Michelle – Great points. So great I’m going to write an article about this soon.

On your comment: Are you trying to lead people that don’t want to be led, or trying to manage people that don’t want to be managed?

I believe all people want to be led, but we want to be led by someone who adds value to our thinking. Our particular manager cannot always do that.

Resistors very often are people who need to be promoted, not “gotten rid of”. The reason why they resist is because they are being expected to submit to the leadership of someone who does not offer them a bigger picture view. I’ve lived this very experience.

This is a frequent occurence with young, high potentials or older high potentials who missed the promotion train early in their career and are now stuck working a in a role that is one or two layers below their capability level. Here’s an article about employees with attitude problems: http://www.peoplefit.com/downloads/whattodowithattitudeproblem.pdf

A designing a system for better matching employees to roles based on cognitive capacity, rather than blaming the employees for being insubordinate, would solve much of this issue. My blog is dedicated to a system’s based approach. My mantra is:

I”m OK. You’re OK. Let’s fix the system.

Regards,

Michelle

Over the years, as an employee assistance counsellor for Seagram Ltd., I have seen people go through many changes and sometimes the employee who seems so resistant or difficult can be transformed into your biggest booster.

Yet, great companies are not great for everyone. There needs to be a fit. So sometimes I think we want to keep our sense of humour about the situation and take the steps necessary to manage the situation and person.

I wonder, am I beginning to slow down and might that not make sense in some situations that have such a very important impact on people and their careers. Having said all this I do chuckle and appreciate the comment from one of Canada’s leading CEO’s who said: “you can’t polish a turd.”

David