 |
 |
|
|
Edited excerpts:  The
Essence of Lead ManagementAs my friend and colleague Brian pointed out so eloquently above, it is only people who feel genuinely respected for their genius and values who offer their employer energy, creativity and commitment. This energy, creativity and commitment are three essential ingredients in producing a high quality, profitable product or service. The purpose of every business or organization is to create a high quality product or service. The purpose of the owner, manager, supervisor or team leader is to ensure that this occurs regularly by managing the workers hired to produce the product or service. Managers can only achieve this task by communicating to each worker respect for their innate genius and their personal values.  This was the primary premise that Dr. William Glasser started with when he first wrote The Control Theory Manager over fifteen years ago. Since then he has evolved his ideas and terminology, and that evolution is reflected in many of his later works—most notably Choice Theory®: A New Psychology of Personal Freedom in 1998. On a drive from Moncton, New Brunswick to Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island about four years ago, I queried Dr. Glasser on whether he had considered writing an updated edition of The Control Theory Manager to expand on his work in applying Lead Management to the business community. He said that he had considered it but that his current commitments precluded it. Then he challenged me to do it with his assistance. The result of that conversation is Using Lead Management on Purpose – Creating Quality Products and Services for a Global Economy. The common understanding of a managing or supervisor relationship is that one person, the boss, tells the workers what he wants done with little or no input from them. The manager also sets the standard for what he wants done and evaluates the workers on how well they are doing it. If they are not doing as well as he wants, the manager tries to motivate them with threats of discharge, loss of a promotion or pay raise. Less common motivators are the offer of more pay or more interesting work.  However, the traditional “reward and punishment” approach ignores that humans are the only animal that thinks about thinking. In other words, they can disassociate or stand outside themselves and consider other perspectives. Lead Managers know that this ability enables them to operate in at least five unique levels or perspectives of awareness: Behavioral, Strategic, Belief, Identity and Spirit. Because this is so, humans are not externally motivated but rather internally motivated by what they value about themselves and their world, their Quality World. Like all objects in the universe, every worker has a purpose and when they see how their work connects to their needs, values, and purpose, they will readily offer their energy, creativity, and commitment to the production of a high quality product or service. A satisfying relationship between the manager and those being managed which honors the values of both the worker and the manager is the most powerful driver to productivity. And this relationship is the essence of a successful organization and especially so in the highly competitive global economy. It is not that “reward and punishment” does not ever work. If the work takes little or no training and there is a large pool of workers desperate for a job, those with these jobs will work harder or make an effort to look like they are working harder. Nevertheless, even in hard times, workers who do not believe the manager cares about them, their needs and their values will resist authority by absenteeism, low quality work, and pilfering from the workplace. There are countless ways that employees who do not believe they are valued can hold onto a job and still do little more than the minimum. There is little in traditional, coercive boss management that can lead to a satisfying relationship between the manager and the workers. The manager can get the hands of the worker but their brains and hearts will focus elsewhere. Instead, they are more likely to use their creativity and energy to get away with doing as little as they can. It is a rare worker who will apply his creativity to enhance the work if he does not feel valued. The only thing that every worker is committed to is his values. Caring managers, Lead Managers, know this and have developed the skills of inserting their values into that of the workers and thereby create greater productivity. Lead Management's Other Uses Of course the same situation occurs in other domains of society. Almost all parents use boss managing in their attempt to rear successful, cooperative children. Warm, caring teachers also start to boss when their boss threatens them to get the scores up on mandated tests. Coaches stop teaching and begin to boss as they struggle to turn out winning teams. Even directors and producers will boss temperamental artists in an effort to turn out award-winning productions. In these instances, where money may not be the dominant factor, the limitation of the “reward and punishment” approach to manager-worker relationships is that it distracts from purposeful productivity and high levels of quality. Despite threats and punishment, children defy their parents, students have no interest in their subjects, athletes pay little attention to their coaches, and performers become difficult and temperamental. Eventually some coercive parents, teachers, coaches, and directors begin to sense that bossing does not work very well, but most of them are at a loss for what to do differently or afraid of losing control of the situation or both. Using Lead Management on Purpose addresses how managers can replace bossing with leading. When they do, they discover that a warm, respectful, and shared-values relationship between leaders and those they lead are the most effective human relationships. There is an additional management problem that typically occurs in situations where the power between the managers and the managed either is close to equal or is thought to be close to equal by the person being managed. Typical examples of this situation are business partners, husbands and wives, parents with grown children, and middle-aged children struggling with elderly parents. In these situations, one or both of the parties may try to boss the other based on the firm belief that he or she knows what is right for the other party better than the other party does. However, the people in the examples above, most commonly marital partners fight back against bossing by the other. In these situations, where money may be a factor but rarely a dominant factor, they refuse to meet expectations and reject the authority of their partner. Not recognizing and respecting each other’s values in these situations is invariably a disaster. The relationship goes off balance and improving it becomes an imperative. When partners realize the role that their spouse plays in their purposeful, valued based life they begin to appreciate each other and all they have achieved together. Using Lead Management on Purpose provides new insights, concepts and tools to address these relationships and situations. Edited excerpts from the Introduction to Using Lead Management on Purpose by Kenneth L. Pierce, Psychologist and Business Consultant. Publisher: iUniverse, November 2007, ISBN: 978 – 0 – 595 – 44832 - 6
|
|
|
|||||||||||||||
|
|
|