The Truth About Managing People

241 Pages·2007·0.633 MB·English

by  Stephen P. Robbins

THE TRUTH
ABOUT
MANAGING
PEOPLE
SECOND EDITION
Stephen P. Robbins, Ph.D.
© 2008 by Pearson Education, Inc.
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Robbins, Stephen P., 1943-
The truth about managing people / Stephen P. Robbins. -- 1st [paperback ed.].
p. cm.
Originally published under the title: The truth about managing people-- and nothing
but the truth. London ; Upper Saddle River, NJ : Prentice Hall, c2002. Financial Times
Prentice Hall books.
Includes bibliographical references.
ISBN 0-13-234603-6 (pbk. : alk. paper) 1. Supervision of employees. I. Robbins,
Stephen P., 1943- Truth about managing people-- and nothing but the truth. II. Title.
HF5549.12.R632 2008
658.3’02--dc22
2007025694
For my wife, Laura.
This page intentionally left blank
Preface . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .vii C
O
N
Part I The Truth About Hiring
T
E
TRUTH 1 Forget traits; it’s behavior that counts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 N
T
TRUTH 2 Realistic job previews: what you see is what you get . . . . . . . . . 5 S
TRUTH 3 Tips for improving employee interviews . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
TRUTH 4 Brains matter; or when in doubt, hire smart people . . . . . . . . 13
TRUTH 5 Don’t count too much on reference checks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
TRUTH 6 When in doubt, hire conscientious people! . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
TRUTH 7 Hire people who fi t your culture: my “good employee”
is your stinker! . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25
TRUTH 8 Manage the socialization of new employees . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29
Part II The Truth About Motivation
TRUTH 9 Why many workers aren’t motivated at work today . . . . . . . . . 33
TRUTH 10 Happy workers aren’t necessarily productive workers! . . . . . . 37
TRUTH 11 Telling employees to do their best isn’t likely to achieve
their best . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41
TRUTH 12 Not everyone wants to participate in setting their goals . . . . . 45
TRUTH 13 Professional workers go for the fl ow . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49
TRUTH 14 When giving feedback: criticize behaviors, not people . . . . . . 53
TRUTH 15 You get what you reward . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57
TRUTH 16 It’s all relative! . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61
TRUTH 17 Ways to motivate low-skill, low-pay employees . . . . . . . . . . . . 65
TRUTH 18 There’s more to high employee performance than
just motivation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69
Part III The Truth About Leadership
TRUTH 19 The essence of leadership is trust . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 73
TRUTH 20 Experience counts! Wrong! . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 77
TRUTH 21 Most people THINK they know what good leaders look like . . 81
TRUTH 22 Effective leaders know how to frame issues . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 85
TRUTH 23 You get what you expect. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 89
TRUTH 24 Charisma can be learned . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 93
TRUTH 25 Make others dependent on you . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 97
TRUTH 26 Adjust your leadership style for cultural differences,
or when in Rome… . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 101
TRUTH 27 When leadership ISN’T important . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 105
v
Part IV The Truth About Communication
TRUTH 28 Hearing isn’t listening . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 109
TRUTH 29 Choose the right communication channel . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 113
TRUTH 30 Listen to the grapevine . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 117
TRUTH 31 Men and women do communicate differently . . . . . . . . . . . . 121
TRUTH 32 What you do overpowers what you say . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 125
Part V The Truth About Building Teams
TRUTH 33 What we know that makes teams work . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 129
TRUTH 34 2 + 2 doesn’t necessarily equal 4 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 133
TRUTH 35 One bad apple spoils the barrel . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 137
TRUTH 36 We’re not all equal: status matters! . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 141
TRUTH 37 Not everyone is team material . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 145
Part VI The Truth About Managing Confl icts
TRUTH 38 The case FOR confl ict . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 149
TRUTH 39 Beware of groupthink . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 153
TRUTH 40 How to reduce work-life confl icts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 157
TRUTH 41 Negotiating isn’t about winning and losing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 161
