilient. Employee understanding brings trust, and even during stressful times, employee retention rates are higher than in a “political” organization.

Employees are also better able to contribute by making innovative suggestions, when they understand the “why” of corporate decisions. A process or technique that has become outdated is much likelier to be identified and improved when information flows freely.

This Is Hard On Bad Managers

In a culture that chooses to minimize office politics, rewards are earned, not granted in return for favors. Every promotion comes as a result of performance factors that are clearly understood by the organization. Performance-based systems allow what matters to the organization, rather than to individuals trying to build a power base, to take precedence.

Managers that promote primarily based on whether they like the candidate, or feel that they will be supported by that person, are part of the problem. Demand measurable, performance-based factors in justification of promotions and pay increases. Insist on fairness in management, and remove or demote managers who refuse to play by a teamwork paradigm.

And Good For Productivity

Make sure every manager can answer the question “How do you know when one of your staff is doing a good job?” The answer needs to be based in measurable performance. Once your managers learn to identify the substance of performance rather than the appearance of it, productivity will increase and the right values will be rewarded.

Improve Your Organization’s Performance

Here’s a checklist for reducing office politics and improving teamwork in your organization:

• Publish most corporate decisions and the reasons they were made.
• Encourage and answer “Why” questions.
• Invite and consider good ideas.
• Measure performance.
• Publish performance data.
• Promote and reward based on performance.
• Eliminate secret deal-making.
• Remove or demote managers who are not team players.