Managers – the squeezed middle

I see the poor old managers are getting it in the neck again about their failure to manage (article in Friday’s Guardian). The raft of comments underneath this article are generally very negative (perhaps not surprising from Guardian readers) and I thought I might stick up for today’s manager.

In our field of internal comms, we deal a lot with the line managers. They are in every stakeholder map you’ll ever do, if you’re working with/in a company that’s bigger than about 12 people. Over time you come across the whole managerial range from brilliant to hopeless. Which does make it tricky when you want them to support your comms implementation, but more on that later.

First, aside from Gary Hamel’s interesting analysis, here are my thoughts on why managers don’t manage well.

Not the right people

The person appointing into the role chooses someone like them – why pick someone who thinks differently from you when that will make life more difficult? I think it’s still rare for someone to think, “I value your different way of looking at things and will employ you for your interesting and new perspective.” Companies don’t have time for different perspectives, they just want you to get on with it. So any ‘faults’ get replicated.

Not enough training

A squeeze on budget usually means a cut in the training budget. Faced with a choice between cutting money from the operational part of the business (where your product or service will suffer) versus training, who would favour the latter? Most budget-holders will acknowledge that people development is important but when it comes to a trade-off you can see which case is more easily made.

Some people are naturally gifted as managers – the rest of us need help. And if training isn’t provided people just copy what they see other managers do (including doing as little as possible)

Not enough time

Decreased budgets also have an impact on the role of the manager. I don’t hold generally with the view that managers in the past were better, but I do think that today with flatter org charts and those vexatious matrix management structures, managers are not allowed just to manage, they also have to deliver stuff. And again, when push comes to shove and you are pressed for time which route would you take? Spend time nurturing your staff and helping them to deliver more effectively in their own way or make sure your boss is happy that you have delivered your own work?

It’s easy to say that it starts from the most senior level and all managers should put people management towards the top of their agenda but (rightly or wrongly) this needs the company to feel it’s in a strong enough financial position to support the time it takes to do this.

What can be done from an internal comms perspective?

Ever the pragmatist, I think you have to work with what you’ve got. (If you’re not working with a culture that encourages good people management, changing it will take a long time.)

The biggest challenge is probably when you have the whole range of managers to support. Good managers will pick it up quickly and do it well; poor managers will do it if it’s easy and if they know they’ll get into deep poo if they don’t.

Therefore my suggestion is:

• Provide a high-level view of what needs to be done – good managers will use it and poor managers will know the extent of the work they are required to do
• Get buy-in from the top down, which means each layer of management needs to demonstrate that they are behind what needs to be done. They need to mention it at their departmental briefings, in their blogs, in their one-to-ones with their people. If it’s not mentioned again, the poor manager will see that s/he can get away with stalling on it
• Provide a toolkit focused on making the manager’s life easier. Provide a range of comms at different levels and put it online if possible as they can select the parts they will find most useful – manager Q&As are always useful

Thoughts/experiences anyone?