Work Matters

  • Luis Urzua and the Trapped Miners: A Good Boss, Performance, and Humanity

    I first wrote this post on September 6th.  I am highlighting it today to celebrate the rescue and to show some of the nuances of Luis Urzua's impressive leadership.

    When people ask me for one sentence summary of a great boss, I answer "He or she promotes both performance and humanity, and strikes a healthy balance between the two when trade-offs are necessary."   In Good Boss, Bad Boss, I quote a cool 2008 American Psychologist article by Mark Van Vugt, Robert Hogan, and Robert Kaiser who, after examining descriptions of admired and effective leaders in settings ranging from ancient human tribes to modern corporations and sports teams, conclude the best leaders are both "competent and benevolent."

    In light of this perspective, I am intrigued with reports (see here and here, for example) about 54 year-old foreman Luis Urzua and the impressive steps he is taking to oversee, organize, protect, and tend to the emotional needs of the 33 men trapped in the mine in Chile — a group that faces months trapped underground.  Urzua kept the men alive by immediately rationing food (two spoonfuls of tuna and a glass of milk every 48 hours for each man), which enabled them to survive and to avoid dysfunctional conflict until food started arriving through a small hole drilled be rescuers — a crucial move because none the miners had run out of food 48 hours before despite the rationing.  Uruza has organized the underground space (he is a skilled topographer) into a work area, sleeping facility, and so on, and is keeping the men on 12 hour shifts by using the headlights of trucks in the mine to simulate daylight.  He not only needs to keep the group healthy and focused to survive the ordeal, he  needs to stay in control because, under some rescue scenarios, the men will need to remove many tons of rocks to help with their own rescue operations.

    I was also taken with reports about the "leadership team" that has emerged.  The New York Times tells us that the oldest miner, 62 year-old Mario Gomez has "become the spiritual guide to his men, government officials said. He has organized a small subterranean chapel and is serving as unofficial aide to the psychologists working on the surface to cope with the miners' sadness and fear."  In addition, another miner, "Yonny Barrios, 50, the group's impromptu medical monitor. He is drawing on a six-month nursing course he took about 15 years ago to administer medicines and wellness tests that health officials are sending down through the 4-inch borehole and then analyzing in a laboratory on the surface."

    This case is so striking to me because Urzua and his team have taken such impressive action to tend to both the performance and human needs of the group — the blend of their competence and compassion is striking.  Moreover, if I go through the mindset of the best bosses discussed in the opening chapter of Good Boss, Bad Boss, the key elements are all there:

    1. The men are being pushed by their leaders (especially Urzua) hard enough to maintain their discipline and order, but not so hard as to be overwhelmed (consistent with the notion that the best bosses strive to be perfectly assertive).

    2. Uruza is showing extreme grit; in particular, a hallmark of gritty leaders is they treat life as marathon rather than a sprint,

    3.  In related fashion, Uruza and his team — and their advisers above — are treating this ordeal as a small wins situation, where the final goal of escape (and not getting overwhelmed by this big hairy goal) depends on one tiny victory after another.

    4. Uruza is clearly not suffering from detachment or power poisoning, as he is hyper-aware of how the large and small things he does affect the miners' moods, actions, and ability to survive; and he is not taking more goodies for himself than others.

    5. There is no doubt that he "has his people's backs," that he will do whatever is possible to protect them.  One way that good leaders protect their people is by limiting outside intrusion, and you could see this mindset when he urged experts to keep the medical conference call short because "We have lots of work to do."

    This is clearly an extreme situation, and you could argue that parts of it don't transfer well to the mundane organizational settings where most us work.  But I do think that extreme situations sometimes bring into focus what human groups need to thrive in terms of both performance and well-being, and what the best leaders do to help make that happen.  Indeed, I gleaned the five elements of the mindset of great bosses — being just assertive enough, grit, small wins, avoiding power poisoning (and being aware that followers are watching the boss very closely), having people's backs largely from research and cases in ordinary and mundane settings.

    P.S. For a take on how the miners can best survive this ordeal, check out this New York Times piece by psychiatrist Nick Kanas. 

