What Type of Leader/Manager Are You? – Train-Wreck or Systems?

I recently read a story about large multi-location national organization and an improvement project facilitated by a well know consulting firm. A recent safety accident had taken the life of a production worker. This triggered the intensive and comprehensive initiative.

The consultant did due diligence and found that the standards of work were not being followed. In addition there was no pay-for-performance reward system in place nor was the performance appraisal process being followed consistently. They immediately recommended that managers be trained to develop specific safety goals and hold their people accountable to those goals by conducting frequent review of their work. They reduced the number of people each manager had reporting to them in order to make them easier to manage.

The supervisors under each manager were also trained to hold their people accountable to the specific goals. To reinforce this structure and motivate the workers, the consulting firm designed a “pay-for-performance” policy that rewarded workers (including managers) only if they achieved their assigned goals, and took additional action with those who didn’t. Furthermore, the performance appraisal process was simplified and mandated. The meetings were to be held every 6 months instead of every 12months. This policy was added to the performance goals for each manager and supervisor.

What struck me was the date on this report was October 1841. Months earlier two Western Railroad passenger trains had collided between Worchester, Massachusetts and Albany, New York, killing a conductor and a passenger and injuring seventeen passengers. This story was recanted in Peter Scholtes’ book, The Leader’s Handbook. The consultant was the Prussian Army. This means our management model has not changed for at least 170 years.

Train-Wreck Managers

Train-wreck managers look for someone to blame. They assume the root causes of problems are to be found in the actions and decisions made by people. This manager assumes improvement in the individual behaviors alone will reduce the errors. Train-wreck management is a very narrow and unsophisticated view of the world. These managers ignore two very important ideas. First, they ignore the idea that there are performance factors (possibly unseen or unknowable) outside an individual’s control. Secondly, they ignore the concept of variation. They view the world in black and white terms. Either a mistake is made by the individual or it isn’t. Unfortunately, the world tends to be “gray” (because of variation) not “black and white.” There is variation in everything. Let’s take a baseball example. Everyone knows baseball.

Why is second base the position that has the most errors in baseball? Do baseball coaches always put the worst player in the second base position? If we just improve the skills of the second baseman will the performance of the team improve? Would the team win more games? I doubt it. That field position is in the middle of the most action. Naturally, the more the ball is handled during a play the higher the probability for mistakes and variation.

Train-wreck managers look for those who caused the errors and bring the mistakes to their attention with “feedback?” Train-wreck baseball coaches would spend the most time with second basemen. Train-wreck managers also wreck employee engagement.

Systems Managers

Systems managers appreciate the concept of systems. They recognize and appreciate the interrelationships between the parts in a system. System managers acknowledge that performance of an individual will be influenced by the interaction between the system and the individual. A system is a series of interdependent processes working to achieve an aim. A baseball team is a system. Each individual is interdependent upon the other. The pitcher who tires toward the end of a game might throw with less power. The hitter then hits the ball more accurately and past the 2nd baseman who dives for the ball, touches it and makes an error.

Systems managers look for opportunities to synergize and brainstorm the real root causes of problems. Perhaps sending a relief pitcher in sooner would solve this problem. This acknowledges that the interaction between the pitcher, hitter, and second baseman all combine into a complex process. Systems are complex and require special thinking and special tools for study. Systems managers improve employee engagement. Train-wreck thinking requires a great deal of work but very little thinking at all.

Evaluating individuals alone and attempting to control individual behaviors is an incomplete and ineffective strategy for performance improvement. Train-wreck managers cause more damage than the train-wreck they attempt to fix. Their approach creates more variation and less effective solutions. What type of manager are you?

“On October 5, 1841, two Western Railroad passenger trains collided somewhere between Worchester, Massachusetts and Albany, New York, killing a conductor and a passenger and injuring seventeen passengers. That disaster marked the beginning of a new management era."[

Note the thinking here: problems are caused by people who don't do their job well, so finding someone to blame is the first step to correcting problems. Scholtes notes: "The era of management that began in the mid-1800s can be characterized as "management by results"....Since managers could no longer do the work themselves or direct others in the doing of the work, managers exercised their authority by holding people accountable for results....In the 1950s, management by results reached its epitome in MBO (Management By Objectives) and performance appraisal, the Harvardization of train-wreck management."[