The Cranky Middle Manager Show #206 Common Management Mistakes Aubrey Daniels
Today Wayne Turmel talks about the most common mistakes managers make, mostly because they’re company policy, and why they often backfire. We talk to Aubrey C Daniels. We also look at where the center of the universe is (it’s not Sales) and lucid words from a crazy person. Just another typical day in Crankyland.
Today’s guest, Aubrey Daniels, author of OOPS! The 13 Management Practices that Waste Time and Money and What To Do Instead. Whew, I’m exhausted just typing that, never mind implementing his ideas.
Show Notes
0:00 Welcome to your oasis of sanity in the desert of workplace craziness. Today we talk about challenging common wisdom- like the stuff all managers are asked to do but usually doesn’t work. Because of that we celebrate Nicolaus Copernicus who challenged conventional thinking but had the good sense to die before actually having to do anything about it. Not a bad plan.
2:00 The quote of the week is from William Blake, who most people considered mad but had some brilliant and lucid thoughts, one of which is if you don’t drain the swamp you wind up with reptiles….or something like that. Check it out yourself.
3:00 Welcome Dr Aubrey C Daniels. Are we lacking good role models for managers? TV doesnt’ help, and who the heck would work for Gordon Ramsay?
5:52 If he had to pick one, what is the most common mistake managers make? Stretch goals are doomed to failure and yet we keep setting them. Instead of one big monster goal, the solution is “many, mini-goals”.
10:15 Ranking employees doesn’t work well either, but I do challenge him on his notion that you don’t have to try your best, just be better than everyone else. My mother would take him to task and then some but she’s not here to take him on.
12:55 Competition is often used badly. External competition is good, internal competition is usually disastrous to group dynamics.
15:30 Done well, bonuses are lovelyPavlovian rewards. Done badly (most of the time) they drive the wrong behaviors or they feel they’re “owed” a bonus. We look at a sales example that sounds all too familiar.
23:00 We have a little difference of opinion with last week’s guest over the most talented people. (If you haven’t heard it, listen to Rob Goffee’s cranky show here). The best and brightest don’t always get you the results you need and frequently they cause more trouble than they’re worth.
Aubrey’s Resources
September 10th, 2009 at 9:39 pm
Hi Wayne. I was listening to this podcast and heard the question you asked Aubrey Daniels on the handling of talented people and made reference to your discussion with Rob Goffee. Now, I haven’t read Rob Goffee’s book (so your comments may have been based on something from the book) but from listening to the podcast I certainly didn’t get the impression he was advocating excessive mollycoddling of talented individuals. In fact I remember him (more than once actually) citing the dangers of over-indulging them. I got the impression that his message was about managing them correctly by understanding the behaviour patterns they commonly exhibit. To my mind this is simply good management practice- I’ve never known a good manager who didn’t allow his/her management style to be informed by the peculiarities of the people they manage, regardless of their IQ. Then again, you did preface the question with a comment about stirring up trouble…
September 26th, 2009 at 8:57 am
[...] few weeks ago, he interviewed Aubrey Daniels, author of OOPS! The 13 Management Practices that Waste Time and Money. Among the discussion topics [...]