

Management's Dirty Little Secret - alanthonyc
http://blogs.wsj.com/management/2009/12/16/management%E2%80%99s-dirty-little-secret/?mod=SmartMoney

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RiderOfGiraffes
I was once told that the purpose of a business is to make money. I don't
believe that any more. Now I believe that the purpose of a business to to make
its employees happy.

It is pretty much a necessary condition, then, that you do make money, but
making money does not, of itself, make your employees happy.

I'd rather have a company that makes its employees happy, and makes money
becuase it's a necessary condition, rather than to have, purely as my business
goal, to make money.

Management similarly. People think the role of management is to get people to
do work. It isn't. It's to make people happy. If you do so without them doing
any work then it won't last, so getting them to do work is necessary, but
that's not the true goal.

(Note: I don't actually believe the extreme position as stated, but it is the
mindset I strive for and occasionally achieve.)

~~~
yason
I think that the purpose of a business should primarily be to help people and
do good, and secondarily charge only what they reasonably need to ensure their
continued operation in the long term. (I guess that is "make what people want"
and "create wealth" in pglese.)

Conversely, it seems to me currently that businesses are here primarily to
make money, and then secondarily help people and do good only up to the extent
that reasonably ensures their right to continue charging -- often more and
more -- money.

Note: I don't mean the business owner shouldn't prosper nor should pay as low
salaries as he can. Quite to the contrary, actually. But making money is the
wrong baseline reason to run a business. If people, including the business
owner, can afford to not have everything, to not rip as much as to themselves
that they possibly can, there will be plenty for everyone.

If the business is just to make money, it doesn't give out more to the
community than merely what it takes back from them. The business will run in
an endless fear of not making enough money and not having enough, and that
will inevitably govern all its activities. That is missing the creation part
of creating wealth.

~~~
gaius
_Conversely, it seems to me currently that businesses are here primarily to
make money_

A corporation is a _machine_ for making money. The corporation doesn't "own"
the money - the owners of the company do. Similarly the corporation doesn't
"want" to do anything with the money - the owners (who may also be the
employees) of the company have wants, as they're not machines, they're people!

Unix philosophy says "a tool should do one thing well". Well a corporation is
a tool that takes raw materials on STDIN and emits money on STDOUT and you
pipe that to whatever you want, be that a roof over your own head, or
vaccinating the entire population of a third world country.

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billybob
An anecdote is not proof, but I personally went from hating my job to loving
my job, while working for the same company and doing mostly the same work for
the same pay.

The difference? I went from working alone under a manager who seemed
indifferent to my creative ideas and hard work, to working with a team under a
manager who said "that's awesome" when I showed him my work.

Guess when I got more cool stuff done?

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skmurphy
Great article, key points:

o In a world of commoditized knowledge, the returns go to the companies who
can produce non-standard knowledge.

o Success here is measured by profit per employee, adjusted for capital
intensity.

o What matters is its relative "share of customer value" in the final product
or solution, and its cost of producing that value.

o The greater your share of differentiation is the greater your bargaining
power with business partners is.

o The lower your cost to produce that value is, the bigger your profits are.

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ggchappell
First the facts:

> Here’s what the researchers discovered: barely one-fifth (21%) of employees
> are truly engaged in their work, in the sense that they would “go the extra
> mile” for their employer. Nearly four out of ten (38%) are mostly or
> entirely disengaged, while the rest are in the tepid middle.

Now the unwarranted conclusions:

> There’s no way to sugarcoat it—this data represents a stinging indictment of
> the legacy management practices found in most companies.

It does? Why? Maybe without the managers, employees would be even less
engaged.

~~~
angelbob
The conclusions are supported toward the end: that 86% of employees love or
like their job, and that they have serious problems with management:

    
    
      Only 38% of employees believe that “senior management
      [is] sincerely interested in employee wellbeing.” Fewer
      than 4 in 10 agree that “senior management communicates
      openly and honestly.” A scant 40% of employees believe
      that “senior management communicates [the] reasons for
      business decisions,” while just 44% believe that “senior
      management tries to be visible and accessible.” Perhaps
      most damning of all, less than half of those polled
      believe that “senior management’s decisions [are]
      consistent with our values.”
    

Calling that a "stinging indictment" seems warranted.