     

  • Evidence-Based Study Tips: Nine Ways To Help You Learn

    All three of my children are students; my son and daughter are in college and my youngest daughter just started high school.  And I have been a professor for over 25 years, so I see lots of variation in how students — undergraduates, masters students, and doctoral students — go about trying to learn and be successful.  As such, I was struck with a list of 9 things over at BPS research that students can do to be more effective, gleaned from The Psychologist.  Check out the post at BPS research for details, but here they are:

    1. Adopt a growth mindset: This might be the most important of all; as Carol Dweck's wonderful research shows, when people believe that their intelligence and abilities are malleable rather than fixed, they try harder of learn more.  It is useless and downright destructive to view your abilities as fixed because, if they are, why should you bother try? And failure means your dumb.  That mindset is dangerous nonsense — and if your teachers start talking that way, ignore them –or send them some information about Dweck's research. 

    2. Sleep well.  There is tons of evidence that sleep deprivation makes people dumber and nastier. There are times when you've got to push it because of deadlines and such, but I think we all know that feeling a dulled mind from lack of sleep. 

    3. Forgive yourself for procrastinating.  A cool study shows that students who forgive themselves for past sins here procrastinate less and perform better in the future. 

    4. Test yourself.  As BPS reports:  "A powerful finding in laboratory studies of learning is the ‘testing effect’
    whereby time spent answering quiz questions (including feedback of
    correct answers) is more beneficial than the same time spent merely
    re-studying that same material."

    5. Pace yourself. People remember things better when they do a bit every day rather than cram for exams. I know this is against the instincts and habits of many students out there, but the evidence here is clear, so learning to plod along can help you a lot.

    6. Vivid examples may not always work best. This one is interesting because, as professor, I know that students love vivid examples.  But BPS reports some research suggesting that learning abstract concepts rather than the juicy stories that illustrate them enables students to more easily apply the concepts to diverse challenges.   (I have to learn more about this, as it actually seems inconsistent with stuff in Made to Stick — although perhaps the challenge is that juicy stories are so sticky that we don't focus on the underlying lesson). 

    7. Take naps.  I love this point. I talk about it a lot in Good Boss, Bad Boss because there is evidence that taking a nap not only makes you more effective, it helps keep your inner jerk from rearing its ugly head.  Napping is also a way to offset some of the negative effects of sleep deprivation when the pressure is on.  See the BPS summary of research on how to nap — lying down is better than leaning forward, but leaning forward is better than not napping at all. 

    8. Get handouts prior to the lecture.  I blogged about this research awhile back; many faculty now put handouts on line, so if you are a student, it sounds like looking at hem before the lecture and bringing them with you is a good idea.  Students who get handouts in advance take fewer notes, but still tend to better on tests, at least according to one recent study. 

    9. Believe in yourself.  As BPS tells us:  "Self-belief affects problem-solving abilities even when the influence of
    background knowledge is taken into account. Bobby Hoffman and Alexandru
    Spatariu     showed this in 2008
    in the context of 81 undergrad students solving mental multiplication
    problems. The students’ belief in their own ability, called
    ‘self-efficacy’, and their general ability both made unique
    contributions to their performance."

    I will send this post to my children; I hope they read it!  I would also add that if you look at this list, these tips aren't just for students.  Really, they are nice summary of the learning mindset, of how to manage yourself for learning over the long haul.  In particular, two overall themes jump out at me that are supported by piles of behavioral science research conducted under diverse banners (psychology, education, sociology) and labeled with diverse jargon:

    1. If you believe you can, you can; if you believe you can't, you can't (points 1 and 9)

    2. Treat your journey as a marathon, not a sprint or series of sprints (points 2,5, and 7; and perhaps some others)

    Let me know what you think of these tips; and also let me know your ideas about how to persuade others to do some of this stuff!  I am especially concerned about the challenge of teaching people (and myself too) to "pace yourself."  That is something that is easier said that done.


  • New Research: There Are A LOT Of Good Bosses Out There

     
    AngelChair In the introduction to Good Boss, Bad Boss, I emphasize that — following an inspiring comment from my wife, Marina, who has worked in numerous management positions — my motivation for writing it was to describe the moods and moves of the best bosses.  Or as Marina put it, to draw on the best evidence and cases I could find to show "what that looks like."  I sometimes worry that in talking about bossholes, brassholes, and assholes that I emphasize  bad bosses too much.  I think it is important to keep in mind that most bosses want to be both competent and caring, and there are a lot of good bosses out there who are aiming to hone their craft.  Those are the people that I had in mind when I wrote the book — not so much the losers and jerks.

