Your appointment

Suppose you are in charge of a department which product (core business) you know very little about. You are conscientious. You really want to do something to impress your boss. What should you do?

What you can't do

You can't really do anything to improve the product as you don't have sufficient product knowledge. You don't know how the market operates. You want to make sure that you don't make reckless decisions.

What you can do

You have to rely on your staff to tell you how to improve the operations and the product. So you "manage the process".

• You make sure that all staff have clear job descriptions.
• You make sure that these job descriptions are reviewed regularly.
• You make sure that no one abuses the system, so everyone has to tell you where they are, what they do at any time.
• You make sure that everyone plans 12 months ahead, and gives you his/her 12-months schedule
• You make sure that they stick to their schedules. Any change of schedule has to be approved by you or your appointees. Changes must be fully justified.
• You set up procedures to review those schedules. Your staffs will have to write reports to explain why they have deviated from the schedule.
• You set up committees so that you don't have to make decisions on your own.
• You ask everyone to consult relevant committees before talking to you. Each of your emails is copied to 8 people.
• You create a form for every operation, such as job review or change of schedule.

Your policy is fully justified

Who can blame you for collecting information, monitoring processes and consulting widely? These are useful things to do. In fact, management courses told you to do them. Under your management, you department is in immaculate order.

What happens to your staff?

Your staff end up spending much of their time trying to tell you what they did when. They also spend a lot of time convincing you what they should be doing. They also have to tell you why they have to change their schedules to better their effort. Since you are not a domain expert, you have to interrogate your staffs carefully for each proposal or decision, no matter how trivial it might look, because you are not sure about its consequences. Such dialogues are time consuming for both you and your staff. It is sometimes frustrating for your staff because they do not always see what you see (or what you don't see).

Inefficiency

You become the bottleneck, as many staffs want your time. They need to talk to you in order to make progress. It would triple the time for everyone if you don't trust them (you think they are proposing things for their own benefit rather than the benefit of the organization). Even the smallest decision takes up a lot of time and effort in your department.

Ineffectiveness

Many of your staff won't bother to propose anything new, as it is a frustrating process. They don't have confidence in being able to persuade you to adopt their new ideas. They may not have faith in you. Members of the committees that you set up will be able to find weaknesses in every new proposal, for sure. It is not their job to bring success to the organization; their remit is to make sure that nothing goes wrong. Neither is it in their interest (or job description) to encourage new proposals. They are fed up by these reviews themselves.

Stagnation

Anyone who point out the inefficiency and ineffectiveness of your department sound like rebels, and therefore you punish them whenever chances present themselves. Those who do nothing get into no trouble. Therefore, to many of your staffs, doing nothing is the optimal strategy. Your management has led to stagnation in your department.

Lessons Learnt

Everyone who cares has worked hard. Your department is inefficient and ineffective. You have misplaced your attention -- you focussed "on the process" and ignored the core business. Your need to acquire knowledge and vision in the core business. You need to manage to succeed, not to manage to avoid mistakes.

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