What to do when complaints are about a senior manager

Suppose your employees are grumbling about one of your senior managers, the director of a key department – he’s much too harsh and turnover is high.  What should you do? One option, the easy way out, is to ignore it.  This option may be especially appealing if productivity is decent, despite the grumbling.

To read the rest of this article from the Business First of Louisville, see: What to do when complaints are about a senior manager http://louisville.bizjournals.com/louisville/stories/2005/01/24/editorial2.html

But suppose you look deeper and the evidence is clear:  Your senior manager is a critical perfectionist.  He micro-manages with sarcastic criticism and put-downs, browbeats staff relentlessly, never gives compliments and hogs the credit and shovels the blame.  He harasses, bullies and abuses his staff.  Even long-term stars want out and productivity is merely OK.  Unhappiness has spread to other departments that have interacted with him.

You can still find easy explanations to avoid getting involved: You have other worries, there are no red flags on balance sheets, he treats you OK and he hasn’t thrown anything, hit anyone or blown up in public.  Employees always complain about hard-driving leaders and why open a can of worms?

Leaders who still gloss over these situations are merely conflict-avoidant.  They’ll ensure years of hard feelings, declining performance, scorn behind their backs and, eventually, increased costs to clean out a bigger cesspool.  Or maybe they think they’ll be long gone before it backs up to their door.

Another option is often chosen by leaders who think, “We’re all good people here. If we got together we’d agree on an effective compromise.”  They hope the politically correct approach of facilitated negotiation will manufacture a solution that works for everyone.

But in this situation that’s just a band-aid.  It won’t lead to long-term, productive change because the problem is a brutal manager, not a lack of understanding and acceptance of different styles within a reasonable range.

At this point, there’s little incentive for the senior manager to make consistent, lasting change.  During negotiations a lot of talk will happen, fingers will get pointed, people will get argumentative and defensive, hopes will get raised and dashed, and people will become even more polarized, antagonistic and litigious.  You’ve simply delayed a real solution and upped the pain and cost.

I recommend a third option: To give the problem manager a chance to turn things around and mend fences, give him an ultimatum - “change or else” - backed by short timelines, close monitoring, effective support for the changes you want him to make and repeated praise from you for any progress.

Get a coach-advisor the manager can respect, accept and trust.  He will need to learn a new managing style and new communication skills.  Expect stepwise progress as he learns whether his new approach can keep productivity, quality and kudos high.  Help him maintain leadership credibility by requiring training for the whole department hand having him participate.

How do you know when to quit dodging your responsibility and to use the third option? A truthful and global costing out is crucial.  See original article for details.

Take into account the effects of his behavior on:

• Productivity.
• Time spent by HR, staff and supervisors in all departments talking about incidents and dealing with complaints and hurt feelings.
• Effects on inter-departmental interactions.
• Transfer and turnover of good employees, especially outstanding young people who would be the next generation of leaders.
• Monetary and emotional costs of facilitated negotiations that fail.
• Costs for litigation, lawyers and buying silence from many employees.
• Lost respect for you and lost passion for your mission and goals, which will infect the organization.

You may have heard the expression, “People don’t leave organizations; they leave bad supervisors.”  That’s much too simplistic.

Once you have competitive benefits, great people leave bad environments – including poor supervisors, peers and coworkers, and systems that thwart accomplishment.  The most effective way of keeping the best employees and managers is setting high standards and standing up for them.

Remember, your leadership is on trial also.

Often, individuals need coaching and organizations need consulting to help them design and implement a plan that fits the situation.  To get the help you need, call Ben at 1-877-828-5543.

Fixing Your Business? Keep the Best, Churn the Rest

What if you showed up for work to find a new sign posted by the owners: “Keep the best, churn the rest”—and you knew the best, and the rest meant you and your colleagues at all levels? Chances are, it’d get your attention.  And that’s exactly what business owners Dick and Harry (made up names for a true illustration) had in mind when they posted that sign at their medium-sized company.

