reverse Peter Principle?

Great Debates
1

Well, sort of a reverse Peter Principle.

Imagine, if you will, Bob. Bob is young and fresh to the workforce.

Bob has all the skills to be an excellent manager. He’s got good social skills, has a high degree of coordinating and scheduling IQ, and is a great communicator.

But Bob has a problem. He’s not that good at other things. He’s physically awkward, not good with his hands, and in general, makes a poor worker.

Odds are, Bob will never get to use his excellent management ability, because all managers have to start as workers, and work their way up.

In short, Bob will never be promoted to his level of competence.

And yet, if someone recognizes Bob’s skills, and makes him management despite being a lousy worker, this would be seen as horribly, horribly unjust to all the workers who do a great job and hope to be promoted some day based on that.

Even if, as it turns out, they are not good managers, and Bob would have done the job far better. They will get promoted to their level of incompetence by the same system that will never promote Bob to his level of competence.

As with the Peter Principle, the real problem is that promotions are seen as rewards because of the hierarchical nature of most business organizations. You are rewarded with a promotion, with extra pay and perks, and perhaps most importantly, a higher spot in the hierarchy, with higher status.

But this also comes with a change in duties. This is not merely reward, but actually filling a job, a very important one, and at least in theory, the best thing for the organization is that these positions be filled by whoever is most qualified for them, regardless of how good they are at lower levels, or even if they are part of the organization already.

What’s the solution? We need to uncouple “reward” and “promotion”. We need ways to reward good people for doing their jobs well without taking them out of said job, and conversely, we need to view management and administration as being equal in status to any other job within the organization. and therefore only appealing to those who want to do that kind of work, as opposed to people who are seeking power, privilege, and rank for their own sakes.

Some of the consequences of this might be hard to take. You could have very skilled entry-level workers making more money than some second and third level managers. This will violate our inherent primate sense of hierarchy.

But still, I think it would be worth it.

What do you think, Teemers?

2

Not sure about your scenario, but there are scads of people out there with excellent big picture skills who will never get to the position of being able to make big picture decisions because they don’t possess small picture skills, which is where most people who work their way up pay their dues.

3

There’s a flaw in your list of desirable attributes for a manager. One of key characteristics of successful managers is respect by his peers (since his peers will be his subsequent subordinates). If the peers do the lower level work better than Bob does to the degree of disrespect, that by definition makes Bob not fit for management.

You can’t expect society to treat managers as equal to everyone else. Good managers are rare and expect to be highly compensated.

4

I am a Bob. What will happen is people will recognize Bob’s skills and come to him for advice and eventually Bob will be running the office. Managers will come to him for advice. Howeer, he will probably never be promoted to manager, and will be the person who knows everything, does everything, has everyone comes to them, but stays at the bottom.

5

I will add that this can be very frustrating. If someone asks me something and I tell them they have to speak to the Big Boss about it, they usually keep asking me. “Well what do you think?” I think you should speak to the Big Boss. “But what do I put for the commission?” Only the Big Boss can do commissions. “But I need to know what to put there.” Ask the Big Boss.

6

I’m kind of a Bob, and have always been so (at least to the point of being better at theory and big picture than focusing on detail). In my case, once you have experience of lower level roles, you apply to other companies outlining your big picture skills and get appointed there.

It’s quite right though, that respect is important. One reason why internal promotion is an issue is because others tend to see you in a certain role - it’s hard to change that perception following promotion. Again, moving elsewhere removes that issue (and means that the individual adapts to the role, rather than the role having to adapt to the individual).

7

A couple of things here. While promotions are often treated (incorrectly IMHO) as a “reward”, each subsequent level of management has greater responsibility and therefore should probably recieve greater compensation. Also, the potential to rise to positions of greater reward and responsibility serves as an incentive for the level below it.

One thing you touched upon about the Peter Principle is that the flaw in promoting your best workers is that the skills required to perform as an individual contributor are often very different from the skills required to be a good manager. The classic example being the brilliant engineer with terrible people skills. People aren’t really “promoted to their level of incompetance”. They are promoted to a position that has a different skill set and often they are unable to obtain the necessary skills to perform at that position.

One thing Peter suggested to get around this is to create different classes or tracks within your organization. Many organizations do this. The idea of “working yourself up from the mailroom” is misleading. The mailroom guy at General Electric typically is hired from a different pool of candidates than their managers (who often come through specific management training programs).

It’s usually difficult to get hired as a “manager” as an entry level position. How can you come into an organization with no practical industry experience and expect to lead people who have been there 10-15 years? Management is more than just putting together project plans and Gant charts. You generally have to demonstrate somehow that you have successfully led people before and that’s hard to do right out of college.

