“Everyone rises to their level of incompetence.”
– Dr. Lawrence Peter
Drucker Was a Liberal Arts Manager
Recently, on a flight to a consulting job in Anchorage, I read some prose literature about the one and only Peter Drucker, and I was reminded just how “touchy-feely” he was. For some reason, I had forgotten about his person-centered approach, his humanistic philosophy and his caring-nurturer style of leadership. It had been some time since I had read one of his books, but these articles sort of hit me right between the eyes and shocked me into reality: It seems Drucker was as much a counselor as he was a brilliant business strategist, and my false image of him being a supreme and all-knowing sage, with a direct and calculating approach to leadership, management and strategy was ALL wrong.
At 35,000 feet somewhere over the Yukon Territory, I read an article in the Harvard Business Review called “The Responsibility of Management Consultants,” by Peter Pashek, who is a consultant in Berlin. He worked with Drucker for 30 years and it was in his article that he stated: “Druker considered management one of the liberal arts and therefore believed that managers should be educated in the humanities and the social sciences.” You might be thinking that that isn’t such an earth shattering statement or not even a mildly enlightening epiphany. Well, it rocked my world. Here’s why…..
Get Grounded With a Strong Liberal Arts Education
I was raised on a liberal arts education, a psychology major as an undergrad, with 98 of 138 units coming in psych, history, philosophy, literature, sociology, humanities, etc. My masters was in the “Feeliest” of the “Touchy-Feely” professions: counseling—even at the M.A. level, 1/3 of my 68 credits were sprinkled with a liberal arts thematic learning concept. In other words, we studied how to become effective counselors by using lessons from philosophy, literature, history and even the fine arts—interpersonal relations are all around us (Especially where ever people happen to be!!), so thematic liberal arts within a counseling curriculum made sense—it made a LOT of sense. I took pride in my M.A. counselor training because it not only helped me learn how to relate, listen, manage, lead and intervene in a helping mode, it was also the most stringent and rigorous counseling program in the country–most masters programs required 30 units, mine required 64 plus 1,500 internship hours—my MA’s rigor was actually equivalent to many Ph.D. programs. But was it enough to prepare me for what was lurking in the weeds?
Management and Therapy Have Much in Common
All that said, I felt great about my training, and when I was called by Head-Hunters for jobs in Corporate America as a manager, it was because they knew about the cache of my master’s degree. Imagine that, a “touchy-feely” counselor type being coveted by, what the media would have you believe is the cold, insensitive, homogenized, Anglo-Saxon, Conservative, Good-‘Ol Boy, corrupt American Corporation—-HMMM……I didn’t know about Drucker’s affinity for the liberal arts back when this was happening, so I was really surprised that corporations would be interested in me. Once I became immersed in all the splendors of management, I soon realized that it is nothing more than babysitting intermingled with some therapy sessions.
Managing Emotional Drama
My first thoughts were, “Good LORD! How can this company manage to get through the day, let alone manage a healthy bottom line!” My day was spent listening to employees gripe about how unfair life is, how they want a closer parking spot, how Shirley is swiping Sammy’s pens, how Billy is screwing Tammy and Tammy is the CEO’s mistress, how Todd won’t work with Ben because Ben steals all the credit, and if I had to see Angela’s tears over the break-up with her boyfriend one more time, I swore I would quit on the spot. That was how this particular company defined management, and that was why I was hired. To listen like a counselor, to help the “clients” move past their pain, loss, and grief, and to help them move on with their lives—just like in a therapy session. In my mind, it wasn’t management at all—it was counseling with 3 times the salary, but it was a crushing disappointment nevertheless.
Once I was immersed in the mode of manager/therapist, I was thankful for my counseling skills and I wondered how on earth a person with a BA in business or an MBA would be able to deal with that babysitting garbage. Maybe that’s why Drucker recommended the liberal arts background, and maybe that’s why most MBA’s steer clear of management and focus on finance or marketing or M&A—I always believed MBA’s were brilliant!
No! No! No! The Managerial Art of Thou Salt Not
Another famous Druckerism, speaking of babysitting, concerns how managers should instruct their employees/counseling clients about handling their workloads—yes, at some point managers SHOULD talk about getting to work! In the same edition of the aforementioned Harvard Business Review, another article reminded me about how Drucker believed in the importance of not only telling one’s employees what to do, but also, it was critical that a manager tells his/her employees what NOT to do! I have been a manager for nearly 25 years now, and all I could think was “My Lord……he’s right!” It’s pathetic, but it’s true. If I read that piece of advice 25 years ago, I would have thought there was no way that could ever happen….but now, I know better.
Case Study: Lisa the Listener
Here’s a quick example from a real life situation. A direct report went into Lisa’s (brand new manager) office, crying hysterically. She closed the door, sat down and began emoting all over Lisa’s floor—it was a pathetic and unprofessional display. She had no regard for Lisa’s time, no concept of business etiquette and no concern for anything but herself and her problems. She immediately launched into describing her feelings about how she feels undervalued and she wants a promotion. She said she was tired of seeing everyone around her get raises and title changes (even though only one person had a title change) and she was sick of feeling like she had no significance.
Tell Me About Your Feelings
After two hours of empathic listening and sympathetic reflection of her feelings, Lisa told the hysterical employee that her productivity was down, her numbers this quarter were low, she had a year-long downward trend in output, she had a series of instances of insubordination and inappropriate outbursts that disrupted the office (just like this current outburst), her attitude and morale had been horrible and was impacting the rest of the team. Since all of this was documented and it had been discussed ad-nausea in the past, it shouldn’t have come as a surprise to her, but it did. So, for the 101st time, Lisa had to spend another 2 hours telling her how she was SUPPOSED to do her job.
The Counselor’s Prescription
Lisa literally had to outline for her, yet again: 1) You are supposed to sell 25 units each quarter; 2) You are supposed to visit 100 customers each quarter; 3) You are supposed to make 200 cold calls each quarter; 4) You are supposed to develop 1,000 new leads each quarter……etc. etc. etc. It got so pathetic that Lisa even had to get more specific and tell her HOW to develop the leads, HOW to work the cold calls and HOW to close the sales! But it gets worse. As Drucker prescribed, Lisa had to also tell her: 1) You are to NOT disrupt my time with crying and general hissy fits; 2) You are to NOT talk to employees about your problems and disrupt their productivity; 3) You are to NOT incessantly complain about how this job is unfair while you don’t have the numbers to warrant a promotion; 4) You will NOT behave in an unprofessional manner by sabotaging the work of people who feel are treated better than you……etc. etc.
Enough Management, Time for Leadership
There have been as many as 8 or 9 people on the same work team who needed this type of babysitting/emotional support/therapy. They were not 18 year old, entry level employees…..they were 40 year old and older “veterans” of the workforce! Folks who honestly felt that work was a place where they were entitled to having someone tell them what to do so they were assured of NOT failing. They believed work was a place to do what they were told, to not do what they were told not to do, and to receive emotional support from the resident therapist—their manager.
I love this quote from Tim Gould, it captures the true essence of management as a social science and as it ascribes to Dr. Lawrence Peter’s theory of managers rising to their level of incompetence (The Peter Principle): “I’ve been promoted to middle management. I never thought I’d sink so low.”