Working Up

by Dwayne Phillips

Don’t like micro managers? Who does? Beware, however, the built-in excuses of the hands-off manager.

“I give you a task. I expect it to be done.”—the charge of the hands-off manager.

Who wouldn’t want to work for the person above? Freedom to use my own judgement and do what I think is right. Wow!

Beware, however, the built-in excuses contained in the above. Remember the conversation between Alice and the Chesire Cat (Lewis Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland):

“Would you tell me, please, which way I ought to go from here?”
“That depends a good deal on where you want to get to,” said the Cat.
“I don’t much care where—” said Alice.
“Then it doesn’t matter which way you go,” said the Cat.
“—so long as I get SOMEWHERE,” Alice added as an explanation.
“Oh, you’re sure to do that,” said the Cat, “if you only walk long enough.”

Something from Somewhere may arise. Now the hands-off manager can exclaim, “What is this? What did you do? This is wrong? You have gone down the wrong path to the wrong Somewhere.”

When the hands-off manager gives a task without any details and “expects” it to be done, that manager is saying “I don’t much care where I want to get to. But I reserve the right to proclaim any destination as incorrect.”

Once the wrong destination arrives, the hands-off manager proclaims, “I expected you to do this right. I don’t have the time to manage this. You’re supposed to do this.”

The hands-off manager is assuming the role of Alice. The way to go is unknown, but the manager can judge the destination in any way on any day.

Don’t want to fall into this trap? Ask questions. Pull answers—in writing if possible. Don’t like to do this? Try to find another manager.