A Lesson in Working with People
Once upon a time. I worked with a manager who had 2 employees:
Employee A he absolutely could not work with, since employee A was a complainer. Employee A saw multiple problems in the status quo, and in the decisions of his management to overcome the status quo, and would seek out alternative means of approaching problems beyond what his management had implemented. Although Employee A was very talented at seeing problems, he needed to be coached on his approach to problem solving. Employee A was clearly seeing problems and willing to take them on by trying out different approaches, and also had no trouble communicating issues up the chain of command, but he was eventually terminated. Over time, the relationship had worsened until the manger felt there was no amount of effort he could expend that would make Employee A less of a high maintenance problem.
Employee B, on the other hand, was seen as one of the best employees this manger had ever had. Employee B would do whatever was asked of him without complaint. Even those in other departments held Employee B in high esteem, and he was able to move around within the organization easily, carrying out his assigned tasks with a positive, can-do attitude.
Employee B ignored the problems in order to demonstrate that he was a team player. Eventually, however, this person who seemed to be a Good Soldier willing to take orders turned out to be remarkably dissatisfied and he moved on to greener pastures, much to his managements dismay. Employee B simply did not stay with the company long and moved on to a position doing similar work, with more challenge and responsibility, for a direct competitor.In the end, the manager was left with neither his most favorite, nor his least favorite employee. He was simply stranded, and stuck in a quagmire of his own making. Why? Because he had refused to pay attention to both the needs of his organization and the individual needs of his staff.
If the manager had been paying better attention, Employee A would have been well coached in ways of seeing his ideas pushed through the organization with greater awareness, tact and problem solving skill. Although frustrated and vocal, Employee A wanted to fix whatever he felt was wrong in order to improve the overall functioning of the workplace. Employee B, although genuinely a pleasant person, was very unlikely to innovate or change anything, even if it needed to be changed, as long as he could gain the favor of senior management.
As it was, the lack of coaching for either one saw the organziation deprived of 2 very capable people. Interestingly enough, the person who was dismissed by management was oriented towards improving the organization with whatever know-how he had, and the person who was celebrated by management turned out to be far more astute in maximizing opportunities for himself.
The lesson: Embrace the frustrated. They’re the people trying to fix what’s wrong
Copyright © 2011 David Kasprzak
Thanks, for the comments, Michelle. You are right – change is a difficult thing to undertake. One of the things we all tend to do is to think of “organizations” as the actors in most scenarios. Organizations don’t act, however — people do. To Rob’s point, the manager in the story wasn’t expected to listen and coach by his own manager, and so he didn’t.
If those individuals had a different set of guiding principles, such as Respect for People, the situation would have most likely turned out quite differently.
The experience and attitude of Employee A varies depending on the work environment. From my career experience, most organizations are afraid of change or are slow to respond when change is needed. I can recall about three organizations that really embraced change and I thrived in those environments. Change isn’t easy and change agents are far and few in between, so organizations need to learn to identify and listen to those individuals who are trying to improve an organization’s efficiency and effectiveness.
Hi, Rob,
An astute observation. Let’s consider the manager’s manager a “Command and control” type, who does very little coaching. That, in turn, may have led directly to the lack of coaching the manager offered his charges as well.
Interesting story. I wonder how the manager’s manager coached him. That may have led to his approach.