I asked a friend of mine the other day that has spent time in the US military as well as the corporate world on how she sees leadership in practice within those two worlds. The reason I asked this is because of my experience with many family and friends who have been in the military and their relating to me what leadership principles were taught to them as well as the recent books I have read on military life. Her answer was very telling. She explained that in the corporate world her managers tended to be box checkers, people who just wanted to hit a revenue or sales target and didn’t care much how it was done or who they upset in the process. As long as the numbers are there, they could care less how it got done.
In the military on the other hand, her non-commissioned officer or NCO, was in charge of making sure their team of soldiers was progressing, stayed motivated and experienced their struggles with them. Characters like the NCO were what she saw missing in much of the corporate world.
That’s not to say that they don’t exist. She explained that the few managers that did exhibit not just manager qualities but leadership qualities, seemed to do so more out of a personal philosophy rather than a corporate policy, principle or slogan.
It’s also important to note that it doesn’t mean the military can’t be a frustrating place to work as much as, if not more so than the corporate world for some people. It’s bureaucratic, slow and has its own ugly politics. However at the very least, it does convey that it takes leadership principals and putting those into action seriously. As well it should, because the military is often dealing with life and death. Strong leadership can keep not just an individual but a group safe to fight another day.
A Philosophy Born of Mistakes
While on vacation last month, an old friend I was traveling with noted the changes I had made since my divorce, he said “Man, you should get divorced every few years.” The reason being that I had turned a lot if the struggles and failures, not just of my failed marriage, but of lost friendships, lost jobs and failed business ventures into learning experiences that I turned around to empower myself personally.
Some of those experiences that were important were the failure in my own leadership at important junctures in my life. Whether I picked the wrong people to work with, was in denial, or was focused on the wrong values, each mistake, when I took a step back and objectively looked at the situation in hindsight, taught me what not to do in a number of different situations. What I found to be the result of these mistakes, unbeknownst to me, was the development of a leadership philosophy and how one (not just me) should lead people to get the best performance out of individuals and groups.
These mistakes included picking the wrong person to go into business with, someone who didn’t have a greater vision for himself beyond what he was doing. It included ignoring the signs prior to my marriage that there were some issues with my wife to be that affected our relationship that maybe had nothing to do with me but that I was getting the sharp end of. They also included staying at a job where I had outgrown the role, my manager and the culture of the firm, none of which fit my innate personality anymore.
It took a lot of trauma and personal loss to come to these conclusions. So what if you are a person that hasn’t experienced this or experienced it and didn’t take anything positive out of it? In that case, you either have yet to make the big mistakes to learn from, because they will happen, or you aren’t learning from your mistakes. I think many managers are in this position currently.
Managing people is exactly that, it’s a people business. It takes skills that have nothing to do with hitting numbers or “deliverables” it takes emotional intelligence, empathy and commitment to the right personal values, even when they conflict with short term interests. Unfortunately, with our focus on short term results, we get short term thinking which usually doesn’t benefit people in the long term.
What Makes a Bad Boss
So given some of the qualities that make for a good leader and hence a good manager, what are some of the qualities people note in bosses that think are bad?
Last year Bamboo HR, a consultancy, did a survey of 1,000 US employees and ranked what they found to be the top 10 worst qualities in a manager. They were:
- Taking credit for employees work
- Doesn’t appear to trust and empower you
- Doesn’t care if you’re overworked
- Doesn’t advocate for you when it comes to pay
- Hires or promotes the wrong people
- Doesn’t back you up when there is a dispute between you and a client
- Doesn’t provide proper direction on assignments or roles
- Micromanages you, lack of freedom to work
- Focuses more on your weaknesses than strengths
- Doesn’t set clear expectations
In the survey, 44% said that a boss has been the primary reason that they have left a job. A bad boss can hit the numbers but blow up retention and the long term outlook for a group and a company.
pSource: BambooHR
I think a lot of us that have more than a few years of work experience have had a bad boss and seen some of these qualities. What is different between now and in the past of having a bad boss is my understanding of people.
It helps to step back and not just put yourself in your bosses shoes but also understand what types of personal feelings and emotions drive the “bad boss” behavior. Personally, I have come to believe it is driven by one thing for many managers (and people for that matter): fear.
Operating Off Fear
Look at the two top qualities of a bad boss and you can understand why fear drives these. Fear that a manager will be outshined by an employee may push them to take credit for others work. The lack of empowerment and trust in many cases is due to a fear of loss of control. A fear that if things are not within their grip, they will slip and go awry. When bosses think things will go awry, they may think they will be seen as bad managers and be fired. The fear of being unemployed and having to find new work drives the behavior to cling to their current role and mistrust workers.
Many of the others have to do with a lack of empathy and basically looking out for themselves. You can make the argument that even these factors are driven by fear. People look out for themselves for the same reasons: they fear the unemployment line.
The reality is though, that operating off of fear over the long term is a losing strategy. It builds up resentment in your employees and as we can see above, they end up leaving due to the poor leadership that fear has produced. Rather it’s the opposite that produces great leaders: confronting fears and realizing that a personal philosophy on leadership and treating people decently to get the best performances it of them is actually the best long term approach. The important thing to note is this philosophy has to transcend a particular role, company and even industry. Having these core values allow a manager to overrule their internal fears and make bold bets on people and on strategy.
I often see on Wall Street that some senior people jump to different firms and a team of people follow them. This is not always just for money. Take the same manager and put them in a different environment and their determination and philosophy often pull people in to follow them, no matter where they go. That is leadership. The question many managers need to ask themselves is, if we started from scratch and were all at the same level, would my employees follow me?
Sometimes it even means helping people to get out of their roles. I had an analyst years back who was a diligent worker and very smart but she hit a wall in terms of her motivation and I could tel she gave up and had mentally moved on. Everyone noted this but luckily we had the type of closeness that I could talk to her about it. Knowing that she could trust me and that I wanted to see her succeed overall, not just in her current role, she explained she was tired of the culture at the firm and wanted to go to business school. Rather than try and keep her in a role where she clearly wasn’t progressing, I wrote her recommendation to business school. She ended up getting her MBA at Wharton and now works as a consultant for McKinsey.
Not every case needs to follow that path and that’s not to say I was necessarily a good leader at that time. But it showed where you can help people get to when you take the time to care about people and not ticking a box. Fear dominates too much of what we do day to day and frankly who wants to live in fear? It’s tiring and it makes life miserable.
If you are operating off of fear don’t fret, there is still time to change. It doesn’t have to take trauma but it will take some self reflection and a lot of courage.
That being said, I’m not holding my breath for my boss though.
The information provided by www.cashchronicles.com is for informational purposes only. It should not be considered legal or financial advice. You should consult with an attorney or other professional to determine what may be best for your individual needs. www.cashchronicles.com does not make any guarantee or other promise as to any results that may be obtained from using our content. No one should make any tax or investment decision without first consulting his or her own financial advisor or accountant and conducting his or her own research and due diligence. To the maximum extent permitted by law, www.cashchronicles.com disclaims any and all liability in the event any information, commentary, analysis, opinions, advice and/or recommendations prove to be inaccurate, incomplete or unreliable, or result in any investment or other losses. Content contained on or made available through the website is not intended to and does not constitute legal advice or investment advice and no attorney-client relationship is formed. Your use of the information on the website or materials linked from the Web is at your own risk.