8

Athletics is one of the rare fields of endeavor which follows the principles suggested by the OP. Playing and coaching are recognized as different skills. The best players make more money than the best coaches. Good players are never taken off the field just so they can become managers. And players can respect good managers even if they weren’t good players, as many were not.

It seems to work well. One wonders why more industrites don’t follow this practice.

9

Preach it, sister. I’m a Bob, too, and what I find grating about being Bob is that you can possess small-picture skills too but if you’re not a Booster or a Joiner, it’s like trying to climb the corporate ladder with an anvil strapped to your back.

Not everyone is the rah-rah type but there’s got to be a place for competence and analytical skill somewhere, no?

10

I’m one of those. I’m good at what I do. I went up to the top step of my pay scale very fast, but never broke into management despite several attempts. I have little patience with people who can’t or won’t do what they are supposed to do. I also have a very low “stupidity thresh hold”.

Looking back, it’s a good thing that I never became a boss. I wouldn’t have the patience, and it just isn’t worth the aggravation.

11

What Bob needs to do is take charge of his career. I know that sounds sort of CareerBuilder-y, but it’s true. Bob should go to his manager and say “look, here are my skills and acomplishments. I’m basically doing the work of a manager. Why do I need to be doing (or not doing) to get to that level and what is a realistic timeframe?” And if Bob is not getting the support or encouragement he needs, then he might need to evaluate whether he should look elsewhere for a new job.

Yes. Be a consultant. There are lots of people who do this who have a strong skillset in a particular area but don’t want to manage.

Quite frankly, the only reason I’m a manager is I don’t like being told what to do (so the higher up I am, the less people there are to tell me) and I end up running stuff anyway because no one else wants to.

12

Intelligent people with good social and communications skill can succeed in innumerable elite professions even if they are physically awkward. They probably need a good degree first but even without that they could possibly succeed in some professions: entrepreneurship, sales etc… Certainly with a good degree there are few limits. The idea that you need to succeed at physical jobs on the factory floor before moving to a managerial position is not at all true and I doubt it has ever been true.

A more relevant possibility is what if you are intelligent but lack social skills. Or what if you are intelligent but are easily bored. Such people often end up underachieving but in the right environment could be highly productive employees. Companies which figure out how to provide that environment at a reasonable cost would benefit from a much wider talent pool.

13

Bob can look for work at a management consulting firm.

14

Or temporary accounting work. :smiley:

15

My personal vote is to decouple employee management and business management.

I’ve had some managers that are very nice people, great at the business management side of things, but terrible when it comes to employee management. If I can, I limit my contact to registering time off and quarterly reviews.

People managers need to know how my job is done, and where to go for answers and resources. This could be the person that works their way up the ranks, but doesn’t necessarily have the business background.

Business managers need to have the big picture overview mentality and skill. They don’t need to know which buttons get pushed when, to make the machines work, or which computer screens to visit to enter an order.

Unfortunately, I often see the 2 merged, which means that half the job isn’t done well.

16

That’s a good way to get into a management track later on, however Bob will still be a worker when he first gets hired. He’ll be some sort of “Analyst” doing quantitative work, building Powerpoint “decks”, drawing 2x2 matrices, etc.

And ironically, I’ve found management consulting firms tend to produce poor managers. The mostly reward for billing hours and selling client services.
Bob might try getting certified as a Project Management Professional.

17

My sister Anne (coincidence? probably… ) had that same problem. She learned that when you’re indispensable, they’ll try to keep you in place through means both foul and fair, including emotional blackmail and sometimes, outright threats. But if you stand firm and look them in the eye and don’t blink, you can usually negotiate a rise in pay, if not in position.

She even once took a sick day for no reason than to remind them how much she did and how much they needed her.

To a great extent, you’re treated however you let yourself be treated. If the snake doesn’t want to be tread on, it has to learn to hiss, or even bite. Often, the Bobs like you are people with a very strong sense of responsibility, and with a good head on their shoulders, but maybe a little too passive.

18

I’m not sure Bob has such a huge problem, because it’s FAR from obvious that future managers always (or even usually) have to start as humble peons and work their way up.

Phil Jackson was a mediocre basketball player, at best. He had the skills to be a great coach. He wasn’t kept out of coaching simply because he wasn’t a star player.

In my workplace, SOME of our managers are former programmers/analysts who were promoted from within, but more have business backgrounds and were hired specifically as managers. They have to understand what the programmers and analysts do, but they don’t have to know Java or Cobol themselves.

If Bob’s skills lie in management, he can pursue a career in management at any number of businesses. A guy with demonstrable leadership/management skills doesn’t have to remain a bad fry cook at McDonald’s forever.