Tuesday, May 3, 2011

Control?

Those of you who know me will not be surprised to hear that I believe one of the most destructive forces in the business world today is the idea of Control. You will also not be surprised to hear that Management is based on successful control of people and things. What I believe is that people have some ability to control things, but very little ability to control people.

I also really love it when people like The Wall Street Journal or Harvard Business School publish results that indicate some agreement with these principles. Take yesterday's HBS Working Knowledge report on a study of casinos and the way they manage their hosts. I needn't give all the details, but you may see the entire article here http://hbswk.hbs.edu/cgi-bin/print/6656.html.

The thrust of the study's conclusions is that while there is more risk in giving employees more flexibility in deciding how to do their jobs, there is also more reward.The study does not suggest that employees have no guidelines or monitoring, but it does suggest that trusting employees to make good decisions and make better ones as they have more experience is very beneficial. The downside of course, is that the employer might become dependent on those employees and their performance. If that occurs, then when it's time to improve profitability it won't be such a good idea to cut those employees.

The big question here is about recognizing the thinking that goes into the actual structure of the business activity. The questions about what the employer is looking for are not as simple as they may seem. What is the value of an existing customer? Am I willing to go a little out of my way to satisfy a customer, or is it better to go find a new one? Can management best make that decision, or is it the person facing the customer the one to make that decision? And you can imagine the series of questions that follow.

The main issue for us is that none of these can be answered in a subjective manner. These are all issues that lend themselves best to a considered plan of action or manner of behavior. In order to do this, I/we believe the way to do this is to create an on-going discussion with all the players and decision makers in order to uncover the greatest wisdom availability. It really isn't about any one person's knowledge or opinion. the most powerful results come out of powerful communication in a mutually trusting environment.

As coaches, we at Paeon understand the ways and means of creating those environments and look forward to continuing the conversation with you.

6 comments:

Unknown said...
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Cecily Crowther said...

Thanks Bill, I think it's interesting to expand the management priciple here to personal relationships, too. It's about great communication and listening to others ideas, as well as promoting one's own.
Cecily

hlmacd said...

Once again, I hear your invitation to stretch into "trust". I look forward to future Paeon postings....

Unknown said...

This is really odd as your comment appears on my iPhone but not on mt desktop. As usual I am baffled by technology.
Thanks for your comment and your insight. I hope it is time for all of us to realize that work relationships are just relationships. And just like all of our other relationships they operate based on agreements. Usually though, the negotiations that create those agreements are rarely honest. They are ruled by the power structure. The smarter people get, the more they need to be seen as people, not just bodies. Respect for each other is in much too short supply in the workplace.

John said...

I find it ironic that we once again are "discovering" that treating humans (clients and employees) as naturally creative, resourceful and whole, and placing our faith in them is good for our businesses. We rediscover it because it is true, and when we operate from fear rather than love, we give up on both a part of ourselves and all others.
John Owens

Jamie J said...

I was talking about this just last week. Thanks for your smart discussion!