Do Nothing! by J. Keith Murnighan

Author:J. Keith Murnighan
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Penguin Publishing Group
Published: 2016-03-30T09:44:53+00:00

* I don’t want them to read chapter 5 because it reveals too much about an exercise that we do in our last class session. If too many people know too much about the exercise, it loses its impact. If only a few people know about it, it still works.

6

Bear Down Warmly

NICE GUYS FINISH last. Although this old saying is often repeated, is it true? We can all think of anecdotes about people who are nasty but successful—for example, executives who have gotten nicknames like “Chainsaw Al” and who have moved from one executive position to another. But what about general trends? Should leaders be kind to their team members most of the time, or should they be tough? Should they be open to ideas or be directive? Should they delegate extensively or be sure they are always in control?

The answer to all of these questions is “Yes.” Leaders must do all these things. In fact, leaders must be wire walkers: they must be able to walk a fine line between control and democracy, between delegation and taking responsibility, and between kindness and direction. Striking this balance is one of the biggest challenges that effective leaders face. Fortunately, there are solutions to this challenge, and research on effective leadership strategies gives us a host of hints about the nature of these solutions.

Researchers have been studying leadership for decades, and the findings of each research study, in its own area, have been tremendously consistent. Over and over again, data indicates that leaders need to think carefully about two major issues, the task and the people. At the same time, however, a challenge comes from the fact that the findings on tasks and the findings on people are somewhat contradictory: effective leaders must push people to do more on their tasks and they must sincerely care about them at the same time. Neither requires that leaders do any work themselves, but determining how to combine the implications from the research on tasks and the implications from the research on people is not immediately obvious. Before we jump to conclusions, let’s consider what each separate area of research tells us.

The Task

In terms of the task, the lessons are clear: to be effective, leaders must push people to do more than they otherwise would. Encouragement, high expectations, and a figurative but almost physical push can all help people achieve more than they would naturally expect or choose to do. People tend to be conscientious: they want to appear responsible and trustworthy, so when you give them a job, nearly all the time, they do it.

But then they stop. Only rarely do people do more than they are asked to do.

How can I make such a strong claim? Think of your own career. Think of the work that accumulates whenever you’ve been out of town and how you have called a meeting of your team members after your return so you could assign each of them a job to help you get caught up. When

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