|
(All material on
Your Office Coach is copyrighted to Marie G. McIntyre. All rights
reserved.)
Management Behaviors
Office Insights: Which Boss is Better - a Jerk or a Wimp?
We all know that managers
vary in their leadership style. And management studies have identified
numerous factors that contribute to effective leadership. But one
quality that has received little study is assertiveness. That fact
caught the attention of social psychologist Daniel Ames of Columbia
Business School, who wondered why previous studies had ignored this
seemingly important leadership trait.
After surveying people
about the strengths and weaknesses of former bosses, Dr. Ames found that
unassertive managers got low ratings. While people seldom mentioned
assertiveness as a strength, they often saw its absence as a weakness.
And lack of assertiveness was a problem in both directions: spineless
wimps were viewed just as negatively as overbearing jerks.
Aggressive managers
produce low morale, hurt feelings, and high turnover. But cautious,
timid bosses fail to resolve problems, obtain needed resources, or stand
up to management. So the message for managers is clear: if your
management style involves either yelling or cowering in the corner, you
need to get some assertiveness training before you derail your career.
(Source: Scientific American Mind, April/May,
2007)
Helpful links related to this topic on Your Office
Coach:
back to top
Office Insights: Can You Tell if Your Boss is Angry or Happy?
Being able to “read” your
manager’s mood is a critical survival skill at work. Most of us stay
alert for any sign that the boss may be in an angry or happy frame of
mind, especially if we need to deliver bad news or have an important
conversation. Unfortunately, a recent study indicates that we may
sometimes get it wrong.
According to psychologist
D. Vaughn Becker at Arizona State University, our brains may be
hard-wired to link anger to men and happiness to women. In one of Dr.
Becker’s studies, participants labeled masculine faces as “angry” and
feminine faces as “happy”, even when their expressions were identical.
So what does this have to
do with your boss? Well, if you work for a man, you may be more likely
to feel that he’s angry when he’s actually just being firm or direct.
And if you work for a woman, you may assume that all is well when in
reality she’s totally ticked off. (Source:
Monitor on Psychology, April 2007)
Helpful links related to this topic on Your Office
Coach:
back to
top
Office Insights: Why Do
Executives Behave Badly?
In your organization, who
is most likely to throw a tantrum, put their hands on other people, or
blame someone else for their mistakes? If your answer was the CEO or
other top executive, that’s no surprise. Researchers have found that
power makes people less sensitive to others and more likely to break
accepted rules of social behavior. The ironic result is that the person
who should be the role model for adult behavior often acts most like a
child.
Dacher Keltner, a
psychologist at UC-Berkeley, found that it doesn’t take much power to
put someone in the “alpha” role. After placing research subjects in
groups of three, he put one in charge of giving assignments to the other
two. When he returned a half hour later with a plate of four cookies,
the “power person” was more likely to take the last cookie, chew with
their mouth open, and leave crumbs on the table.
Power seems to shut down
some of the normal inhibitions that regulate social behavior. As a
result, here are a few things that powerful people are more likely to
do: interrupt others, invade personal space, make physical contact,
escalate a conflict, smile less, and flirt more blatantly. Other
factors that reduce social inhibition include being wealthy and feeling
irreplaceable, both of which apply to most executives.
So if your boss behaves
like a boor, don’t be surprised. And if you ever reach the top spot
yourself, continually solicit feedback from lower-level employees.
That’s the one thing that seems to help executives see the world more
clearly. (Sources: Psychology Today, September
2005; Atlanta Journal-Constitution, March 2007)
Helpful links related to this topic on Your Office
Coach:
back to
top
Office Insights: Can Your Boss Affect Your
Health?
For years, polls have
shown that a bad relationship with the boss is the number one reason
that people leave their jobs. And this may be a good thing. According
to other studies, your manager can have a profound impact on both your
mental and physical health.
Brad Gilbreath, a
researcher at Purdue University, found that that the manager/employee
relationship is almost as important as the husband/wife relationship
when it comes to a person’s overall well being. Rapport with the boss
not only predicts risk for depression and other psychiatric problems,
but can also affect you physically. Nadia Wager, a psychologist in the
U.K., found that nurses working for supervisors with poor management
styles had dramatically higher blood pressure than those with more
empathic supervisors.
Emotionally, we are most
affected by intimate relationships and power relationships. And the
primary power relationship in your life is usually with your boss.
People working for happy and productive managers are more likely to be
happy and productive themselves. So if you find yourself toiling for an
authoritarian tyrant, starting a job search may not be a bad idea. (Source:
Psychology Today, December, 2005)
Helpful links related to this topic on Your Office
Coach:
back to
top |
