…taking responsibility for one’s actions must happen at the time you perform your actions, not at the time you get caught.
Simon Sinek, Leaders Eat Last
If your team don’t feel safe to tell you what they really think, then they won’t tell you when you need to hear it.
That’s why a good manager humbly accepts the most annoying comment at the least appropriate time.
That’s also why a good employee aptly disobeys the least constructive command at the most critical time.
The sweet spot of worrying about other people’s opinions is caring enough to learn from them, but not so much the you conform to them. It takes humility to rethink your views in the face of disapproval. It takes integrity to put your personal values above social approval.
Adam Grant
Being a manager is not only hard work, but also a high bar for being human. What makes it even harder is that being a manager is not the same as being a leader.
Managers have a lot to sacrifice because they have a lot of capacities to own. They need to have the capacity to:
- Deeply reflect on themselves
- Act on those reflections
- Focus on a team’s ambition
- See the big picture of the team’s possibilities
- Translate visions to priorities
- Nurture balance between fragility and boldness
- Enjoy solitude
- Seek support from mentors
- Trust the evolving nature of the team and its purpose
- Embrace the uncertainty
It’s hard to be a manager and leader. In fact it’s so hard that many books have been written about it.
Here are some quotes worth snacking on (all but the last one are from Good People, Bad Managers by Samuel A. Culbert):
I find it a real shame that so many people are the recipients of state-of-the-art, default-setting, bad management behavior. It’s a shame because, for the most part, the bad behavior is meted out by well-intentioned, good people acting without realizing the negatives their actions inflict, and without awareness of the forces driving those actions. In their minds, they’re doing their very best to cope with situations not of their making.
Going to work shouldn’t dampen the human spirit. It never does when people feel they’re working effectively, have their manager’s support, are appreciated, and see themselves making progress toward personally important goals. In fact, under the right circumstances, work isn’t even work; it’s what a person wants to be doing.
…bad managerial behavior is the consequence of a system that permits it and, yes, causes managers to behave badly without realizing the negatives their behavior inflicts on others.
…digging deeper, I see managers more overloaded by work-culture-provoked insecurities that prevent them from following their good instincts. If good intentions were enough to make good behavior, the workplace would already be transformed.
…good management behavior requires stepping back from the limelight and putting self-pursuits on hold. It’s about helping direct reports to merge what’s unique and important to them with the needs of the enterprise employing them. That is good management in the true sense of the word.
People arrive to the job motivated. The real trick is to avoid turning them off.
…few managers understand that hierarchy should be kept out of relationships. And those who do seldom know how.
…most managers fail to notice anything wrong with a hierarchical system that allows them to hold employees accountable for just about anything they decide to criticize or insist on.
You can call what managers do many things—surviving, coping, remaining viable, and accomplishing—but please don’t use the term “good manager behavior” to describe it. Real good management behavior requires an other-directed focus.
Unfortunately for the world of work, culture changes very slowly, and good management is needed today. Waiting for cultural change to make good management happen will not get your company much relief.
Good managers give operatives up-front information about the resources and budgets they are authorized to draw upon, and are explicit about the limits of authority being delegated. They seek to build trusting relationships that permit candid give-and-take on any issue that arises, whether it be operational or stylistic. In every instance, good management behavior begins with a question, not a declarative.
Most managers believe they know what’s required for good results and find telling people what to do far more efficient than explaining what’s needed and then getting into their “heads.” It takes time to inquire, guide, coach, and support—what the textbooks claim to be desirable, other-directed, good managerial behavior.
…regardless of circumstance and chemistry, what people holding leadership and manager titles need implanted in their thinking is that leading and managing are distinct activities and the company needs both to take place.
Self-directed is for managing resources and systems. Other-directed is for staging people to work independently and accomplish on their own.
There’s a relatively simple way to determine a person’s inclination to manage. Ask the individual what they’re out to accomplish, what they’re doing to accomplish it, and why they decided to go about it the way they did.
I’ve long endorsed skin-in-the-game accountability, where the manager’s accomplishments are reified in the success of their employees. That’s what management is supposed to be about. I don’t know better metrics for measuring good management than direct reports’ accomplishments, feelings of personal success, and trust level with the manager.
And at the broadest level:
What makes for a good manager? If we put all of their heads together, the great management thinkers at the end of the day give us the same, simple, and true answer. A good manager is someone with a facility for analysis and an even greater talent for synthesis; someone who has an eye both for the details and for the one big thing that really matters; someone who is able to reflect on facts in a disinterested way, who is always dissatisfied with pat answers and the conventional wisdom, and who therefore takes a certain pleasure in knowledge itself; someone with a wide knowledge of the world and an even better knowledge of the way people work; someone who knows how to treat people with respect; someone with honesty, integrity, trustworthiness, and the other things that make up character; someone, in short, who understands oneself and the world around us well enough to know how to make it better. By this definition, of course, a good manager is nothing more or less than a good and well-educated person.
The Management Myth: Debunking Modern Business Philosophy by Matthew Stewart
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Noah Fang 