To read the rest of this article from the Houston Business Journal, see: Fixing your business? Start at the top with managers http://www.bizjournals.com/houston/stories/2007/10/29/smallb5.html

Dick and Harry had allowed their company to drift into unprofitability.  Though they brought in more business, profits never increased.  And the more jobs they took on, the crazier their lives became.  They were so exhausted trying to stay afloat, they didn’t have time to plan how to get out of the mess—until a stress-induced fight finally forced them to stop and think.  It was change or lose the business.

They realized they had a lackadaisical staff, lackadaisically managed, producing minimally.  The big problem was their poor leadership.  Dick and Harry had let their standards slide.  They’d stopped being leaders and had become conflict-avoidant fixers.

They complained whenever something was done wrong, but they fixed it themselves.  They worked harder and dumber.  No one was re-trained or fired.  They never stopped bullies. The result?  The more business that came in, the worse their quality and the more profit gushed out of their pipeline.

The more frantic they had become, the less they enforced behavioral standards.  Over time, narcissism, cranky complaining, criticism, whining, demanding, bullying, emotional drama, back-stabbing, sabotage, negativity, hostility, cliques, cyberbullying, personal vendettas, turf fights, entitlement, claims of unhappiness and poor morale, control-freaks, toxic nastiness, gossip, disruptive actions and lying increased.  These behaviors are the typical signs of problems.

When standards slid, the best people left because they got tired of being forced to work with jerks who prevented success.  And they hated being paid the same as jerks.

Dick and Harry started demanding excellence from themselves.  Before they could fix problem employees, they had to fix themselves.

To let their staff know that there would be a new culture of high performance and accountability, they started an internal campaign: “Keep the best, churn the rest.”  To show that wasn’t a punitive exercise or mass downsizing, the slogan meant four things:

• They began at the top.  If they didn’t perform, they’d leave because they weren’t worthy of leading the company.
• Fixing managerial problems was urgent because problems at the top cost more.  One problem manager caused more damage than one problem employee.
• “Keep” meant increasing rewards because each quality worker is worth more than two jerks.
• “The best” meant competent, productive employees, not just shooting stars.

Although Dick and Harry needed to reward good performers, they also needed to demand high quality and accountability at all levels. That meant honest evaluations, with rewards and consequences.  They knew they had to stop bullying.

Dick and Harry didn’t expect a quick fix.  And there wasn’t one.  During the next 18 months, they turned over about 35 percent of their staff, including managers.  But they stuck to their plan. They walked the walk and talked the talk.

The company turned around.  The more they kept the best, the easier it became to churn the rest.  At all levels, unmotivated or incompetent people were gone.

High standards protect everyone from unprofessional behavior.  Learn what you can do to eliminate the high cost of low attitudes, behavior and performance.

All tactics are situational.  Expert coaching and consulting can help you create and implement a plan that fits you and your organization.

Don't ignore new hires after they start work

You’ve spent a lot of money finding and hiring the perfect employee.  Do you kick back, feel the thrill of success, and throw the new hire into the jungle in hopes they’ll become productive rapidly? If you do, you’ve just wasted all the time and money you spent making that great hire.

To read the rest of this article from Business First of Louisville, see: Don’t ignore new hires after they start work http://www.bizjournals.com/louisville/stories/2008/01/28/editorial1.html

For example, Helen was a highly skilled manager with a great track record.  On the first day at her new company, she was introduced – then senior management abandoned her.  Thus, the predators on her team felt emboldened, and immediately tried to see how far they can push her.  Who’s really going to be the alpha wolf and control this turf?

Helen wanted to start off on the right foot.  So she talked reasonably to each of them, one to one.  She tried to understand why they were so hostile and tried to get them to understand how much her feelings were hurt.

The bullies interpreted her reasonableness as weakness and her hurt feelings as vulnerability.  They remained hostile and righteous.  They escalated their emotional harassment and abuse into a feeding frenzy.  They claimed it was Helen’s fault their feelings were hurt.  Her feelings didn’t matter to those narcissistic bullies.  They told her they had nothing to apologize or make amends for.  Their threat: If Helen didn’t leave them alone, they’d complain to the senior manager.

Helen felt like she was the new kid trying to break into a clique of junior high school princesses.

