Fix Until Broken

About the Book

Everybody's had at least one: a boss who gets in the way, doesn't really seem to understand how things get done, or just won't listen. And nobody wants to be like that when we get the chance to be in charge. Some kinds of unproductive or destructive management traps are easy to fall into if you don't see them coming.

This short book describes thirteen of these traps and gives real-life examples of each. Suggestions are offered about how to avoid each of them. The author's stated goal: "to help you avoid doing damage." Based on his own experiences and the experiences of people he's worked with, the author provides practical advice on communication, decision making, keeping your eyes and ears open, and other techniques designed to keep your organization moving in a positive direction.

About the Author

The author is a psychology professor at the University of Wyoming, with several years of administrative experience at different levels. He also serves on his local Board of Education, and has served on several statewide boards and task forces related to education, mental health, and substance abuse. He also draws on his experiences as a private pilot. He is co-author of the college textbook Drugs, Society, and Human Behaviour (McGraw-Hill, 2004).

Table of Contents and Excerpt

Contents

1. Primum Non Nocere
2. Out-planning Evolution
3. Management by Printout
4. Yell Before Listening
5. Collateral Damage
6. Playing with Fire
7. Divide and Conquer
8. Promisus Interruptus
9. Ask The Lawyer
10. Keeping Secrets
11. Forcing Change
12. Tunnel Vision
13. Grabbing for Glory
14. Epilogue

Call it bumbling, call it clueless, call it evil-- unfortunately there seem to be abundant examples of leadership gone wrong, both in the corporate world and in public-sector organizations. Individuals are able to cause or contribute to amazing damage to the organizations left in their care--the financial ruin and public-relations nightmares we read about in the newspapers (Enron and Worldcom) are only the tip of the iceberg. Usually the harm is less dramatic, resulting in poor morale, missed opportunities, or dissatisfied clients.

Continuous positive effort on the part of the staff can't entirely make up for these all-too-common leadership mistakes. For examples, just ask anybody who has worked in any complex organization for more than a few years. The best indicator might be the success of the comic strip Dilbert, the subject of which more often than not is either the idiot manager or the evil HR director. One is too clueless to know how much trouble he's causing, and the other derives pleasure from the pain he causes others. The comic strip would be pointless if a heck of a lot of people hadn't experienced this kind of administration in their own organizations. Even the most intelligent, honest, and decent person can on occasion step right into one of the destructive patterns of behavior described in this book. These are traps people do fall into all the time that seem to make sense but in fact are dangerous to your organization.

Perhaps you're moving into administration for the first time, or you're taking on a more challenging role, or you're just trying to understand why your bosses seem to screw up so often. In any case, maybe you can benefit from spending a little time stepping back from the day-to-day details and thinking about what you want your organization to achieve. Probably a little time is all you can afford. This book is short, partly for that reason, and partly because there's a finite limit to the amount of wisdom I can comfortably claim to possess. The most experienced administrator would be hard pressed to provide a complete recipe for being a successful manager, so this book takes a different approach and tries to tell you what NOT to do.

Whatever your own goals for administrative success may be, my goal is a simple one--to help you avoid doing damage. I've set my sights there only because you and I both know that destructive leadership is far from rare. This book is like a series of signs that say, "Danger- Thin Ice". When you skate near these situations, be extra cautious.

What makes me qualified to tell administrators how they shouldn't act? I have administrative experience in a university setting (chair of the faculty senate, department head, associate vice president, dean) and I worked closely with several school administrators during my years on the local school board. Through various advisory boards and councils I've rubbed elbows with leaders in state government, law enforcement, and the corporate world. So, I've had opportunities to work closely with a variety of administrators.

I've picked up some ideas from listening to the experiences of others, including my wife, who was an Army officer and has since worked in medical organizations. Some of my attitudes began to develop years ago based on stories my mother told me. She worked for the National Park Service, and was administrative secretary to the park Superintendent. Superintendents came and went, but she was a fixture. The bosses who asked for her advice always did better than the ones who knew it all before they walked in the door. Or, at least that's the way my mother told it.

MANAGEMENT BY PRINTOUT

I've seen it many times, and I'll bet you have, too. The boss walks into a meeting with a big stack of computer printouts, and you think, "Oh no. What does he think he's learned now?" The manager who sits in his or her office and learns about the workings of the organization primarily by examining data may well be starting down a dangerous path. The impulse to act on the basis of those data to make some change in policy or procedure, without looking behind the data to see what's really going on, is definitely risking doing damage due to self-imposed ignorance.

Don't get me wrong. I love both data and computers. I think the kind of information you can get by counting big bunches of things and then summing or averaging can sometimes reveal large-scale features of an organization that are not visible when looking at individual bits of activity. But before you take action based on such totals or averages you should learn as much as possible about the way the information was collected, the assumptions that were made about categories and classifications, and so forth. Does "number of items shipped" include both fifty-cent dinkies and fifty-thousand-dollar gizmos? Does "paid hours" include or exclude vacation? Does "number of employees" include parttime and contract employees? Whatever you're counting, find out what counts and what doesn't. For example, in a University setting it is virtually impossible to come up with a solid number for something as straightforward as the number of students in a given major. How do you count "double majors"? Also, some students enroll and then drop out, so the time point at which the count is made makes a difference. Some students are only taking a single class, so we use "head counts" for some purposes and "full-time equivalents" for other purposes. What about a graduate student who is working on a degree but did not enroll in classes while writing a thesis? Still using the library and computers and meeting with professors, but usually not counted as a student. Anyone trying to interpret data on student numbers should have some understanding of these issues, particularly if they affect some departments more than others. Similar complexities arise in counting "procedures" in a medical setting or "accounts receivable" in a business. Also, remember to think about that complex organization and its complex environment. One big average number rarely does justice to all the various conditions under which pieces of data were gathered to produce that average. Was the environment mostly the same five years ago, if you're looking at trends over time? If you're comparing similar functions in different locations, are there differences in the economic conditions or level of competition or access to resources? So, as soon as you get the data the next step should be to look behind the printouts and see what they are really saying about the way the organization is working. To do that you have to show the numbers to people and ask them to explain the data to you.