The emperor has no clothes

According to a study by the European Foundation for Management Development (EFMD), “leadership is not a divine gift for the blessed few. It is an art that can be learned by many”.

The above is probably true but there has to be a level of personal awareness and commitment to help realise it as well as a sort of ‘appetite’ for constantly facing new and unknown realities, all of which tends to go against the self-imposed ‘image’ that many managers fall into without even realising it.

Most managers get into management because they are good at something else and even when they have been University and Business School trained to manage, their final score can often say more about their grasp of the theories than the actual ability to put them into practice.

The main problem resides around the weird but pervasive set of pictures, beliefs and images about what it means to be the boss of someone else and, much as you might fight it, the likelihood that you are not operating under some of these is about as likely as you getting out of this life alive, ultimately.

Seriously, ever since childhood we have watched, hated or loved people who can tell others what to do and in either case we have been in awe of them, so without even realising, it we made it our business to be like them (but not quite – after all, we are individuals!).

The single most overwhelming reason why managers have poor communication skills is down to what we’ll call ‘unconscious posturing’. Said less kindly, ‘putting on an act’ and then buying it oneself.

The attempt to take up a ‘management mantle’ is absolutely automatic when we are faced with making people do stuff and survive with our neck stuck firmly on the line. The longer we are in management, then the more solid the mantle can become, that is if it remains below the level of personal awareness

This is why people can be doing magnificently well and are then ‘promoted to their optimum uselessness’ by giving them a title and responsibility that detaches them from their natural experience of what to do, replacing it with the need to prove they know what to do as a point of qualifying their credentials.

The best managers in the world are those that still know that they don’t know and, when they do, they know it makes little difference in new times and new realities (every day, in other words).

So, effective management behaviour is the thing to look at before effective management communication skills and, to do that we need to understand what a manager is really for and what job it is they are really there to do.

'If only I wasn’t so modest, I’d be perfect'

 This is an extreme expression of management arrogance but it is not as rare as you might think. Underneath the social etiquette, many managers do believe that they have the job because they are the best. Sometimes they are the best but more often than not there is someone else out there who could do the job just as well, if not better.

The value that management provides is actually around guidance and leadership, discipline and standards, within a context that says ‘It’s my job because it’s the job I have’ rather than ‘It’s my job because I am so, so far ahead of you’.

As a manager, your role is to support people and demand they become the best … not you being the best. If you are the best in your team, the business is in trouble and if you know more about what goes on than your team does, the business is in great trouble.

You might be waiting for some tidy communications techniques but you are likely to make much more progress if you can revisit the management context you have set in motion and change it if it is causing you more problems than necessary.


Models of management communication

Very broadly speaking, you can divide management styles into three main categories that denote what communication ‘tone’ and effect the individual is likely to have:

Autocratic management

This is where the manager overall works on the principle of, a dictatorship. Most autocratic managers would never believe that’s what they are but certain symptoms might help tell them more about it. Autocratic management symptoms to watch out for are:

• Inadequate time spent in briefing prior to delegation
• Under-emphasis on WHAT needs to happen and an over-emphasis on HOW
• Inconsistent follow-through against projects in progress
• Short attention span when listening to others
• Short fuse when being less than pleased by others
• Tendency to withhold acknowledgement
• Tendency to take credit or indicate that it could have been done better personally
• High propensity to ‘catch people out’ doing something wrong
• Low  propensity to ‘catch people out’ doing something right
• Inability to see genuine physical  ‘indicators’ but acceptance of ‘nodding heads’
• Given to one-way communication; talking at people rather than to people
• ‘Domino effect’ when receiving pressure or criticism from above, it’s passed down-line
• Belief that motivation is mostly based on material and status issues
• Inadequate levels of personal responsibility expressed by others in the team
• ‘Arse covering’ mentality, covering up mistakes and ‘dropping others in it’ by the team
• Suppressed communications culture, blame and cynicism
• Constant ‘fire fighting’ mentality and activities
• Lack of knowledge exchange between members
• General low energy around inspiration and high energy around fear and survival
• Scared to take risks at the heart of the culture

Of course, this is a pretty nasty list that is unlikely to fit all autocratic managers in every sense. Quite often in fact, autocratic management has quite literally saved an organisation as, in times of crisis, there is very little difference between exercising strong discipline and exercising strong leadership.  However, this Byte is about locating and ‘disappearing’ some of the management communication styles that may be limiting our abilities and, as such, paints the picture very ‘black and white’ for that purpose.