    Toward the end, a new study came out today that reinforces this positive spirit.  It is based on a nice random probability sample of Americans by StrategyOne, which suggests that most working Americans have good bosses.  In this survey, over 80% of respondents reported that they felt respected by their bosses and that their bosses respect their work.  There was evidence that some people out there fear their bosses, as 26% feared being fired by their bosses if they took a day off from work.   On the whole, however, this survey paints a picture of people who are generally satisfied with their work, bosses, and companies — although I given all that, I found it strange that 56% would be at least somewhat interested in leaving for a job with the same compensation elsewhere. Perhaps that was explained in part by the general job insecurity out there, which you see in this survey as well, with 44% reporting that they have had their pay cut in the last couple years and 46% reporting being concerned about losing their jobs. 

    To return to my main point, however, I think it is important — as Labor Day weekend in the U.S. is starting — to take some pride in the quality of most of the 20 million or so bosses in our country (estimates run as high 38 million bosses), and to remember that while work can be a source of dissatisfaction and distress, and bad bosses do suck, that most of the 90% of us in the workforce who have bosses are satisfied with these immediate superiors and, more important than that, feel respected by them.  I would also add that, equally heartening, is that most bosses I know are not only competent, most devote considerable energy to getting better at their jobs.  As I said at the outset, I wrote Good Boss, Bad Boss in hopes it would be of some help to all the hard working bosses out there strive to keep honing their difficult craft.

  • Is Your Boss A Certified Brasshole? Take The BRASS And Find Out

    Frequent readers of this blog know that one of the most successful tools, or if you prefer, PR gimmicks, we did for The No Asshole Rule was an online quiz called the ARSE, the Asshole Rating Self-Exam.  This is a 24 item quiz to determine if you are a certified asshole.  Approximately 250,000 people have completed it so far, and I still have people come up to (or email me) and say things like "I scored a 2, I am very good" or "I got a 9, I am borderline, watch out."  The items on ARSE appeared in book, but the name was added by Guy Kawasaki and he recruited the wonderful folks at Electric Pulp to develop an online version.

    DevilChair In the spirit of the ARSE — and once again with some great coaching from Guy– I have developed the BRASS, the Boss Reality Assessment Survey System (I know it is dumb spelled out, in fact if you have a better idea, let me know… one suggestion that I kind of liked was "Bob's Roughly Accurate Superior Survey").  The 20 items on the BRASS draw on major themes from Good Boss, Bad Boss, which are used to rate your boss on items including:

    Is so pushy and overbearing that it drives us nuts

    Lacks confidence in his or her ability to lead others

    Doesn't have our backs, won't go to bat for us, and doesn't protect us from the idiocy that rains down from on high

    Leaves me feeling drained and de-energized after even a short conversation.

    Is a chronic credit hog.AngelChair

    The higher the score, the worse your boss.  If your boss is really bad, if he or she scores "true" on 15 or more items like these, then you have the misfortune of working for a certified brasshole. And if your boss scores below five, my advice is that you better treat him or her right, because one like that is hard to find! 

  • What Are Signs That Your Boss Cares About You?

    My post on the power of bosses who take a moment to offer a simple "thanks" to people got me thinking about the more general question of little signs that your boss cares for you.  Certainly, as my recent HBR article shows, when a boss "has your back" that is sign that he or she cares about you.  But when I made my top 10 list, I had the distinct feeling that I was leaving out a lot of important stuff.  So I guess this is a form of open source PR.  To get the conversation started, here are are 10 signs that your boss really really cares about you, based largely on Good Boss, Bad Boss:

    1. REALLY listens to what you say, doesn't just pretend.

    2. Is careful to give you as much — or even more — credit than you deserve.

    3. Sticks-up for you behind your back.

    4.  Takes care not to embarrass you.

    5.  Apologizes sincerely and completely when he or she does something that upsets or hurts you.

    6. Goes out of his or her way to make it easier for you to mesh the challenges in your personal life with your job.

    7. Is respectful of your time.

    8. Takes time to learn your quirks and idiosyncrasies — and accommodates them within in reason.

    9. Goes the extra mile to make sure that you succeed at your job and keep developing skills.

    10. Doesn't bullshit you about your weaknesses or screw-ups — tells you the truth.

    This is just first draft.  What should I add?  What should I remove?  Do you have any stories along these lines?   I look forward to your comments and I will revise and extend the list after hearing your ideas and comments.

