What else we know about micromanaging

More analysis of the survey I ran about the effects of micromanaging, with some tongue twisters

Last month I talked about the survey I ran about how people felt and what they did when they were micromanaged at a paid job. The results weren’t at all surprising. People who had been micromanaged felt bad about it, and it made them disconnect from the micromanaging manager and from their work. They stopped working as hard, and in a lot of cases looked for a new job and left.

The results of the survey that were most interesting to me were in the question about whether or not the person had told anyone else or asked for help from anyone else in the organization when they were being micromanaged:

Question 5: “When you were being micromanaged, did you have anyone you could report that to with a reasonable expectation that it could be fixed? “

Yes, and I did and they helped: 5.4%
Yes, and I did and they recorded it but nothing changed: 13.7%
Yes, and I did and I was punished in some way: 7%
Yes, technically, but I didn't feel safe reporting to them: 14.7%
No, there was no one I could tell safely: 51.8%
I didn't consider telling anyone else about the micromanaging: 7.4%

Only 5.4% of the respondents told someone and got help with it. The other 94.6% of respondents either went to someone and didn’t get help, or didn’t feel they could tell anyone else, or didn’t even think about it.

This is bad news for HR in these organizations, because it means that HR (the Human Relations department) has lost control of the narrative entirely.

A note about what I’m going to say here and everywhere else about HR: I love individual HR workers. I’m cool with a lot of HR departments. I’m not excited (actively disgusted) about the way HR is often weaponized against workers (including the HR workers themselves!) by the way the organization sets up systems and processes, and think everyone could do a lot more work together, make more money, feel more satisfaction, and not be gaslighted on a daily basis if organizations would allow HR departments to be the voice of the worker and to serve workers at all levels in the company.

HR wants employees to feel like they can come to them for help with work situations and issues. In some organizations that’s true, but in almost every organization, HR’s loyalty is to the organization, not the employee, whether or not the individual HR workers want that to be true. If an organization sets up practices and policies that are prosocial and put everyone—owners, managers, workers—on the same side, HR can actually serve the organization and the workers at the same time, because interactions are about finding solutions that strengthen the entire system. But that’s really not the majority of organizations, so orgs spend a lot of time asserting HR as the peacekeeper or the ally to workers, when everyone knows that’s anywhere from definitely not true to sort of true.

But that narrative, that HR is there to help workers, is vital to the self-image of most work organizations. And the organization needs to control that narrative to continue to assert moral authority over everyone who works for the org, managers, HR managers and workers, workers, everyone.

However, if almost 95% of the people in my (biased but representative of a specific type of knowledge worker who is usually served decently by HR departments) survey either didn’t think of approaching HR or approached HR and didn’t get help with a micromanaging manager, that narrative of HR as the workers’ ally is not dominant.

If there’s no help, no agency or board or mediating body that cares and wants to sort things out or find solutions, then people will just do whatever they can to protect themselves. Including the 62.5% of the respondents to my survey who left the job.

Managers who micromanage do it for a lot of reasons, most of which they probably aren’t aware of. I really think that the majority of managers who micromanage aren’t doing it because they’re bad people, even if they’re doing it maliciously—sometimes people are pushed into malicious behavior if they don’t see any other options and aren’t being supported in better behavior. Which brings it all back around to the organization again. If the organization is setting up systems, policies, etc. that push managers into micromanaging*, the org is also likely not empowering HR to do anything to mitigate this or help either the micromanaging manager or the micromanaged workers.

I can teach a manager to stop micromanaging and start managing more effectively. I can run programs to help managers find the healthy line between undermanaging, overmanaging, and micromanaging so it never even becomes an issue. I can help HR develop practices that support managers in healthy management practices. All of those things can improve the working experiences of everyone involved (which always results in bigger profits for the org over the long term). But if the owners and c-suite of the organization are determined to pit everyone in the org against each other, it’s never going to be as profitable or satisfying as it could be for the org and everyone involved with the org.

File under: organizational dynamics make my head hurt, prosocial management is easier for everyone, started at the bottom now we’re here?

Basically, you and everyone reading this deserves to manage well and be managed well, and if you’re in HR you deserve not to be the bad guy just because your organization is playing outmoded mind games.

If you’re in HR and you know you’ve got a micromanager or three in your organization, but no one has ever come to you to talk about it, this is your sign to get help. With both the micromanagers (I can do a program for them without using the work “micromanage” so you don’t have to tell them they’re micromanaging) and with the fact that you’re not seen as either an ally or a resource for getting help or troubleshooting. Work really shouldn’t be a battle of employees of the same organization—all that energy and adrenaline could be going toward something productive and revenue-generating.

* If you want to read something about an organization pitting everyone against each other for decades and how that drove the company into the dirt, read American Icon: Alan Mulally and the Fight to Save Ford Motor Company by Bryce G. Hoffman.