Leadership spent a lot of time, energy and money hiring Helen but they failed to support her.  They didn’t set the tone for how new hires are to be treated.  When they didn’t support Helen’s attempts to set high behavioral standards, they enabled a toxic workplace and she moved onto bigger and better things.

Imagine your company beginning with a vacuum of standards for behavior.  If you and the highest quality staff don’t set the tone for the workplace, the most vicious and nasty members of your staff will fill the vacuum with their standards.

I discovered that the leaders at Helen’s organization weren’t merely absentee, they were conflict-avoidant cowards.  They weren’t successful leaders.  They tried to avoid stopping bullying while they whined and complained, “Why can’t we all just get along?”

Don’t throw new hires to the turf-building jackals.  The simple solution is to develop and implement an effective “How We’ll Welcome the New Employee” plan.

The welcoming process may sound like a huge expense.  But compare it to the cost of losing a perfect hire, having to repeat the hiring process and probably watching your next generation of leaders leave or sink down to the lowest level.  Problems welcoming new hires are a sign of widespread bullying and abuse, and lack of planning and oversight.

Don’t let that happen.  Your job as a leader is to actively set the tone.  You can’t allow the most predatory members of your organization to feed on other staff.

Learn what you can do to eliminate the high cost of low attitudes, behavior and performance.

All tactics are situational.  Expert coaching and consulting can help you create and implement a plan that fits you and your organization.

Don’t try to make all your employees happy

Don’t try to make all your employees happy.  But do make your best employees happy. Do you recognize who the best employees and managers are?

We can’t define who the best are, but we all recognize them.  They’re the ones with inspiration – the inner drive to accomplish things and succeed.  At all levels, they’re superstars and solid, steady, productive professionals.  They’re the beavers eager to learn, develop skills and be competent and productive.  They want to be efficient and effective.  They take responsibility and they care.

They’re the ones who anchor a culture of success.  They keep communication channels open and they get along well enough with other productive individuals in order to make their teams succeed.  They take care of customers and teammates.  They partner with employees on other teams when success depends on joint effort.  They’re the low-maintenance people we can count on.l

It’s a pleasure to make them happy.  They appreciate your efforts and respond with more of their own.

You can generalize by thinking that your organization has about 15% stars and 75% solid producers – all in that group of high quality employees you want to keep happy.

The other 15% are the problem adults.  They’re the whining complainers, hyper-critical bosses, lazy slackers, negative discouragers, backstabbing rumormongers and gossips, know-it-all squelchers, micro-managing nit-pickers and turf-protecting power brokers – to name only a few.  They’re unproductive, but always have excuses they think justify their unprofessional behavior.  They create hostile workplaces.  They’re energy vampires – they can suck the life out of any effort.  No matter how much you give them, it’s never enough.  They’re not grateful and they don’t give back.  They demand or connive to get more.

Don’t try to make them happy.  It’s an impossible task.  You’d have to cater to them and give away your organization to them.  Instead, good leaders and managers help them go somewhere else.  Maybe they’ll be happy at another company or maybe you can get them a job in a competitor’s organization.

Give your time, energy and goodies to your high quality employees.  How?  You don’t need my top 10 list to get started making your best employees happy.  Maximize their chances for success.  Give them all the training, equipment, operating systems and support they need to succeed.  To high quality people, accomplishment is an aphrodisiac.  Beyond that – ask them.  Every individual will have an individual list of desires – training, opportunities for advancement, cleansing their environment of losers, more flex-time and money, etc.  Then do your best to give it to them.

What if there’s more than 15% bottom feeders at your company, and management doesn’t care?  Be one of the best employees.  Try to get the attention of leaders.  If that doesn’t work, go be a best employee at your competitor’s company.

"Mr. Negativity" proudly destroys teamwork

Carl loved the title of “Mr. Negative.”  He was proud of being smarter than anyone else and thought his put-downs were funny.  No matter what you said, he would disagree, counter it or top it.  His personal attacks, sarcasm and cutting remarks could bring most people to tears.  He could create a tense, hostile workplace in minutes. He could bring a brainstorming or planning meeting to a halt by finding fault with every suggestion or plan, and proving that nothing would work.  He was convinced that his predictions were accurate and more valuable to the team than the frustration and anger he created.  On his team, sick-leave and turnover were high, while morale, camaraderie and teamwork were low.  Productivity was also low because most people wasted a huge percent of their time talking about Carl’s latest exploits.

