The Impact of Incompetent Management

15.30 – 16.00 on Wednesday 24th April 2013

Jon CowellDirector, Primary Colours Consulting and Edgecumbe Consulting Group Ltd

Associate Fellow, Saïd Business School, University of Oxford

Agenda

What is a competent manager?

What is an incompetent manager?

How common is incompetence?

So what? What is the impact?

How has this happened?

What are we doing about it?

What can we do – an emerging consensus on leadership?

Call to action

What is a competent manager?

“All managers need to be effective leaders. While a command and

control culture will ensure that employees comply… it does not create

the enthusiasm, innovation and engagement that modern

organisations need to compete effectively in a global marketplace.

Leadership is all about setting direction and creating the right

organisational conditions for heading in that direction. This is as

true for the team leader as it is for the chief executive…

effective leaders have a clear vision of the future and the capability

to communicate that vision to others so that they are inspired to

share it and work collaboratively to achieve it... Above all, leaders

need to inspire trust in their capability to take the organisation in the

right direction”.

Leadership & management in the UK- the key to sustainable growth (2012), Dept for Business Innovation and Skills, pp 22 – 23.

What is an incompetent manager?

Bentz, 1985, A View from the TopHogan, Hogan and Kaiser, (2009), Management Derailment

Bad relationships

Unable to delegate

Unable to build a team

Lack of business skills

Failure to deliver

Poor strategic thinking

No visionLet self-

interest cloud judgement

How common is incompetence?

Individual

managers

Overall

management

quality

43%1

72%1

30-67%2

93%3

40%4

74%4

1 Leadership & management in the UK- the key to sustainable growth (2012), Dept for Business Innovation and Skills 2 ILM (2012) 2 Hogan, Hogan and Kaiser (2009) Management Derailment, in American Psychological Association Handbook of Industrial and Organisational Psychology 3 ILM (2012) TheTalent Pipeline4 Cowell (2012) UK Leadership – stuck in a crisis mentality?, Edgecumbe Group

UK leaders’ strengths & weaknesses

Cowell, J (2012) UK Leadership – stuck in a crisis mentality?, Edgecumbe Group

Set strategic direction

Plan and organise work

Deliver Results

Lead

Work in teams

Cope with pressure

Build & sustain relationships

Create alignment between people

52%

53%

56%

46%

43%

40%

40%

35%

27%

22%

14%

24%

25%

25%

20%

21%

21%

25%

30%

30%

32%

35%

40%

44%

%positive %neutral %negative

So what? What is the impact?

1 2012 Trends in Global Employee Engagement, Aon Hewitt2 Kular, Gatenby, Rees, Soane and Truss (2008), Employee Engagement: A Literature Review, Kingston Business School3 Leadership & management in the UK- the key to sustainable growth (2012), Dept for Business Innovation and Skills

Employee Disengagement1

Organisational Performance2

Business Costs3

Corporate Failures3

How has this happened?

The bad and the mad

The sad

What are we doing about it?

1 Cowell, J (2012) UK Leadership – stuck in a crisis mentality?, Edgecumbe Group2 Hutchings P and Woodman P, (2012) Economic Outlook – April 2012, Chartered Management Institute

Why aren’t we doing more?

1Leadership & management in the UK- the key to sustainable growth (2012), Dept for Business Innovation and Skills2Cowell, J (2012) UK Leadership – stuck in a crisis mentality?, Edgecumbe Group

Low confidence2

Poor training1

Distorted self- perception1

Unclear expectations1

A Leadership Lens

What is leadership – an emerging consensus?

Thinking/Working out which way to go

Acting/Getting things done

Feeling/Emotional intelligence

The Primary Colours® Model of Leadership

…and Coping with Pressure

Delivering results

Planning and organising

Setting strategic direction

Creating alignment

Building and sustaining

relationships

Team working

Leading

STRATEGIC DOMAIN

OPERATIONAL DOMAIN

INTERPERSONAL DOMAIN

© Edgecumbe Consulting Group

Delivering results

Planning and organising

Setting strategic direction

Creating alignment

Building and sustaining

relationshipsTeam

working

Leading

Creating the future

Delivering today

Focus on task

Focus on relationships

© Edgecumbe Consulting Group

Strategic

Operational Interpersonal

The Primary Colours ® Model of Leadership

Delivering results

Planning and organising

Setting strategic direction

Creating alignment

Building and sustaining

relationshipsTeam

working

Leading

© Edgecumbe Consulting Group

Strategic

Operational Interpersonal

The Primary Colours ® Model of Leadership

Call to action

Call to action – 5 steps

Keep the faith Clarify expectations

Assess Develop

Demonstrate