~~~
ggchappell
Missed that. Thanks.

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lmkg
I disagree with the base assumption that a manager's job is to make employees
engaged or inspired. A manager's role is to cause work to be done (by other
people). Effectiveness of management is measured by productivity, not surveys.

More generally, there's a tendency to conflate management and leadership.
Management is about operations and efficiency and production. Leadership is
about inspiration and engagement. The two are related, to be sure, but
distantly. Certainly, if I'm engaged, I'll work harder. But inspiration alone
isn't going to streamline workflow, or increase accountability, or acquire the
right tools, or choose the correct problem to be solving in the first place.
It's not even going to do that great a job at keeping people on task and in
scope.

To be sure, engagement is a useful quality. But first, it's not a necessary
one, and second, it's not the role of management. If it's anyone's role, it's
the role of executives. The ones with vision making bold statements and
sweeping changes, not the ones down in the weeds doing the tactical work of
maintaining the metaphorical tubes of work in the plumbing of productivity.

~~~
alanthonyc
I believe what you describe is the traditional view of management, one that is
possibly on its way to being outdated.

I think that going forward, management and leadership will have to be the same
thing. If either one needs to drop by the wayside, it will be the management
portion. In today's world of greater efficiencies and flow of information, the
traditional "manager" becomes a bottleneck, in much the same way that
traditional newspapers have become bottlenecks in the transmission of news.

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sliceghost
Dan Pink has a great talk about motivation on TED.

<http://www.ted.com/talks/dan%5Fpink%5Fon%5Fmotivation.html>

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ahi
perhaps 79% of management are also disengaged from their work. The alienation
of labor is pretty much complete, even for management. Most jobs are about
paying the mortgage, nothing more.

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billybob
I thought this part was insightful: "three things that are critical to
engagement: first, the scope employees have to learn and advance- are there
opportunities for them to grow; second, the company’s reputation and its
commitment to making a difference in the world- is this a company that
deserves the best efforts of its people; and third, the behaviors and values
of the organization’s leaders- are they people employees respect and want to
follow?"

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pasbesoin
Actions speak louder than words. And it's a two way street.

Engagement may be a valid measure (if somewhat abstract). But I've heard an
awful lot of lip service paid to it, by the same people who are saying no not
just to pay increases but to upgrading that three year old computer or
otherwise providing an environment conducive to actually getting the work
done.

When you're young, you try hard because the prevailing social message (at
least in the circles I traveled) is that hard work pays off. After you see
enough with your own eyes, you may either "check out" or learn to be much more
discriminating about where and when you apply your effort.

I've had a few genuinely good (to/for me and my work) managers. Unfortunately,
sooner or later, they all seemed to end up fighting the tide. That may be a
reflection of the macro-economic changes going on in the U.S.

My one bit of advice is not to stay in such circumstances. If you can afford
to, walk away. To the extent you can, try to keep your life structured so that
you can afford to do so when needed.

Management is the aggregation of work effort. If bad management can't attract
any work effort, it will die off. Another reason to avoid monopolies -- so
that they cannot set themselves up as the only game in town.

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pwnstigator
Most corporate managers are fighting the last generation's war, operating
under a mentality that is outdated, but pervasive at all levels of corporate
America.

If you're running a plantation or a coal mine, the work is physically
difficult and the rewards are minimal, so you have to be either (a) generous
or (b) brutal in order to get people to work. Historically, the latter option
was more popular.

Thus, we end up with the entrenched (but increasingly wrong) idea that people
have to be intimidated into working, or they'll shirk: "Theory X", in
management parlance. It works if you're running a coal mine; not so much for a
software shop.

Of course, most bosses would rather be "Theory Y" (nurturing, encouraging)
than X. Few people want to be assholes. The problem is that a manager who's
permissive and nurturing will be regarded well by his subordinates, and held
in good regard during good times, but if something happens outside of his
control, he's likely to take blame from above for having been "too soft".
Follow the ladder high enough, and at some point you're likely to encounter
someone with the old mentality (or an egomaniac, or an asshole).

~~~
ojbyrne
My understanding is that both "Theory X" and "Theory Y" have largely been
superseded by "Theory Z," also known as "a bit of both."

