M
y daughter recently joined one of the reputed colleges in Bangalore as a lecturer. Like me, she is small built and unlike me she is thin. Being new in the teaching profession, she has been frequently sharing her experiences with all of us at home. What she said five weeks ago particularly interested me. She complained - "the students are not scared of me!"
My son (age 21) and I responded almost in chorus, "but why do you want them to be scared of you?" Her response was "how do I otherwise mind the class?" Both my son and I felt, it was in fact a wonderful opportunity to establish a relationship as a friend with the student. A relationship that was not based on any threat or pseudo respect.
InWipro, at the age of 25 years, I was appointed directly from the campus as the head of the factory personnel department. It was not a small factory. It had about 800 direct and about 600 indirect employees. The interesting feature was, as a 25 year old departmental head, I was required to supervise a team that consisted among others, of a labour officer aged 60 years, a security officer who was a retired police officer of 62 years and a chief time keeper of 61 years with a lot of terror about him among one and all in the factory.
The very first assignment that I requested to the labour officer was flatly turned down by him. It was about culling out some data from the Employees' State Insurance Act. He simply said, "I
cannot do it". It was something that was fairly simple and he could have done it in an hour's time. I invited him to the conference room and asked him, "Why do you refuse?" He maintained a studied silence. I explained to him that unless the team members cooperated and did their work, it would be very difficult for me to deliver what was expected of the department. He just listened-I did not push further and decided to take it easy. I got the output from a young time keeper in the department.
Surprisingly, the next morning, the labour officer wanted to meet me. We sat in the conference room again. He was in tears. I was even more surprised. He started profusely apologizing to me requesting me not to get angry with him. I assured him that I was not angry at all - but just perplexed with his response.
He told me that he narrated the entire incident of the previous evening to his wife who told him that what he did was completely wrong and that he had lost an important opportunity to establish a good working relationship with me. The labour office narrated to me all the injustice that was allegedly heaped on him by the "management" for the last several years and that was the reason for his bitterness. He felt that there was no reason for the management to bring in a young, inexperienced person like me and that he should have been made the departmental head etc. I heard him patiently and explained that there was not need to feel bad. He needed to thank
the management that he was continuing despite having completed 60 years. He saw the point and assured that he would extend all the cooperation to me. Till his retirement, I respected him like my father and he took great pride in helping me to settle in the job.
As I remember today, I found the whole incident very amusing. I did not feel angry or powerless. I felt, it was a very interesting situation and the challenge was how to manage the situation. The only thought in my mind was how do I still get my job done?
Right from the beginning, I never found the need for people to be scared of me and overtly respect me due to any position that I held.
I find it very funny, when a group of employees suddenly lower their voice or change their posture or sit properly the moment a senior colleague is passing by. The principle is simple - if you are not doing something wrong - there is no need to change your behaviour or hide it from seniors. If you are doing something wrong, you should not be doing it in the first place.
On the other hand, it's a common phenomenon that the supervisors expect a lot of respect and some amount of fear about themselves in their team members. There is a (false) sense of authority and power that 'I can make or break the career of these chaps'! That I am very important in the lives of my team members and can either construct them or destroy them. These are the supervisors, who do not find it necessary to bother about the
sensitivities of their team members. These are the ones who get very upset when their team members do not pay adequate attention when they are speaking but are busy whispering amongst each other. It is another matter that they may do exactly the same when their supervisors or others are speaking.
Even in social functions of their team members, some of these supervisors want to hold a center stage (because it is synonymous with being powerful). To the extent that left to them, if they are attending a marriage, they would want to be the bride-groom themselves. Their hunger for power gives them all the right to crack jokes on the hapless team members -but the team members dare not even indirectly attempt the same on them.
Hundreds of books have been written on the subject of power dynamics. But, despite a lot of knowledge about this topic dynamics and its implications, people continue to harbour a keen desire to be feared about as a very satisfying factor for them.
While it may satisfy people to feel powerful, it normally creates destruction around them in people. Excessive usage of power position can at times destroy other people's confidence. It prevents people from coming up with newer ideas and methods. It creates an unnecessary fear of failure among people. It kills creativity in a major way.
The hunger for power has its roots in our socio-cultural factors. Father wants his children to listen to him without arguing (interestingly, mothers normally have a much lower need to exercise power over their children). Teachers in the school want children not to ask too many questions and go by whatever they are saying. Supervisors want their team members to obey them and do their work as "told". People find it very easy to manage from the position of authority and power.
There is bad news for these "power hungry" people in the knowledge economy. The equations are fast changing. The value of a supervisor or any person in authority is no more dependent upon the position or level in the hierarchy of this person. It is based on that person's "referral value". Itis based on the commitment of the supervisor to contribute to his/ her team members on a daily basis. That is because, in many "knowledge jobs", the employees know far more about their job than their supervisors do. The supervisors' knowledge is either non existent or is not up-to-date. The fluidity of knowledge makes it even more difficult for the supervisor to keep acquiring the in-depth knowledge about the work of their team members. Therefore, the supervisor's role is changing to providing a "thought leadership" for his/her team members. The supervisor needs to be in a position to bring different perspectives and dimensions of the situation that will enable the members to be more effective in their performance.
In many cases, the hunger for power arises out of the underlying insecurity and need to exercise control over others through the "power equation" than through other legitimate means such as superior knowledge, higher competencies, ability to add value etc. For many, it is an easy option out since acquiring higher competencies all the time is a more difficult process than simply enforcing something based on position power.
If a teacher is brilliant in her knowledge and teaching methodology, there is hardly any need for her to shout at students and enforce discipline. Her brilliance and superior skills of teaching will create the required interest among the students. I still remember that some of our most popular teachers in school and college were those who were extremely good at their subject
knowledge and chose methods that were creative to engage the attention of the students.
InWipro, we have a supplementary application material titled "Something More about You" consisting of some 30 odd qualitative questions. One of the important questions is "what kind of managers brings the best in you". I have gone through the response of at least 500 respondents to these questions. An overwhelming majority of respondents express that they like working with supervisors who do not throw their weight around. Supervisors who allow required freedom to operate are trusting, supportive, and above all those who respect them for what they are bring out the best in them.
To me, this is conclusive evidence that most employees do not want to work with the power hungry people.
The good news is that the current generation is all out to rebel against people whose key working style is operating through "power". My daughter no more complains about the students not being "afraid" of her but has found the joy of effectively interacting with them through different methods of teaching learning. (hc)