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Lousy Bosses Pull You Down: How to fix things

Guest post by: Rebel Brown

Article Overview: Talk about gravity. One of the most powerful things pulling down organizational performance and morale is lousy bosses.

Lousy Bosses Pull You Down: How to fix things

Today's guest is a fabulous coach for all. Wally Bock writes about business and leadership. He also writes for businesses on the same topics. He ghostwrites for some and helps many authors to bring their books to life. Today, Wally discusses leadership, the Gravity it can bring and how to ditch that leadership Gravity and soar.



Talk about gravity. One of the most powerful things pulling down organizational performance and morale is lousy bosses.

There's ample evidence that your boss is has the most impact on productivity and morale. And, when talented people leave the company, the odds are about even that a lousy boss was the reason.

There's good news and bad news here. Let's do the good news first. This is something we know how to fix.

Today, most new managers are promoted because they were good at something else. We can fix that if we start selecting new managers based on demonstrated ability to do things that will help them succeed.

Forget intelligence. You need enough, but it's not really that important. So downgrade assessment centers, in-box exercises, interviews and anything else that's based on explanation and not demonstrated competence.

Being a manager is a lot like riding a bike. You don't learn it by reading about it. And you demonstrate competence by talking about it.

People who want to move into management should have the opportunity to do some small-scale leadership work. They can head up a task force or project team, for example.

That way, when it's time to consider men and women for management work, you've got something to go on. Here's what to look for.

Look for people who understand that management is a contact sport. It's not memo writing, deep thinking, or long-winded explanations. It's conversations.

Look for people who are willing to talk to others about performance and behavior. Supervisors in my programs consistently identified this as the hardest part of their job.

We can teach you skills to do it better. We can't teach you to be willing to do it. And in most management jobs you'll do it several times a day.

Look for people who are willing to make a decision. In most teams, the boss will be the "default decider." This is another area where we can teach technique, but not willingness.

Look for people who enjoy helping others succeed. That's the real job of a boss: helping the team and team members succeed. If you don't like that, every day will be a slog.

Selecting good candidates is only part of the battle. You've got to train and support them, too.

Get your new managers some training in key job skills. Do not wait until they've formed bad habits. Get them training early and often during the transition period.

The transition from individual contributor to boss is one of the hardest in life. The new manager has to identify with a new role, learn new skills, and develop new habits and rhythms. Just to make it harder, this will happen while his or her support system shifts into a new shape.

The transition is going to take twelve to eighteen months in most cases. During that time there should be coaching and peer support to help out.

When the transition is done, it still takes most competent managers a decade or more to master the craft. During that time peer support, training, and development opportunities are vital.

Seems easy, right? We could make all those changes in most organizations starting tomorrow.

But here's the bad news. If we start changing things tomorrow it will take a good twenty years before the managers we promote are in senior positions.

That's a long time. I guess we better get started.

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Article Tags: business growth, business leadership, fix things, gravity, lousy bosses, organizational performance, organizations, powerful things



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