Logan works in a medium-sized company as an individual contributor. She likes what she does, but views it as a dead-end job unless she can create a management position for herself. So, Logan makes the case to let her oversee a team to increase productivity within the organization. Logan’s manager approves of the plan and Logan gets her team. However, productivity does not increase. What’s more, it does not take long for the new employees to start showing signs of burnout, and Logan herself feels stressed because even though she was a superior individual performer, she lacks management skills.
Logan’s situation is not uncommon. Managers are often individual contributors who were good at their jobs and were promoted into management as a “reward.” However, as in Logan’s case, this is not a sustainable career track. According to an article in the November-December 2023 issue of the Harvard Business Review entitled “Reimagine Your Managerial Pipeline” 54% of managers suffer from fatigue and stress as a result of their jobs and 50% of employees lack faith in their manager’s ability to move the team towards success in the next two years.
The same article suggests a selection process that might help choose the right people for the job. The process includes:
- Asking people to nominate themselves for managerial roles
- Ensuring a rigorous applications process
- Equipping aspiring mangers for the hardest parts of the role
- Normalizing opting out.
Would this process have worked in Logan’s case? Let’s see.
Asking people to nominate themselves for managerial roles
The idea behind this step is to give people ownership in the decision as to whether or not management is right for them. Logan nominated herself, so being a manager fits her long-term goals.
Ensuring a rigorous application process
This step would have forced Logan to consider why she was suited for a management position. Does she possess empathy, adaptability, and authenticity, for example? Logan, who is a member of many philanthropic organizations, believes that she possesses these skills and would have provided examples through her work outside of the office. The problem is that her own assessment is not a good judge because she does not lead an authentic life. She checks the boxes of what she thinks that good people should do, but in doing so is only trying to look good in the eyes of other people.
Equipping aspiring managers for the hardest part of the role
Going through this step would have forced Logan to think about the difficult daily issues that managers have to face such as pay equity, remote work, support for social justice, layoffs, how they can help employees through a difficult time (especially if they are going through one themselves) and what they should do if they are asked a question and do not know the answer. This step may have revealed Logan’s lack of empathy as her answers would have been a precursor to events to come. Logan could not train her team. She lacked strategy and pushed them in different directions. When they felt overwhelmed as they tried to guess what she wanted next, she told them to skip breaks so that they could get more work done. As she really believed in what she was doing, the organization’s management team might have seen at this point that she would not make a good manager.
Normalizing opting out
This step would allow Logan to return to her role as an individual contributor without losing respect or pay. Many managers who do not like the managerial role do not give it up because they fear the ramifications.
While this process helps choose the right person for managerial jobs, the question remains as to how to train a person to be a good manager. An article in Slate entitled “There’s a Reason Everyone Hates their Manager. Why Don’t We do Anything About It?” suggests having new managers enter something similar to an apprenticeship program for their first few years. Senior managers would serve as mentors and “help them put the right systems in place to support their teams, guide them through real-life situations as they arise, and workshop difficult decision and conversations…” Such a program may help individuals who are open to receiving training, however for others like Logan, who believes that she has management skills, perhaps the best option is to change the HR mindset and send the message that individual contributors are just as important as managers.