What can you do?

In this case, his manager had heard me present “How to Eliminate the High Cost of Low Attitudes” at a conference, and had brought me in as a consultant.  She wanted me to help her create a culture that would be professional, retain high quality staff and be much more productive.

Why did his manager, Jane, bring me in, instead of simply evaluating Carl honestly and having consequences leading to demotion and eventual termination if he didn’t change?  Jane thought that:

• Carl was bright and expert enough in his specialty that she was afraid of losing him.
• If she was a good enough manager and learned to say the magic words, Carl would straighten out.
• Her hands were tied because Carl was a long-term employee in a government organization.

Coaching helped Jane see that she was victimizing the rest of the team by giving in to her fears and helplessness.  Carl was verbally abusive and emotionally intimidating.  And he was subtly manipulative because he had a soft voice and a smile on his face while he sarcastically cut his co-workers to ribbons.  She saw that if she continued to give in to her fear of losing Carl, she’d lose her reputation and position because her team would mutiny or quit.

Despite these insights, Jane remained a conflict-avoidant manager.  She would allow the team to act, but she wouldn’t lead the way.  Therefore we worked around her.

I helped the team create a set of behavioral expectations for individual professional interactions and for team meetings.  It was no surprise that the list did not included any of Carl’s behaviors, that his behaviors were specifically prohibited and that the list of appropriate behaviors contained the opposite ones Carl had been bullying coworkers with.

The rest of the team voted to accept the code of professional behavior.  Carl said he’d sign but he wouldn’t change his behavior.  He’d been Mr. Negativity as long as he could remember and didn’t think he could change.

That seemed like an impasse.  No one wanted to waste a lifetime waiting for Carl to go through therapy, especially since he didn’t want to change anyway.  I helped the team realize that Carl had no reason to change.  There were no adverse consequences to him if he kept doing what he was doing.  The team needed some leverage.

Since the manager wouldn’t act on her own, the rest of the team took a bold step.  They told Carl that they wouldn’t tolerate his hostility and the tension it caused.  They said that they’d remove him immediately from any meeting in which he started his negative putdowns.  He laughed nervously, thinking they’d never really do that.  He still wouldn’t accept that his behavior was so hurtful and despised.

At the next meeting, of course, Carl was negative as usual.  He was shocked when the rest of the team immediately stood up and told him to leave.  He sheepishly did, with a parting shot that they’d never come up with a good plan without him.

He was wrong.  They did develop a good plan to deal with the problem they’d been working on. They also gave him his assignment within it.  They told him that people who weren’t at meetings must be happy with the tasks assigned to them.  Carl was outraged and protested.  He looked for support from anyone on the team, but everyone was against him.  That also stunned him.  They told him that they were following the team’s behavior code.  He could play according to the rules and take what he got or leave.  They also told him that he could be very likeable when he wanted to and they’d be glad to be on a team with the “likeable Carl.”

It took two more meetings at which Carl was asked to leave, before he began to change.  It was amazing to all of them, including Carl, that what he thought was a life-long pattern, changed when enough leverage was applied.  He really did like what he did and he also had wanted to be liked.

This example is over the top in many ways.  But I have a question for you: Did the rest of the team bully Carl or were they right in voting him off their island when he was an abusive bully?

One general lesson here is: “When the legitimate authority won’t act and, therefore, leaves a power vacuum, the most hostile and power-hungry people usually fill it.  Your task is to fill it with the best behavior instead.”

There are many other ways to solve the problems that the Carl’s of the world cause at work and at home.  A stronger manager would have done it by herself.  Jane obviously had problems as a manager and wouldn't step outside her comfort zone to solve them.  Her boss soon took appropriate action.

It’s also a different matter if the negative person is the manager or boss.  There are many other problem behaviors that can be resolved with the Behavioral Code approach.  In other blog posts I’ll cover those bullying situations at work.

Please tell me your story so I can be sure to respond to it.