Comments on: 7 Habits of Highly Ineffective Managers

By: Raven

Raven — Tue, 23 Oct 2007 01:00:16 +0000

Excellent tips for all budding managers! Publish the manual, shoot the video and start training folks on WNTD (What not to do!!), which is a slightly shorter acronym than HTABACMM (How to avoid becoming a completely moronic manager). Shhhweet!

By: Gal Morale

Gal Morale — Sun, 14 Oct 2007 15:24:59 +0000

Ineffective Manager Tip: Utilize the skills and talents of your team to complete a project and then, when kudos come your way, bask in the glory and take all the credit.

By: Darlene

Darlene — Sat, 13 Oct 2007 03:33:45 +0000

Very good post! I am amazed at the lack of leadership in most organizations. It would be great to think that these examples of poor leadership/management are limited to entry level or mid-level management, the fact is this skill set can be found all the way up to the highest level of any organization in America. But I'm getting on my soapbox.

More examples of ineffective managers: To wield your power by reminding them that you are the "new sherriff in town and it's my way or the highway. Or you could whip them into submission by berating their performance and tell them how great you are as the boss - NOT! Another is to "delegate" your responsibility to a subordinate, give them bad news to communicate to your team, and be no where in the hemisphere to deal with the negative fallout. Just let the team know through an email that these are the new rules of engagement. Live with it or leave.

And I could go on...

By: Scott

Scott — Fri, 12 Oct 2007 09:30:22 +0000

How about -

Assigning tasks (aka "opportunities") while withholding critical information to which is only given at the very last possible moment. There is nothing like setting your employees up to fail! Then wonder why they mistrust you and cringe when they hear the word "opportunity" slipping through your lips.

By: Phil Gerbyshak

Phil Gerbyshak — Thu, 11 Oct 2007 23:10:26 +0000

Emily - That could be a very effective way of being ineffective. Time with insubordinates is a direct relation to the amount of love the rest of your team feels. Attention = intention, and the more attention, it's obvious the intention is to keep the slacker. Unfortunate but true.

Jen - Great suggestion! Fake it until they QUIT, because after all, you're the boss, right?

David - Ah, the memo master, my favorite co-worker. Write well but don't do the right things well. The pen is mightier than the sword, at least when it comes to being purely ineffective.

By: David Zinger

David Zinger — Thu, 11 Oct 2007 22:57:39 +0000

Of course there is one was to mask incompetence with efficiency by being efficient but not efffective. Do the unimportant really well and ignore what is most important. Become a memo master rather than a management master.

By: jen

jen — Thu, 11 Oct 2007 18:10:52 +0000

Even if you have no idea how to do your subordinate’s job, pretend that you do, and that you can do it better than they can. Be sure to condescend to them and belittle their skills as much as possible. After all, employees won’t respect you if they think they know more than you about something. Don’t worry that they’ll see through the ruse — you’re the boss, after all.

By: Emily

Emily — Thu, 11 Oct 2007 17:48:09 +0000

Ineffective manager tip: Do everything to keep the insubordinate, slacker employee while ignoring the other employees who are working hard to keep the “team” together. Everything including bending personnel policy rules to support the slacker, but demanding the other employees to follow the policies.

By: Phil Gerbyshak

Phil Gerbyshak — Thu, 11 Oct 2007 12:24:38 +0000

Eric - Great advice! Planning sucks :)

David - No eye contact. That's wonderful!

Edward - Sorry about that. I guess I lived your life a bit.

Bryan - 2 more great ones. I work halfdays now. 7 AM - 7 PM. Thanks for validating that for me.

Ron - I'll definitely be checking you out. Thanks for the link. And thanks for reminding us that we learn from the best, and the worst. You're right, The Office is a GREAT reminder of the worst we can learn from.

Noah - Good for you for escaping. Sounds toxic. Sucks for those folks you used to work with though. Why didn't they escape?

By: Noah

Noah — Thu, 11 Oct 2007 00:17:34 +0000

My boss at a job I left a couple of years ago actually did all seven of those; I stuck around for almost a year before the very thought of going to work in the morning made me physically ill. The odd thing was that two of the three people I worked closely with had been there for nearly 15 years and all three still work there.