Draft a memo that I might use to prop up sales in the mid-west and then provide me with some stats showing how sales have fallen over the last quarter…

Sounds like something reasonable for a boss to direct a subordinate to do.  Probably, some phrase like this is asked by bosses throughout the world every day.

Effective communication requires clarity, and the above example seems to satisfy that aspect.  Of course, the communication might be further improved if the boss communicates with a tone that implies a request rather than an order.  Many consultants would say that’s it – clarity and respect.

However, I would like to point out that what’s being developed is far more complex, far more committing than what a boss might realize.  In my mind, directives from a boss are implicit contracts.  They demand that the boss reciprocate with attention, action or reaction when the requested work is delivered.  To ignore this reciprocity is to flirt with destroying the motivation of your subordinates.

Here’s what typically happens:

The memo is written, the spreadsheet created and both are delivered to the boss.

BUT NO FEEDBACK IS GIVEN.

The boss either moves on to new directives or the issue is forgotten.  When this becomes a pattern, the quality of the subordinate’s work falls and motivation is lost.

In graduate school, I was lucky to have a thesis director, Dr Richard Steffy, who was not only a great clinician but also a great teacher. When I presented a draft for a thesis or paper, within days he would have comments and revisions. There was an implicit contract- I worked, he reviewed and the productive cycle continued.

Regrettably, many bosses that I coach are too solidly embedded in their own hierarchy.

I direct, others do!

Their mental scheme reflects a linear and non-reciprocal processes.

To maintain a committed subordinate, assigning work means making a commitment to review or at least comment on that work. Failure to provide feedback drains subordinates of motivation and desire.

bad bosses

Come and hear about some observations about the nature of work that was discussed in a recent CJAD interview.

In the interview, emphasized the important transformation of raw materials to a higher sense of completion that is the essence of work.  Whether, as an accountant who takes numbers to produce a final budget or a craftsman taking raw timber to a finished sculpture, we need to achieve. The process not only brings a sense of completion, but as described in the recently published, Rush: Why you Need and Love the Rat Race by Todd Buchholz an emotional rush as well.

No tags

Recently, I was asked by a large company to screen applicants for a senior management position using traditional psychological assessment tools. The lucrative offer was tempting but I declined.

In my previous post I argued that psychologists were not very good predictors.  Now I continue my criticism by suggesting that psychological testing has many underlying assumptions that need scrutiny before testing can be applied to selecting job applicants.

Besides a conceptual orientation, the assessing psychologist needs to decide upon what domains to assess.  Does he or she examine basic underlying cognitive abilities such as the ability to conceptualize, combining for example many seemingly disparate work elements into a common corporate theme.  However, there are multiple so-called formative cognitive abilities beside conceptualization. Again, which ones should be selected?  Furthermore, cognitive abilities cluster into higher level skills such as strategic thinking, therefore some job assessments focus on these more macro abilities or competencies.

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Recently, I was asked by a large company to screen applicants for a senior management position using traditional psychological assessment tools. The lucrative offer was tempting but I declined.

The assessment role was never a role I felt comfortable assuming. By nature I like to help people, not pick and choose. However in this case, the company wanted a definitive judgment “yea or nay ” about each applicant’s suitability. Besides my personal concerns, more psychologists are writing about the problems associated with the use of psychological assessment in predicting what candidates will make good employees.

As highlighted by the psychologists Kuncel and Highhouse in a recent issue of Industrial and Organizational Psychology, experts from a variety of sampled fields are generally poor predictors. In one review that examined over 27,000 expert predictions in fields as diverse as politics to economics, the so-called experts were little better in their predictions than dilettantes.

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Psychological testing

I was recently interviewed by one of Montreal’s leading investment analyst, Mr John Archer.

Read the story here

behavioural fincance · investment