In this new era, a lot is turned topsy-turvy, and for many who once considered management simple, it has now become complex—and the framework in which they need to succeed makes the management role even more complex.
You see, there are managers who find it complicated to not be able to generalise their management onto everyone and having to devise other methods to create better results than a loaded gun.
Unlike before, they are now expected to be able to customise their management by adapting it to the development needs of the individual.
This means that all managers have to spend more time with their employees, which managers who are pressed for time and not motivated my management may find entirely unnecessary.
Management as a weighted average and B teams
Generalising management, also referred to as ’one size fits all’ management may seem immensely simple. However, this management style promotes an inevitable cultural complexity and thus an inevitably low vibrational energy, reducing the performance cadence.
The thing is that performance cadence is inhibited when the options for individual, personal growth are reduced, and this happens when your development becomes part of a weighted average.
Therefore, the generalised perspective on management of people very quickly breeds an organisational B team filled with pent-up ambitions, hampered talent and stagnated energy.
Fitting-in cultures or B teams occur as soon as people find that they cannot fit in as they are, and thus, our unique contributions wither as part of a weighted average.
If you have to adapt to an extent where you are not true to yourself and your strengths, you are stifling your own power and not moving freely.
Who would ever be happy running at high speed in size 9 shoes, if their feet are a size 4?
Behind on the first day of work with a gun to your head
We have entered a paradigm where we are all evolving. So, on this path, we need to grant each other more patience and trust.
In the past, I have seen people around me being judged as failures very quickly. If the business results were not evident after the first 100 workdays, the search for their replacement was initiated. There was no patience or trust.
In a previous position, I reported to four CEOs in four years, and I have seen several managing directors lose points already on their first day of work.
Several of them shared with me that they felt as if they had a ’gun to their head’, and I often found them to be anxious and semi-paranoid as managers, and fearful in their attempts to create results.
Think of the energy they sent downwards in the organisation. It was not constructive.
Therefore, it was the easiest and simplest solution for the managing directors to generalise their management style and spend as little time as possible on understanding their employees.
They did not have the time, considering that their days were numbered.
In addition to this, the companies had often recruited managing directors that had no interest in the growth of people.
At our most primitive, we become very similar
We expect a lot from our managers, and rightly so. They have a lot of responsibility, being responsible for other people. And on top of that, they have to create results to pay the many wages and keep their promises to boards of directors, investors etc.
However, the boards of directors and investors need to look inwards as well, as we only get the management that corresponds to the framework we provide.
Someone who is not people-oriented can become even less people-oriented, and a people-oriented person can become less people-oriented.
At our most primitive and unconscious, we become very similar. We are overpowered by the chemistry in our brains, which means that we become impulse-driven and can easily deprioritise the humane in favour of the instruments that ensure our survival.
When being self-responsible and aware, the distance between people becomes shorter. We navigate more according to our common sense, and we take the time to choose the right course of action. In this way, we become more capable of seeing our world from different angles and providing constructive input.
Therefore, if we meet our managers with impatience and distrust, it channels downwards as heavy energy. This energy creates unsafe zero-error cultures, and this happens quickly.
If we meet our managers with more patience and trust, this is what is channelled downwards, resulting in a higher vibrational energy, which provides room for error cultures and innovation.
Can anyone change to the better?
The other day, I was asked whether I believed that someone in a high-ranking position who was undermining in their actions would be able to change. My answer was ’Yes’.
Before I started my company, my reply might have been ’Maybe’, but that not many would succeed.
I have seen so many end up fatigued and on sick leave, and I still see this, but it is also my experience that more managers are waking up and want to change.
Particularly managers who have lived with a gun to their head for many years. They have started asking questions about whether it is really worth it.
I also see that once these managers start learning the art of leading people, they become more aware of the consequences of the lacking psychological security they once promoted themselves and also needed and still need—and this realisation makes them perplexed and embarrassed.
It is never too late to apologise. It is never too late to forgive.
Instead of judging, pigeonholing and pointing fingers, let us reach out as good examples.
Because, there are many managers who now have to unlearn in order to acquire new skills. There are many managers who in order to acquire new skills are also starting a rebellion against working with a gun to your head, a style of management to which they themselves have been exposed.
In order to succeed, we have to meet them with friendship.
Friendship that means that they are not already behind and fighting an uphill battle on their first day, which is what they are used to. Where we support them with the same amount of additional patience and trust that we expect from them in the future.
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