I once had a client we’ll call Phil, who came to see me because, as he put it, “Work is starting to get to me, and I’m not handling things the way I should.” He was a supervisor in a blue collar environment, mostly men, but an increasing number of women.

Phil’s boss wanted me to “fix” him, but what that really meant wasn’t clear.

Phil had been there going on 18 years, had outlasted several management makeovers, and an ownership change. Even though there were no barriers to firing him, like a union or strict seniority policies, there was no stomach for it either.

The real concern was the persistent, low-level grumbling from his employees that Phil was getting harder to deal with, that he made it all about him, didn’t listen, seemed to be on automatic and slightly agitated all the time. Sure he was outwardly gregarious, but it covered a more arbitrary “just do it” piece just beneath the surface – and he wasn’t as sharp as he used to be. He didn’t always remember totally what he’d said yesterday, but mostly denied or minimized any problem.

The women found him annoying because he was so unapologetically a “guy” who assumed you’d watched the Patriots game yesterday, or wanted to banter with him about the point spread, car engines, or how “kids these days” don’t know how to get a job done.

Truth to tell, Phil wasn’t messing up that badly in the day-to-day performance of his duties. Yes, his style was a turnoff to the younger, more diverse staff, but it was uncanny how he never quite stepped across the line, or served up a concrete incident that might trigger a harassment claim, or could be highlighted as a performance problem. He actually knew the job cold, and had done surprisingly well at learning the updated information systems recently put in.

I received a few compliments because Phil had actually gone back to see me a second time, and supposedly seemed “slightly better.” I wasn’t buying it. Now that I’d eyeballed Phil on the job I could see the situation was going no place good.

“When am I guilty of micro-managing? What’s a reasonable way to sort that out?”

I’ve often been asked a version of that by managers who aren’t sure whether they’re coming on too strong or not coming on strongly enough.

Often what’s going on at the time that question is being posed is that a manager has had a run-in with an employee, the term “micro-managing” has been tossed into the discussion, and the manager isn’t quite sure how to react.

The textbooks say micro-managing isn’t good – that it impedes employee initiative, generates resentment, and indicates a “controlling” temperament. And as far as it goes, that’s right. In a healthy environment with an even distribution of reasonable people, micro-managing is both unnecessary and disrespectful. It can actually reduce employee productivity.

The problem is that in the real world it tends to overlook, or at least sidestep, the issue of accountability. In many workplaces, the key quality that makes someone a manager is his or her willingness to step up and take responsibility for the satisfactory completion of the work product. Since managers are acutely aware that their own job performance is being closely monitored, there’s definitely more urgency attached to following up on problems – in fact, failure to anticipate and act on problems is one of the main reasons managers lose their jobs. Which is why many have learned from bitter experience to be vigilant, and stay on top of potential problems early and often.  Which is exactly what some call “micro-managing.”

And which takes us back to the beginning. What’s a reasonable level of checking in and monitoring, when does it morph into micro-managing – and who decides?

Here’s a link to my comment on David Maister’s excellent blog added to a long thread about why bad management persists.

http://davidmaister.com/blog/477/Why-Does-Bad-Management-Thrive-So-Much