"good Leaders Aren't Perfect"

Author Michael Maccoby thinks we've had enough of old-style managers.

 

Businesses require a new kind of leadership if they're to thrive during the 1980s, claims Michael Maccoby, social psychologist and author of The Gamesman, the 1976 bestseller on management styles.

The Leader, Maccoby's latest book (see Books, December 1981), describes a manager who is willing to share power, inspires cooperation rather than competition, and is more flexible and tolerant that his predecessors. It is based on case histories of six managers -- three in industry, two in government, and one in a labor union.

His thesis in both books is that the most successful managers understand, and often embody, the positive elements of the existing "social character," Maccoby's term for the dominant attitudes and values of Americans during a given era.

In The Gamesman, Maccoby identified four management types: "The Craftsman holds the traditional values of the early 1900s, with a concern for quality and thrift, and for his craft. In the past he may have been a furniture maker; today he may be the leader of a research and development team.

The Jungle Fighter sees both life and work as a struggle for power in which his peers are either accomplices or enemies, his subordinates resources to be manipulated. Past examples include such empire-builders as Andrew Carnegie. Now the Jungle Fighter may be the turnaround artist who is brought in to clean house and reorganize a troubled company.

The Company Man came to the fore during the tranquil '50s. His modesty, loyalty, sense of responsibility, and negotiating skills lent stability to corporate environments. He adapts to a company as if it were another family; his weakness may be greater concern for security than for success. Now he most often excels as a middle manager in a large company.

The Gamesman fit the management needs of the 1960s and early 1970s when fast-growing high-technology companies thrived on competition, innovation, flexibility, and aggressive leadership of project teams. Today he may manage a semiconductor firm. His career is a game, full of possibilities and options; his goal is winning.

In the current decade, one of limited resources and increasing international competition, the assets of the Gamesman are becoming liabilities, says Macoby. He can no longer motivate his team by continually promising more. He may inspire counterproductive competition and distrust, and he can alienate subordinates by his lack of compassion in dealing with people.

The Gamesman is giving way to the Leader, a manager who understands the changing attitudes of the late 1970s and early 1980s. What are those attitudes, how do they shape this new style, and how can managers of smaller companies adopt traits that will make them more effective? Michael Maccoby answered these and other questions during a recent interview with INC. senior writer Sharon Frederick.

INC: The leader you describe as the model manager for the 1980s sounds almost too good to be true. Is it a leadership style that's feasible for most managers, and, if so, how does one begin to develop such a style?

Maccoby: Good leaders today are not people who are "perfect." They all have faults. The difference between them and old-style managers is that they acknowledge and struggle with those faults, rather than ignoring and becoming defensive about them.

There are no easy rules for becoming what I call a leader. You start by looking at yourself, at your strengths and weaknesses as a manager and a leader. One way to do that is to find somebody you're close to and trust, and say, "Look, I really mean this: You'd be doing me a great favor if you'd talk to me about my strengths and weaknesses as you see them." You'il be amazed at how much you can learn.

Another way is to look at other people and how they operate. That's the reason I use six models of good manager-leaders as the basis for my book. If you honestly think about yourself in comparison to Pehr Gyllenhammar, chief executive of Volvo, or Irving Bluestone, former United Auto Workers vice-president, you'll see differences between the way you manage and the way they manage.

INC: I find it hard to believe the head of Volvo, or a UAW official, has much in common with managers in small companies.

Maccoby: They do have some things in common. What may be more revealing, however, is what they don't have in common. If you have an entrepreneurial temperament, you'll see you operate very differently from someone like Gyllenhammar. You may see that the same traits that got you where you are today can keep you from going any farther, particularly because you're going to have trouble motivating and managing today's employee.

Most limiting is the entrepreneur's tendency not to listen to anybody else. Successful entrepreneurs are often people who have done something when everybody else said it couldn't be done. If you've survived and brought a company to $1 million or $10 million in sales, you know you've succeeded where many others have failed. You've stayed on the edge of the cliff while they've fallen off. So you think: Why should I listen to anyone else?

You may also tend to think of yourself as father-knows-best. People are either with you -- in the family and under your protection -- or are enemies, outsiders. You want to control most situations and won't give up power to anybody unless you're sure the person is totally loyal. That paternalism limits an entrepreneur's effectiveness and creates dislike and resistance among employees.

There's also a certain ruthlessness to many entrepreneurs. They simply don't pay attention to what effects they have on other people. They don't try to be destructive; they just push ahead, regardless of the risks for themselves or others. That may have worked in the past, for the jungle fighters like Andrew Carnegie. I don't think it works well for managers today.

The best models for entrepreneurs today are the Hewletts and Packards. They've articulated values that go beyond getting rich or winning. They've learned to work cooperatively and to respect individuals who are different from themselves.

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