

How to change "Boss will catch you" mindset? - va9

I manage around 70 people in very high level. There are managers who stands the floor to get the actual work done. I just go on daily meetings, just once in a day to understand where a job stands and give them directions.<p>When I walk around floors, recently, I started hearing "do that way, steve will catch you." I think this statements are not healthy. So my team is working properly just because I catch them in review calls. This isnt correct, right?<p>I am sure I listen to them when they say things sensible. I made sure I never run beurocratic team management. Is this is normal? How can I put the "I too own the product" mindset in my team just not because team is performing that their boss asked them to do.
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pif
IMHO, people will feel that they "own" the product when they'll really _own_
the product! I mean, when they'll have some freedom in how to do their work,
when they'll be sincerely requested their opinion before taking decisions and
when they'll participate in the financial benefits and risks. If you pay a
fixed salary to someone to do the work you dictate him, you'll have a
subordinate, not an associate. Just to be clear, I don't consider wrong or
reductive at all to offer a fixed salary; it's just that a co-founder and an
employee are in a different situation: a co-founder shares your goal (success
for the company), while the employee has his own goal (more money and better
conditions for him) which only partially are based on the overall success of
your business.

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rachelbythebay
It's not clear what your people are saying ("do that way"?) so it's not easy
to say what might be going on. Please clarify.

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va9
I mean to say, suppose they have to finish a document. Now due to the time
factor they are "making-up" something to achieve the deadline. They know they
are "intentionally" missing something. Due to the fact they know I will catch
the missing thing or "improper" document they say to other peers. "Don't miss
it, Steve will catch you". Now this is okay that the document ends up to be
expected one. But the mindset of someone will catch me if I miss it -- is this
is normal? What if I fail to attend such daily meetings in future. At some
point, once they realize, I am no more there to review them they will no
longer producing "perfect" ones. Or I am doing lot of baby-sitting that made
my team so dump they just follow my lines. Kind of have some thoughts around
how to manage such team would be great to hear.

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rachelbythebay
Okay, that helps. Thank you.

What I'm getting from you is that your employees seem unable or unwilling to
accomplish their jobs by themselves. You are constantly cleaning up after
them, and worry about what's going to happen once you stop doing that. Will
they pick up the slack or will they start producing substandard output?

Unfortunately, in my experience, there's only one way to find out, and that's
to just disconnect and let things revert to their true output levels. Without
you artificially propping things up, you should be able to see what they are
able to produce. If this isn't enough to make you happy, well then, you have
to do something about that.

I say this because I've been witness to a phenomenon some people dubbed the
"cone of influence". Some people were buoyed up by the presence of a much
stronger coworker in their area. That person was responsible for helping them
accomplish many of the harder tasks they encountered. When that person was
later removed from the team, not only did that person's direct contributions
vanish, but the remaining team members also lost effectiveness.

It sounds like you might be providing one of those cones.

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va9
Makes sense, thanks.

