Posted on 06/04/2019 1:12:08 PM PDT by NobleFree
In my MBA program, I was fortunate to have a practicing psychologist teach a course on management.
He used a variety of teaching methods, but one in particular involved discussing and debating case studies. The case studies would present this or that management challenge and we would each present and discuss our solution.
When we first started, we were surprised at how easy it was to solve these supposed management dilemmas. We’d confidently explain how we would address these issues and most of the class would agree. “I’ll just make them do this or that.” “I’ll just make them get along and work together.” Often our “solutions” involved the word “make” or one of its many derivatives.
Whatever action, we would just make our employees do it. Compulsion sounded so straightforward and easy. That way of thinking didn’t last long. The professor would constantly ask, “And how will you make them do that?” A simple sounding question, with profound implications. Think about the question. How will you make them do that?
Just how do you make an employee do anything? For many people, the quick retort would be, “Well, if they didn’t do as I say, I’d just fire them.” IJFT. One quickly discovers that this mindset—which is almost universal with the “I’m the boss” viewpoint—almost always immediately leads to IJFT.
The professor wouldn’t allow us dance about this point; it is almost magical thinking to believe you can “make” an employee do anything and this professor didn’t allow magical thinking in his classroom. The genuine solutions were much more difficult, much more detailed, and seldom had an easy answer, if they had an answer at all. We quickly learned to erase this magical thinking from our repertoire. The class was one of the most valuable I have ever taken.
Sadly, most new and even many seasoned managers start with a force-based mindset and retain it throughout their careers. But your box of managerial tools must hold more than a stick if you want to develop into a great manager and leader. By the very nature of the employment agreement, all employees understand their boss can fire them—it is a given. Constantly reminding your employees of this fact does little to motivate them. In fact, in most cases it does just the opposite. Threats and intimidation generally do not make for good leadership.
What I just described is the mindset of a great many politicians. When I listen to Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) and many others political “leaders” describe their policy proposals, I am taken back to that management class.
Ocasio-Cortez sounds like a green MBA student. Everything is soooo easy. When I listen to her, what I hear in effect is, “Why were those people before me so stupid? This is simple!”
The freshman congresswoman from the Bronx offers solutions that boil down to “I’ll make them do this.” Remember what Ocasio-Cortez said when she got pushback on her Green New Deal? “I’m the boss. How about that?”
Every tyrant, whether in the workplace or the government, with the thought “I’ll make them do it.” At least in business, the worst that can happen is a person gets fired. In government, the mentality can lead to death on a massive scale.
In business, IJFT becomes the ultimate tool. In politics the ultimate tool is at the end of a gun.
Listen to Ocasio-Cortez and her cohort of leftist activists and “democratic socialists.” They are tyrants in the making. If they had the power, they would surely use it. From the gulags of Stalin’s Soviet Union to killing fields of Khmer Rouge Cambodia, from Mao’s cultural revolution to the Islamic revolution in Iran, from the socialist workers’ “paradises” of North Korea and Cuba and Venezuela, the road to tyranny begins with “I’ll just make them . . .” Can’t happen here? Don’t be so certain.
Most new managers misunderstand what the job means. Most focus on the position’s rights and privileges—not its duties.
Leadership is lifting a person’s vision to higher sights, not haranguing others about your organizational power. Or using your power as an elected official in an attempt to compel people behave and think as you see fit.
The road to tyranny might be paved with good intentions but it does not lead to them. We must remember tyranny lurks in many hearts, whether pretty young women or grizzled old men. We forget this at our peril.
Postal workers motto, “ Ill just make them do it.....or I will kill them all.”
It’s the old IT joke:
Q: How was God able to create the world in 6 days?
A: He didn’t have an installed base.
Good article. It took me a long time to realize IJFT is a bad way to go. Sometimes you have to, but it’s never easy, especially when your employees belong to unions.
I’ve largely made a career out of teaching and consulting on the points raised by this post (and related ones), sans the political angles. Even argued with people on here about such things — ex-military types who believe leadership is a one way street: the boss talks, you do what he says. There’s nothing new here; these so-called techniques (bossing around) never worked, at least not for long periods of time. The problem is that the response is often going all the way over to the other side — trying to be friends.
Don’t forget Eric “I’ll nuke them if they don’t turn-in their guns” Swalwell.
Excellent post. When I’m approached about convincing a team to change behaviors I always ask what the result is they want to achieve.
Then I tell them they get what they measure.
It’s not a perfect answer and it requires time to achieve the result, but it works.
I took a graduate management class many years ago.
The instructor posed a question
If you were king of the world for a day...what would be the first thing you did.
Most women answered world peace, and men said make themselves filth rich.
I answered that I would execute everyone on death row. When queried why, I said that is served a greater good, and did not benefit me directly. When asked why I wouldn’t make myself rich I pointed out that I was already “king” and thus was already “rich”. I further pointed out that I could make myself rich at 23:59 rather than at 00:01
I remember taking over a group of disguntled employees as a Second Lieutenant. It was a disfunctional unit with just about everyone working for me hating to be in the military. I called each one over on a one to one basis and asked them that, understanding they needed to serve their duty, if they could do anything in the office they wanted what would it be. Each stated that they would like to do this or that and I said, “Ok, you are now in charge of that task.” Within two months we were a well oiled machine. It was a experience I never forgot as well as earning me a commendation.
Capitalism works the same way. Let people do what they want to do and stand out of their way.
Great story, but what would you have done if the overwhelming majority of them wanted to be in charge of the same task?
Yet you accuse the original poster of being a 'blogpimp'.
Do you believe that a blog that could produce this article (an article you find relevant and important) shouldn't be promoted?
Not promoted by pimping - that is, needlessly posting only an excerpt in order to drive hits to the blog. Jim has said that's not what FR is for, and I agree with him 100%.
“I have no complaint if a good conservative blogger posts his own material to FR, not as an excerpt to drive hits and discussion back to his blog, but rather to impart useful information to OUR readers and to promote and join in on the discussion and conservative activism HERE on FR.
“If a blogger can’t or refuses do that, and if he constantly complains or fights with our participants over it, then I’d just as soon he doesn’t post here. It’s not my job to make his content or his presentation or cooperation acceptable to our readers. That’s his job. And if he cannot do it or refuses to do it and continues posting brief excerpts only and obviously attempting to draw away our participants while loudly complaining about it, then I have no sympathy for his complaints and the more apt I am to ban his account and blog.” - http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-bloggers/2636843/posts?page=552#552
It’s the old IT joke:
Q: How was God able to create the world in 6 days?
A: He didn’t have an installed base.
Alternate answer: He didn’t have a project manager.
Would alter the phrase a bit (have a psychiatrist friend who constantly has to deal with the fallout of postal worker’s management failure— aside from their own “issues”. The US PO is hardly advanced management— it is civilian version of military top down, with zero incentives as it is a “civil service job. Built for failure).
Postal Management motto: “ I’ll just make them do it, and harass them when they don’t do as ordered. And.. they will come back to the workplace and “go postal” with violence— against everyone, but especially “management”.
A great leader gets his people to do things because they want to. As a Marine NCO and SNCO I rarely had to resort to the old “because I said so” way of doing things. Train your people to the point that you can disappear on leave for two weeks and things still run as if you had been there. Train your people to take your place, give them ownership and hold them accountable. Allow them to come up with ways to do it better and let them implement them. Allow them to fail as long as they are doing the right thing, then constructively critique their effort and allow them to fix the problem. Do this, and they will crawl through Hell in gun powder suits for you. I left the Marine Corps knowing the Marines that were put in my charge were going to be good leaders.
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