Creating An Accountability Culture – Prerequisite Three
By Michelle Malay Carter on March 5, 2008
Today is post three on the Requisite Organization model’s four minimum managerial authorities that are prerequisites for creating an accountability culture.
For those arriving via search engine, here is requisite authority 1, and here you can find number two.
Requisite Authority Three:
Managers shall review, recognize, and reward their employees’ effectiveness.
When written, this seems easy, but what implications are embedded in this statement??? Many managers have the authority to recommend in a performance management process, but the true decision authority lies elsewhere.
Effectiveness Cannot Be Calculated!
This statement also implies that organizations are judging employee effectiveness and not just simply calculating performance.? Calculating performance requires a calculator.? Judging effectiveness takes an involved manager.
In the words of Elliott Jaques from the book Requisite Organization, “It is the manager, and only the manager who is in a position to judge – and who must judge – the working effectiveness of subordinates, and thus determine any merit review.”
“[For a manager] to only have the authority to recommend leads to that well-known shoulder shrug and passing of the buck:? ‘I told them you were good, but they wouldn’t listen.’? Effectiveness appraisal and determination of merit review of immediate subordinates are fundamental requirements of being a manager.”
The High Cost of Removing Managerial Authority
I’ve said before, that as organizations have slowly eroded managerial authority and given away managerial accountabilities to HR and other third parties, they have created managerial impotence.? The managers have responded by rightfully refusing to take the helm of accountability.? As a result, employees are not being led, and they are disengaging in droves.? HR has a role to play, but it is not that of proxy manager.
Restore managerial authority and watch accountability take an upswing.? I’m OK.? You’re OK.? Let’s fix the system.
Have you ever lacked the authority you needed to be a leader?
Filed Under Accountability, Employee Engagement, Managerial Leadership, Requisite Organization, Talent Management
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3 Responses to “Creating An Accountability Culture – Prerequisite Three”
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Great post. I think this is very important and largely lacking in today’s managers. Managers need to TAKE back more of their own responsibilities to drive their teams and improve accountability and employee engagement. I believe that a manager has a lot more power to do things that SEEMS like it is HR’s role and just don’t dare to do it, then what they THINK they have the power to do.
Since management is all about managing your people, why would you let someone or some group get involved when they don’t KNOW your people. Well, you wouldn’t! So, why do you do it!
If I had a dollar for everytime I was advised to consult with HR before making a move on accountability, well you know the rest:). It literally paralyzes and makes the leader a leader by proxy only.
As always, I’m glad you address the system, rather than argue that we can coexist with the current state.
Mike and Eric,
Thank you for stopping by and adding to this topic with your insights.
Isn’t amazing how much surrounding authority and accountability is left to interpretation and inference?
The military is one type of organization that leaves nothing to the imagination here. They understand that the cost of amibiguity and split leadership can be death.
Within other organizations the cost is “merely” buck passing and disengagement, but most have yet to connect the dots.
Regards,
Michelle