Democratic management

This is where the manager overall works on the principle of, a consensus.

Whereas this may well be a more pleasant management style than the extreme autocratic model, it actually holds no superior likelihood of expressing great leadership at the end of the day. Democratic management symptoms to watch out for are:

• Inadequate consequences clarified in briefing prior to delegation
• Under-emphasis on HOW something needs to happen, over-emphasis on WHAT
• Inconsistent guidance and directing of performance and projects in progress
• Short attention span when listening to one’s own bosses
• Creating ‘islands of loyalty’ and an ‘us and them’ mentality against other departments
• Tendency to give acknowledgement without checking true merit
• Tendency to make it difficult for an individual to take credit or be rewarded for it
• ‘Rolling up the sleeves’ and getting down to the level of the problem, with staff
• Insufficient decision making; not wrong just not much
• Inability to see genuine physical  ‘indicators’ but acceptance of ‘good words’
• Given to ‘counselling’ communication; patronising and talking down to people
• ‘Buffer effect’ when receiving pressure or criticism from above, down-line is protected
• Belief that motivation is mostly based on teamwork and freedom of choice issues
• Inadequate levels of personal responsibility expressed by others in the team
• ‘Low reach’ mentality, covering up personal ambition and positive drive
• Suppressed communications culture, don’t blame me and I won’t blame you
• Effete in times of high pressure and threats from the external marketplace
• Sense of ‘job for life’ that negates the obligation to grow and develop with merit
• Constant ‘fire fighting’ mentality and activities
• Lack of knowledge exchange between members
• General low energy around success / winning and high energy around acceptance
• Scared to take risks at the heart of the culture

As you can see, many of the symptoms in the two lists are the same, even though the management styles are in many ways complete opposites.

In fact, improving management communication can only happen within a third model, called:

Empowerment management

This word has unfortunately already been ‘done to death’ in management vernacular but it remains the only true management context that will automatically release the most natural and effective form of management communication available.

An Empowerment Manager knows that his / her job is to bring out and focus the highest underlying forces within the organisation, team and individual and, in many ways, this makes the model the most personally uninvolved one of the three.

Apparently, when J.F Kennedy was made President he said something along the lines of, 'I have just made the last new friend I will make for a while'. We assume he didn’t mean that he could no longer have friends but that being a leader means accepting a level of responsibility and decision making that cannot ultimately be shared with anyone, even those people that advise and support or even love us.

The safety net that ensures a manager is about empowerment is in the area of what a culture based on ‘meritocracy’ looks like. A meritocracy is where everyone is recognised for the merit of their contribution, to the hard areas of results and the sift areas of culture.

You can only become an Empowerment Manager, creating and growing a meritocracy when you operate in such a way as to make yourself redundant at the level you are currently depended upon.  Whilst this might seem like ‘career suicide’ and an invitation for all the 'new blood' to pull you down, it is the exact opposite.

True leadership inspires trust and trust creates true staff loyalty.  True staff loyalty creates just about anything you care to imagine big and positive enough. This will only ever be the case where the manager is intent on managing a true culture of growth with merit appropriately applied to people who are striving to make a difference.

This is not about heroes and martyrs nor is it about false competition about who makes the biggest contribution, it is based on recognising the individual and the highest in their intent and attempt, no matter how much life and circumstances has helped to erode it.

It is about respecting the role of leadership as a temporary assignment and one that is given due to your great willingness to take care of things, rather than due to a superior capability.

It is only in this domain that your management communication will express the innate flair, inspiration, discipline and leadership that people look to you for.

Conclusion

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