Choice Theory (41 page)

The answer to that question would be yes if all successful, wealthy people with strong power needs also had very weak needs for love and belonging. People with that profile never restrain their desire for more, no matter how much they have. What prosperity we have had has been due to the fact that besides their strong need for power, most people who have become successful also have a strong need for love and belonging. They built a lot of their success on good relationships with the people they do business with and with the people who work for them.

When some successful people become greedy, it may be that their love and belonging behaviors, which might be strong enough to moderate their greed in a choice theory society, are difficult to express in our external control world. They tend to distrust people who are not their friends and, especially, people who are less fortunate than they are. If the people who are in charge of others, almost all of whom have normal or even above normal needs for love and belonging, made an effort to learn choice theory—and use it successfully in their personal lives—they might attempt to make more friendly contact with the people they manage.

Once you give up external control psychology for choice theory, it is almost impossible for you to come into contact with people who work for you and not think about how much better it would be if we all got along well. If these contacts are satisfying, it feels good, and you will tend to want even better relationships; that’s how our genes work. If Scrooge was able to give up being greedy, there is still a little hope for the world, but something more than ghosts and spirits is needed. We will never make a dent in greed with the psychology we are now using.

We have hardly scratched the surface of the prosperity we could have if we changed from bossing to leading in the workplace. Southwest Airlines is successful because its satisfied employees work hard for a CEO who is not greedy, who does not downsize when other, more greedy, managers would. I am not so naive as to claim that people will not work hard for bosses. Many will because they see themselves as hard workers, no matter how they are treated. They will give their hands and, even, their brains to a boss. But they will give their hearts only to a leader, and the feeling we experience when that happens is something a boss will never know.

Lead management is to boss management as choice theory is to external control psychology. While it is effective anywhere it is used to manage people, it is much easier to practice in the work-place
than in schools because there are few on-the-job equivalents of schooling. Some things you are asked to do on the job may not be pleasant, but everything you are asked to do has some value in the real world. Also, you are paid to work, and on most jobs, although you can be fired, there is no failure in the sense that you are failed in school for refusing to do what makes little sense to you. What makes work more difficult than school is that, unlike school, almost all jobs depend on people working together. Even if you want to do your best at work, you may be frustrated because others you depend on are not doing their share. But when others are doing their share, working hard together for a good manager can be one of life’s most satisfying experiences.

What makes boss management so destructive is that it focuses on individuals and pits them against each other, as was done in the paint factory. What makes lead management so successful is that it focuses on creating a cooperative system and on the belief that if you treat people well and explain what you want them to do, you can trust them to do a good job. In the following four elements of lead management, you will continually see that the message,
We care about you,
is central to this effort. Lead managers know that caring costs nothing and has a huge return. Lead managers keep asking themselves the core choice theory question: If I do this, will I get closer to the people who work for me or further away? If the answer, which is usually obvious, is further away, they don’t do it.

Lead managers also know choice theory and use it in a way that is apparent. But as it is being used, it is extremely effective to teach the workers choice theory so they understand that this is something that can be both learned and used. A good way to do this is to offer to teach choice theory to the workers and their spouses at a company-sponsored seminar. This way they all see that it is not just another company gimmick but a genuine attempt to help them succeed not only at work but also with their partners and children.

Lead managers know that the core of quality is managing workers so they put the manager; each other; the work; the customers;
and, in private industry, the stockholders into their quality worlds. That is, all who are involved must get close and stay close. As in every other area discussed in this book, good relationships are the key in the workplace. There are four elements of lead management that parallel what I described as boss management:

1. Lead managers engage all workers in an ongoing honest discussion of both the quality and the cost of the work that is needed for the company to be successful. They not only listen but continually encourage the workers to offer them any suggestions that will improve quality and lower costs.

2. The lead manager, or someone designated by him or her, models the jobs so the workers can see exactly what the manager expects. Even as the lead manager is doing so, the workers are encouraged to give input into how their jobs may be done better. In this way, the manager works to increase the workers’ control over their jobs.

3. The workers are responsible for inspecting their own work with the understanding that they know best what high-quality work is and how to produce it at the lowest possible cost. But the manager makes it clear that quality takes precedence over cost. In practice, when the workers are given this assurance, quality goes up and costs go down. High quality depends on a level of trust between workers and managers that cannot be achieved by bossing.

4. The lead manager uses every chance he or she has to teach that the essence of quality is continual improvement. Unlike schooling, everything that is done in any job can be improved or done more economically. The managers make it clear that their task is to facilitate improvement by providing the workers with the tools, training, and a friendly place to do the work. When the company is making higher profits because of increased quality, the lead manager sets up a compensation system in which the workers share some of what their efforts have made possible.

The strongest argument for lead management in the workplace is that because it is both more productive and leads to higher-quality work, it saves money. This is money that boss-managed companies must spend. There is no difference in the actual cost of labor and material between competitive companies. Ford and General Motors pay similar wages and buy steel and tires at the same price. It is the other costs, beyond the actual cost of labor and materials, that are so much lower in a lead-managed workplace than in a boss-managed workplace. Many of these costs are tangible. Bossing leads to increased worker’s compensation claims and to more theft, absenteeism, abuse of sick leave, lateness, difficulties with unions, violence, and harassment, sexual and otherwise. But even more costly are the intangibles, such as obstruction, that are common to boss management.

