“Cute” Management Tricks – Avoiding the Real Issues

Do you ask your employees to do this?

The Opportunity

There is a lot of help out there for managers. Unfortunately, some of it is better at selling books than at solving problems. Many management systems were written by academics or writers who are not “in the trenches” managing real people in real companies and solving real problems.

The wrong management style or philosophy, or the right program applied at the wrong time for the wrong reasons, can be a very bad thing. It can exacerbate existing problems, and create new ones.

The Solution

We’re going to outline two scenarios where a management system or philosophy was applied improperly.

Wendy works for a finance department. A new manager was hired into what was already a difficult environment with “a lot of finger pointing.” The new manager decided to apply a philosophy from the book FISH Sticks. The office was decorated with a jungle theme – lots of vines and stuffed animals. Wendy says “Now, at age 56, I’m a giraffe, the woman who shares an office with me is a 62 year old zebra, the rest of the department are a tiger, a gorilla, a monkey, a gazelle, a lion and something else, but who cares.”

Wendy feels that if she expresses any opposition she risks being labeled “not a team player.” Even worse, each month the department nominates candidates and votes for a “coconut head” or the person who is the most difficult to get along with. The current coconut head is the 62-year-old zebra whose husband recently passed away leaving her with financial difficulties, and who is dealing with some medical issues of her own. “No wonder she’s crabby!” Wendy says.

Mike works for a support organization that has adopted a “Survivor game” theme. The department was organized into teams or “tribes” who gain points by meeting certain statistics of performance. There are prizes (including extra days off, premium parking spaces, and even financial awards) for tribes that “outwit, outplay and outlast” the others.

This program worked well at first, but the longer it’s gone on, the more players have learned to circumvent the system designed to measure performance. They ignore important aspects of their job that are not included or measured by the criteria of the game. There have even been suspected incidents of team members sabotaging the performance of other tribes.

In both cases, the negative byproducts of implementing these programs were probably a nasty surprise to well-meaning managers. The unfortunate consequences of implementing a bad program (or implementing it badly) may:

• Exacerbate trust problems among employees (who may cheat, or suspect others of cheating in “game scenarios”)
• Erode trust in the management – creating a barrier to communication
• Legitimize non-constructive criticism (by “voting people off the island” or voting them the “coconut head of the month”) which may sound fun and harmless, but can do some real damage
• Take the time and money required for other management activities that may be more appropriate or relevant to the situation

Matching the Solution to the Problem

Many times, managers read a book or go to a seminar and get excited about what seems to be a cure for all of their problems. They go back to their companies and apply what they have learned before understanding the issue and asking the right questions of the right people. Managers entering a new company or department, or students studying management for the first time need to be especially careful of this. It’s very easy (and fun!) to see a situation that has worked for someone else and immediately go apply it. It makes the upper management think you’re full of fresh ideas and that you’ll get results. Six months from now will tell the real story, however. Many new managers fail to meet objectives in their first year, and many times it’s because they didn’t understand the unique issues that need to be solved in their environment.

Wendy’s Situation

The FISH sticks program was inspired by the fish markets in Seattle. They were in a public service industry, and had high turnover. Many of their employees were “Generation Xers” (see Leading Generation X) and college students. Being educated about fish, interacting with customers, being happy and upbeat all the time, and being very visible were part of the job. Their issues were retention and motivation.

At Wendy’s workplace, we encounter a very different set of circumstances. We have an established workforce of mature workers, with complex jobs and interactions between jobs. Their issues were trust (or mistrust) and personal issues.

There are ways to solve the problems encountered at Wendy’s workplace. Resolving some of the personal issues would be a good start. Wendy’s co-worker, the 62-year-old who had lost her husband and was in financial difficulty, would probably improve her relationships and performance at work if she had the resources to resolve some of her personal issues. A more flexible schedule to allow time to meet with counselors, support groups, or financial resources would probably help, and many “Employee Assistance” programs can help refer employees to good resources at a fairly low cost to the employer. There are many things that could help, but nominating her as the “coconut head of the month” is probably not one of them.

Mike’s Situation

In Mike’s situation, the issue was about improving performance. The “Survivor” theme carries competition to a level that is probably not appropriate in a workplace, it implies that each person succeeds only by outlasting (or even causing) the demise of his teammates or other teams.

Games are fun, and can provide a great motivation, but you have to be very careful what you measure, and you have to ensure that the prizes are proportional to the contribution made to the company. If it’s important to you that people “play well with others” and help train one another on different procedures and resolve issues together, then a competitive game may not be the best scenario, unless the whole department is rewarded for meeting certain criteria.

How to resolve this issue depends a great deal on where you’re sitting. We’ve included suggestions for employees and managers.

From the Employee’s Perspective

If you’ve had a “cute” system inflicted on you as an employee, you need to tread carefully, especially if it sounds like management is thrilled with the idea. In some cases, it might be good to “play along” until the novelty has worn off, before bringing up issues. Then you can hopefully find someone in management who is not so enamored with the system and get a fair hearing.

Use the parts of the system that work to your advantage as an employee, and try to bring alternatives to the parts that don’t work.

• Mike suggested to his employer that they add some criteria to the “game” for helping other departments- the winning team for the week needs to get good “feedback” forms from their internal customers as well as meet their previous objectives.
• Mike also suggested that employees get points for submitting good ideas and solutions for problems. “I only wish I’d made the second suggestion before I made the first, so that I’d get credit for it.” he grins.
• As an employee, you might have to practice some “passive resistance.” This is risky, because it puts you at odds with management, who clearly want you to go along with the program. But if you’re required to do something that you can’t do in good conscience, you can always smile sweetly and say, “I don’t think there’s been a ‘coconut head’ this month. Everyone has been SO helpful!”
• Leave this article anonymously in the suggestion box, or on your manager’s chair.

From the Manager’s Perspective

It’s great to learn new management philosophies, and to learn tactics that have been successful in different industries. Unfortunately, applying the wrong system or philosophy to a situation often does more harm than good- and the harm is usually seen first by the employees it’s inflicted on, rather than by the manager who did the inflicting. Just because a management system is “cute” doesn’t make it bad. But unfortunately, it seems that most of the “cute” systems we’ve heard about are forgiven for terminal faults because of their cuteness. Try any change in management style on for size:

Some questions to ask:

• What are the differences between the company I’m studying and my own?
• What do the employees say is the real issue? Do they have their own ideas on how to solve it?
• How could the program you’re considering be exploited by an employee with an “ulterior motive?” (Many people have one!)
• Does the program encourage negative behavior in any way?
• Does the program reward people for behavior that contributes to the success of the organization as a whole, or just to their unit or department?
• Will this philosophy or system stand a chance of improving things here?
• What is the down side if “stuff” goes wrong during or through implementation of this new philosophy?
• Put yourself in the shoes of the “managed.” Not just a cursory look, but really think through how you would feel if this system were inflicted on you?

If your idea fails on any of these criteria, you may need to go back to the drawing board. Sometimes real solutions are overlooked because they are not as much fun or not as easy to sell to upper management (and the employees themselves.) The “uncute” truth is that serious problems often require very hard work by serious people.