Part VII The Truth About Designing Jobs
TRUTH 42 Not everyone wants a challenging job . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 165
TRUTH 43 Four Job-design actions that will make employees
more productive . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 169
Part VIII The Truth About Performance Evaluation
TRUTH 44 Annual reviews: the best surprise is no surprise! . . . . . . . . . 173
TRUTH 45 Don’t blame me! The role of self-serving bias . . . . . . . . . . . . 177
TRUTH 46 The case for 360-degree feedback appraisals:
more IS better! . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 181
Part IX The Truth About Coping with Change
TRUTH 47 Most people resist any change that doesn’t jingle
in their pockets! . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 185
TRUTH 48 You CAN teach an old dog new tricks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 189
TRUTH 49 Use participation to reduce resistance to change . . . . . . . . . 193
Part X Some Final Thoughts About Managing Behavior
TRUTH 50 First impressions do count! . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 197
TRUTH 51 People aren’t completely rational: don’t ignore emotions! . . 201
TRUTH 52 Employee turnover can be a good thing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 205
TRUTH 53 Beware of the quick fi x . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 209
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 213
About the Author . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 231
vi
Managers are bombarded with advice from consultants,
professors, business journalists, and assorted
management “gurus” on how to manage their
P
employees. A lot of this advice is well thought-out and valuable. R
E
Much of it, however, is a gross generalization, ambiguous, F
A
inconsistent, or superfi cial. Some of it is even just downright C
E
wrong. Regardless of the quality, there doesn’t seem to be a
slowdown in the outpouring of this advice. Quite to the contrary.
Books on business and management have replaced sex,
self-help, and weight loss as topics on many nonfi ction best-
sellers lists.
I’ve been teaching and writing about managing people at work for
more than 35 years. As part of my writing efforts, I have read upward
of 25,000 research studies on human behavior. While my practitioner
friends are often quick to criticize research and theory-testing, this
research has provided innumerable insights into human behavior.
Unfortunately, to date there has been no short, concise summary of
behavioral research that cuts through the jargon to give managers
the truth about what works and doesn’t work when it comes to
managing people at work. Well, this is no longer true. This book has
been written to fi ll that void.
I’ve organized this book around key human-behavior-related
problem areas that managers face: hiring, motivation, leadership,
communication, team building, managing confl icts, designing jobs,
performance evaluations, and coping with change. Within each
problem area, I’ve identifi ed a select set of topics that are relevant to
managers and where there is substantial research evidence to draw
upon. In addition, I’ve included suggestions to help you apply this
information to improve your managerial effectiveness. And at the
back of the book, I’ve listed references upon which the chapters
are based.
Who was this book written for? Practicing managers and those
aspiring to a management position—from CEOs to supervisor
wannabes. I wrote it because I believe you shouldn’t have to read
through detailed textbooks in human resources or organizational
behavior to learn the truth about managing people at work. Nor
should you have to attend an executive development course at a
vii
prestigious university to get the straight facts. What you get from
this book, of course, will depend on your current knowledge about
organizational behavior. Recent MBAs, for instance, will fi nd this
book to be a concise summary of the evidence they spent many
months studying. They won’t see elaborated theories or names of
major researchers, but they will fi nd accurate translations of research
fi ndings. For individuals who haven’t kept current with research
in organizational behavior or for those with little formal academic
training, this book should provide a wealth of new insights into
managing people at work.
Each of the 53 topics in this book is given its own short chapter.
And each chapter is essentially independent from the others. You
can read them in any order you desire. Best of all, you needn’t tackle
this book in one sitting. It’s been designed for multiple “quick reads.”
Read a few chapters, put it down, and then pick it up again at a later
date. No continuous story line has to be maintained.
Let me conclude this preface by stating the obvious: A book is a
team project. While there is only one name on the cover, a number
of people contributed to getting this book in your hands. That team
included Tim Moore, Jennifer Simon, Lori Lyons, Karen Gill, San Dee
Phillips, and Gloria Schurick.
—Stephen P. Robbins
viii
1
TRUTH
Forget traits; it’s behavior
that counts!
1