  • The Boss as Human Shield: Protect People from Your Own Worst Instincts Too

    Boring-meeting-largethumb1613679

    Over at HBR online today, one of the articles they are featuring is my piece on The Boss as Human Shield.  One point the article makes, and that I emphasize in Good Boss, Bad Boss , is that your job as a boss isn't just to protect employees from other idiots — it is also to protect them your own idiocy.  At or near the top of the list are bad meetings, too many meetings, and meetings that run too long.  The picture above of a boring meeting made me laugh and and made me think.  If the people at the meetings you run look like that, you might want to think about having fewer meetings and changing how the are done (see the example here and here of an all-hands meeting at Timbuk2 that our students at the d.school helped fix.. there were people sleeping at the meeting too before it was changed).

    Certainly, meetings are sometimes necessary, but are often ran badly.  What do you do to hold just the right number of meetings and to run them effectively? 

  • It Isn’t Just a Myth: A Little Thanks Goes a Long Way

    The approach that I take to giving advice in Good Boss, Bad Boss and in everything else I write is to try to be as evidence-based as possible.  But I also realize that the academic literature does not always map neatly onto the demands and needs of bosses and others in organizations.  So I also offer logical or theory-based advice that seems like it is likely to be supported by research — even if that research has not yet been done or I don't know about it.  Although most assertions in Good Boss, Bad Boss are grounded directly in evidence from peer reviewed studies, my arguments about the value of saying "thanks" were only indirectly grounded in research on influence, especially on the norm of reciprocity.  At least they were it wasn't until I learned of this study in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology from co-author Adam Grant.  Here is what I wrote at the end of Chapter 3, which focuses on wisdom:

    Wise
    bosses don’t just display empathy, compassion, and appreciation through
    dramatic and memorable gestures, as Dean Plummer did for me.  They convey
    it through tiny and seemingly trivial gestures. As we’ve seen, effective bosses
    work their magic by piling up one small win after another – and realizing that
    followers are watching their every move.   A host of renowned bosses
    talk about the importance of thanking people, about the power of this small
    gesture and how failure to express appreciation to people who are working their
    tails off is a sign of disrespect.  The late Robert Townsend, former CEO
    of Avis and author of     Up the Organization, defined “Thanks” as “A really
    neglected form of compensation.”  Max DePree, former CEO of furniture
    giant Herman Miller, described saying “thank you” as among a leader’s primary
    jobs. 

    I thought all this talk about something so small and so obvious was
    overblown until a professor from another school told me about a trip he took
    with his university president to China.  The logistics of the trip were
    difficult, as it was a traveling road show where transportation, hotel
    accommodations, meetings, and hundreds of other little details, had to be
    orchestrated.  The staff traveling with the group worked 12 to 16 hours
    day on these chores and did a magnificent job. Yet my colleague reported that,
    even though the president made many requests of the staff during the trip, he
    never once thanked them.  This lack of gratitude was demoralizing, as they
    catered to his every whim but weren’t otherwise noticed or appreciated.

    This perspective on the power of simple expressions of appreciation is bolstered by a series of four intertwined studies by Adam Grant and Francesca Gino in a paper called "A Little Thanks Goes A long Way: Explaining Why Gratitude Expressions Motivate Prosocial Behavior."  These researchers found, in each study (all are randomized experiments with control and treatment conditions), that a simple expression of thanks by someone in authority led people to be more likely to volunteer to do extra work. Their research shows that this happens because the simple act of being thanked makes be feel more valued — and in some of these studies — it also increased peoples' feelings of self-efficacy (essentially, the perception that they were making a bigger impact on the world around them).