Whether it is within the company or in how the company deals with the people it does business with, including, unfortunately, its customers, obstruction is a huge but intangible cost. The more workers are bossed, or in many instances even when they are not bossed but are so used to being bossed that they perceive every request as bossing, the more they enjoy using what little power they may have to obstruct. You can hardly go through a day at work without meeting someone whose mission in life seems to be saying,
I’m sorry, I can’t do that; it’s against company policy; I don’t have the authority; You’ll have to wait;
and, often, just plain
no.

Playing it safe and enjoying it while the company grinds to a halt is the goal of obstruction. Workers in many modern boss-managed companies are told to use their initiative and make decisions-it’s become the thing to tell them-but no one knows the choice theory that explains
why
it is the thing to tell them. As soon as workers at any level in a boss-managed operation take the initiative in an effort to keep the machinery going smoothly and something goes wrong, they are punished. This has to happen
only once for the word to get around that it’s safer to do nothing or to say no. Let the boss figure it out; that’s what he’s being paid for guides the worker no matter how it hurts what the company is trying to do. I had the following conversation with an airlines counter woman a few years ago.

“Here’re my thousand-mile upgrade certificates. How many will I need?”

“You’ll need three, but you’re OK; there are three here.”

“Wow, three. How far is it?

“It’s a little over two thousand miles.”

“Do you give me change? I mean, can you at least give me a five-hundred-mile certificate back? You sell those.”

“No, you can buy a five-hundred-mile certificate and use it now to save the miles, but that’s the best we can do.”

“Does that seem fair to you?”

“It’s company policy; there’s nothing I can do.”

“Do other customers complain, or am I unusual?”

“They complain all the time.”

“I’ll bet your company has meetings to get input from the staff. Do you have these meetings? Most big companies do nowadays.”

“Oh yes, sure; we have them.”

“If there are a lot of dissatisfied customers, would you bring this issue up? I think the policy makers ought to have some feedback, don’t you?”

“I’m not concerned about the policy makers. I’m not going to bring it up, not a chance. I keep my mouth shut unless they ask me a question.”

“Why?”

“I’ll be marked down as a troublemaker, not a team player. They are always laying off; I’d be the next one to go. I’m sorry, it isn’t worth it.”

This woman’s attitude is an example of the boss-management use of what could be a good procedure in a company that is trying to improve the way it manages. The woman won’t open her mouth at those meetings if it could be construed by anyone above her that she was criticizing company policy. The company is getting
nothing more from her than the use of her hands. Her brain is not on board, and her heart, which is what the company in that competitive business needs so desperately, will never be the company’s.

But the habit of saying no extends far beyond what happens inside the boss-managed company. Workers often say no even when they are asked to do something they are paid to do as long as there is no way to check up on them. Since there are many instances in which it is hard to check up on them, customers can be very frustrated.

In dealing with their customers, many hotel employees delight in saying no. No is always safe, and they use it a lot. Some variation of what I am going to describe happens to me in hotels several times each year; it is only June, and it has already happened three times this year. The cost of this obstruction must be staggering. Keep in mind that if it happens with customers, it must also happen with coworkers who are as much the victims of this obstruction as are customers.

I was giving some seminars with my colleague, Dr. Chester Karrass, and we were working at a huge New York hotel. Karrass’s office had shipped three boxes of supplies to the hotel, and when I checked in, I wanted to get the supplies in hand. I had learned enough about this problem not to wait until the last minute. At the convention center in the hotel, a woman told me that the supplies were in a receiving room; all I had to do was call the clerk and he would bring them to my room. I asked the woman to stay with me for the next few minutes while I called in case there was any difficulty.

“Hello, this is Dr. Glasser. Three boxes marked
Karrass Negotiation Seminars
have been sent to the hotel. I’d like them brought to my room.”

“Sure, Doc, tell me again what they’re marked. And are they large or small?”

“They are about ten inches high, a foot wide, and about eighteen inches long. They are marked with a stencil: KARRASS NEGOTIATION SEMINARS, BOX 1 of 3, 2 of 3, and 3 of 3.”

The man was gone about three minutes; when he came back on the phone, he said cheerfully, “Sorry Doc, they’re not here. If they come in, I’ll get right in touch with you.”

On the basis of a lot of experience, I said, “OK, that was your first look. I’d like you to take another look; this time, look all over the room. Could you tell me what you are looking for so I’m sure you understand what I want?”

“Sure, Doc, three boxes marked with some kind of a seminar, Karrass, is that it?”

“Yes, KARRASS. Please take another look. They were sent over a week ago from Los Angeles.”

This time he was gone almost five minutes and then he said, still cheerfully, as if humoring a child, “Sorry, Doc; they’re just not here.”

I said, “I still think they may be in the room. Would you mind taking one more look? I really need to locate them.”

The young woman who was still with me looked at me as if I were crazy. The man had looked twice, what more did I want? This time he was gone only about twenty seconds; when he got back on the phone, he said, still cheerfully and with no apology, in a tone of voice that sent the message that he was happy for me that he had taken another look, “Yeah, Doc; they’re here. The damn things were right under my desk. Where do you want them?”

I told the young woman that she should keep this incident in mind and tell customers to be persistent. She was amazed, but not amazed enough to ask me how I knew to do what I did or anything about what happened. I could see that getting boxes for her customers from the receiving room was not really her concern and that she was certainly not going to do anything to improve the situation. Both the man and the woman had
no
part of their jobs in their quality worlds. The way that hotel is managed, they never will.