Knowledge workers require more attention to management style
than manual workers. This lecture describes how Theory Z management style
should be modified according to situations and to individual knowledge worker’s
needs.
In the book cited in Lecture 8 Peter Drucker says knowledge
workers are not subordinates, they are associates and they must know more about
their specialties and specific jobs than their bosses. In the past manual
workers were often constrained to be content to have their job, be paid a
reasonable wage and treated fairly. In contrast knowledge workers are less
constrained and seek those benefits plus:
• Challenge
• Opportunity
for achievement
• Responsibility
for their work
• Rewarding
mission
Knowledge workers can set their own goals in support of the
organization’s goals and participate in organizational planning and decision
making. Knowledge workers make decisions affecting the organization’s results
just like managers; they plan, execute and measure. They desire accountability
for themselves and want poor performers removed from the organization. They
desire clear career ladders in spite of today’s environment of limited
opportunities for promotions. (This is true for managers, technical workers, &
volunteers.)
Knowledge workers are individuals and must be managed as
individuals to maximize organizational effectiveness. The effective leader of
knowledge workers must recognize that knowledge workers have different
strengths, weaknesses, training needs, learning styles, and values. They
perform best in certain environments:
• Big team,
small team, no team
• Highly
structured environment, little structure
• Decision
maker,
• Leader,
follower
They can be at different levels of Maslow’s hierarchy at different
times due to both the job environment and environments outside their job. This
again calls for treating them as individuals rather than as a homogeneous group
of workers.
Here are some ways an effective leader can help knowledge
workers manage themselves:
• Help them know their strengths
•
Don’t focus on their weaknesses until you know
and recognize their strengths. As an objective observer you are be able to
better assess their strengths and weaknesses than they are. If they know you
understand and value their strengths then they can accept or try to improve
their weaknesses without being in fear of their weaknesses.
•
Ensure each is in the best environment for his
or her strengths and personality
•
Some are best when working by themselves, some
in a team and some are best at guiding the work of others.
•
Get to know them and then guide them into the
proper role: Leader/follower, decision maker/advisor, etc.
•
Help them keep up with their specialties and
develop their career
•
Fight for the budgets necessary to help
specialists update their skills from time to time.
•
Take time to have honest discussions of their
career paths and, if you can, help them realize their goals. Don’t make
promises you can’t keep. It will undermine your credibility and authority.
•
Help them understand how to best communicate
with their bosses and coworkers learning styles
(oral, visual, or doing)
•
For example, even though you might know that the
big boss is an oral learner your workers may not. Make sure you give them guidance
if they are going to be briefing people they are unfamiliar with.
•
Help them manage their time
•
Don’t involve them in unnecessary meetings. Take
time to ensure that they understand your instructions and guidelines for any
new assignments. Facilitate interactions with other skilled workers whose
knowledge or experience they need to utilize. Don’t ask for unnecessary
reports. (More on time management later in the course.)
•
Help them improve their processes using modern
methods (These are defined in later lectures)
•
This means ensuring that they have the proper
training, then are empowered to change their processes, have access to all data (such as financial
data) necessary to assess changes to their processes and access to any
specialists, such as those skilled in statistics or other special methods of
process improvement.
You may be getting the impression that being an effective
leader of knowledge workers takes more time than traditional management styles.
Actually it’s the reverse. The recommendations described above do take time but
they enable workers to manage themselves and thereby save the manager from the
constant firefighting of crises that consume most traditional managers. If
you’re not convinced reread the next to the last paragraph in Lecture 2.
You should not get the impression that having trained,
motivated and empowered workers free the manager from the responsibility of
providing leadership. The organization’s leader must have active and intimate
involvement in the main activities of the organization. The studies of Gary
Lynn and Richard Reilly reported in their book Blockbusters- The Five Keys to
Developing Great New Products, reveal that highly successful new products,
which they call “blockbusters”, were three and one-half times more likely to
have senior managers intensely involved in their development than failed
product developments. Empowered workers should handle routine work without
management involvement but difficult and important work needs leadership by
senior managers. Moreover knowledge workers require more than one type of
leadership.
Some excellent advice on managing knowledge workers is found
in the popular book The One Minute Manager by Kenneth H. Blanchard and Spencer
Johnson. The authors recommend that managers match their management approach to
the situation and to the needs of the worker. I’ll only summarize their
comments on four management approaches to be used with four different types of
workers as you can benefit from reading the book.
• Directing-
Specific Instruction & Close Supervision- For Crises and Workers that are
Enthusiastic Beginners
• Coaching-
Directing + Explanations, Solicitation of Suggestions & Support- For
Disillusioned Learners
• Supporting-Facilitates
Subordinate’s Efforts & Shares Responsibility for Decision Making- For
Reluctant Contributors
• Delegating-Decision
Making and Problem Solving Turned Over to Subordinates-For Enthusiastic
Contributors that are Highly Competent & Highly Committed
Note that these authors support Drucker’s view that
effective leaders must treat knowledge workers as individuals to the point of
changing their management style according to the individual worker’s needs.
Also the four approaches defined by Blanchard and Johnson can be viewed as
variations of the basic Theory Z management style.
Exercise:
1. Think about
the last crisis in your organization. Did you adopt a “directing” style by
accepting the leadership role, giving specific instructions and providing close
supervision until the crisis was resolved? Or did you seek to delegate this
tough task to someone else?
2. If this
crisis were to reappear rehearse how you will handle it next time.
3. Pick six of
your workers or peers and see if you can classify them as:
a. Enthusiastic
beginners
b. Disillusioned
learners
c. Reluctant
contributors
d. Highly
competent and highly committed enthusiastic contributors
4. Think about
your recent involvements with workers in each of the four categories. Did you
adopt your style to the worker’s needs?
Rehearse how you will interact with these workers in your next
interactions.
If you find that the pace of blog posts
isn’t compatible with the pace you would
like to maintain in studying this material you can buy the book “The Manager’s Guide for Effective
Leadership” at:
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