    I was especially interested in the study with university fund raisers.  The simple act of having a boss come by and offer a public thanks to one group, and but not the other, really packed a wallop.  These fundraisers were paid a fixed salary, so Grant and Gino compared the number of phone calls made be each fundraiser before and after the "thank you" intervention.  The results were pretty impressive, as while there was no change in the average number of calls made by the group that was not offered thanks, the folks who heard a warm two sentence thank you from a boss made an average of about 50% more calls during the subsequent week.

    To return to the argument in Good Boss, Bad Boss, it appears we have some new evidence, as Robert Townsend put it, that "Thanks" is "A really neglected form of compensation." It is also a remarkably cheap form of compensation. 

  • Managing Leadership: An Unappreciated Gem

    Jim Stroup's Managing Leadership took me by surprise.  I got in the mail last week and was intending to glance at it for a few minutes, but I am now hooked.  I also felt compelled to write an Amazon review because this is a book that needs more attention.  Too many leadership books are either unrealistic, full of nonsense, or
    downright boring or useless. Jim Stroup has somehow managed to
    transcend these hazards to provide us with one of rare compelling,
    inspiring, and relentlessly useful book on the topic. I was especially
    struck with his contrasts and deep exploration of leadership from the
    rear, leadership from the rear, and leadership from within. This book has been around since 2004 and and is an
    unappreciated gem. I wish I had read it earlier, especially when I was writing Good Boss, Bad Boss,but I am glad that I did
    now. I just added it to my list of favorite boss books.

  • HBR Article on The Boss as a Human Shield: 100 Free Downloads

    Sutton_penultimate

    As I wrote yesterday, I just had an HBR article on "The Boss as Human Shield" appear, which presents some of the main points from Chapter 6 of Good Boss, Bad Boss.   HBR online posts the text of the article for free for a few weeks, so you can go here and read it now if you want.  But they also give authors 100 free PDF's.  If you would like one, please go here to get it.   Please just take one so that others can have a copy.  And if you try to get a copy and they are gone, please email me so I can let people know.

    P.S. The above picture is the opening graphic for the article; it was inspired by an executive I quote in the article who talked about how, when people mistakes, sometimes her job is to let them "hide behind my skirt."

  • The Boss as Human Shield: New HBR Article Based on Good Boss, Bad Boss

    The September Harvard Business Review includes my "The Boss as Human Shield," which presents some of the main points in Chapter 6 of Good Boss, Bad Boss.  From what I can tell, HBR puts up articles on their website for the month the issue is on the stands, but then sells them for six bucks or after that (also, they do this weird thing where they pay $100 for the article… and you get no royalties after that.. really a brilliant financial model as they are so skilled at selling their articles in so many ways).  So you can read the whole article there now and, if you like, leave a comment.  The core idea of the article — like Chapter 6 — is the best bosses lead people who construe that he or she has "got my back."  Here are the opening paragraphs of "The Boss as Human Shield:"

    William Coyne headed research and development at 3M—the company
    behind Ace bandages, Post-it notes, Scotch tape, and other
    inventions—for over a decade. Shortly after retiring, Coyne spoke to a
    group of hundreds of executives about innovation at 3M and his own
    management style. He said he’d started at 3M as a researcher and learned
    firsthand how well-meaning but nosy executives who proffer too many
    questions and suggestions can undermine creative work. So when he became
    head of R&D, he was determined to allow his teams to work for long
    stretches, unfettered by intrusions from higher-ups. Coyne understood
    his colleagues’ curiosity; if successful, an R&D project could
    generate millions in new revenue. But he limited their interference (and
    his own) because, he said, “After you plant a seed in the ground, you
    don’t dig it up every week to see how it is doing.    ”

    Coyne knew that the performance of his employees—as well as his
    career and the company’s success—depended on shielding them from
    threats. This notion that management “buffers” the core work of the
    company from uncertainty and external perturbations is an old theme in
    organizational theory, going back at least to James D. Thompson’s 1967
    classic     Organizations in Action.
    The best bosses are committed to letting their workers work—whether on
    creative tasks such as inventing new products or on routine things such
    as assembling computers, making McDonald’s burgers, or flying planes.
    They take pride in being human shields, absorbing or deflecting heat
    from inside and outside the company, doing all manner of boring and
    silly tasks, and battling idiots and slights that make life harder than
    necessary on their people

    Check the rest out and let me know what you think –and what some of the other ways are that great bosses protect their people.