by: K. Palmer Hartl
Working to Outputs, Not Inputs
How many managers work to outputs rather than to inputs? Most work to inputs, and it sends the wrong message to the employee and likely results in less initiative and creativity in the workplace.
The other day, a client sent me a resume for a job that he was thinking of applying for. Sure enough, even though this was for a senior-level position in the organization, the job description was written in inputs: here is what we want you to do. Certainly at the most senior level of the organization, this job description should have said what the expected outputs were for the position.
An output is the product of the position. What is this position supposed to produce? The closer the position is to the top of the organization, the more it reads and looks like what the organization itself is trying to accomplish.
One of the inputs listed was to manage and put on over 100 educational programs during the year. This is an input. That is not to say that the person who takes the position will not put on educational programs, but the real question to be asked is, why are you doing this? In fact, one way to begin to manage to outputs rather then inputs is to ask — about everything you are doing — why? Why are you doing it, and to what end (output)?
In this example, the education programs have something to do with improving the health of the employee population. That is the output that organization is wanting to achieve. Their insurance costs are too high, and somewhere along the line it was determined that the way to improve the health of the employees was to run programs focused on improving one’s health.
There is nothing wrong with this, but if we know that the output is the improved health of the employee population, the thing that we should be measuring is whether the needle moves on this output (improved employee health), and not on whether the SVP and the training unit put on 100 programs.
In fact, there may be many other interventions that this training unit might offer to improve the employee health population, if they are focused on the output of improved employee health rather than the input of 100 plus courses during the year.
The other thing that managing to outputs rather then inputs does is that it says to the employee, “we know what we want for the output, but we are trusting that you will figure out what is the best set of things to do to achieve it.” If we are hiring an HR training professional, then you ought to have some ideas about this yourself. We don’t need to tell you what to do, rather you tell us what we should be doing, now that you know what the output is that we are looking for.
This is an empowering thing for management to do. It is also motivating to the employee. It stimulates the creativity of the employee and provides them with a feeling that they have the permission and the ability to make a difference for the organization.
Finally, the organization that chooses to manage in this way sends a message to the employees: “we are looking for you to innovate and create to help us solve our problems. You are not just an order filler doing what we have already determined will fix the problem, rather you are part of the solution, not just the execution.”
Stop Trying to “Fix” Employees
Somewhere along the line, managers and their bosses got the idea that managers should try to fix employees who were underperforming. First, the notion that you can fix another person is wrong-headed from the get go. None of us can fix another person. I can fix myself, you can fix yourself, but I can’t fix you. Nonetheless, day after day, managers are engaged in efforts to fix others.
I assume that this got started as our American management culture became overly paternalistic. Years ago, employers began to take a custodial attitude toward their employees. Bosses agreed to play the part of the parent and employees took the complementary part of the child. At its height after WWII, this was called the Loyalty Paradigm. The quid pro quo was that I the boss/parent will take care of you the employee/child as long as you are loyal to me and the organization and do what I ask you to do. This was seen by management as a way to hold on to employees in the competitive employment situation in the 50s, 60s and 70s. The Loyalty Paradigm also included lifetime employment as long as you were loyal and did a tolerable job. But this arrangement began to falter during the 80s as companies started to lay people off.
The legacy of the Loyalty Paradigm still lives with us. One of the forms that it currently takes is this notion that I can fix another person. What I can do is to offer an underperforming person training, advice, education, etc. But this is different from trying to fix a person. Training is different than fixing. The key is to know when to train and when to fire or move the employee to a different position where the person has a chance of contributing to the organization and being successful.
Too many managers who are in the “fixing” business are attempting to address psychological problems. As I have said to any number of managers who find themselves engaged in this kind of an effort, you are not a therapist and you should not try to be one.
Psychological problems manifest themselves as attitude problems, abrasive or abusive interpersonal skills, lack of assertiveness, etc. Almost all of these are behavioral problems, not knowledge or skill deficits. If a company values such an employee, they can make the offer of help by hiring a coach or a therapist. If you go in this direction, it is critical that the employee truly wants the help and wants to behave differently.
Organizations need to encourage their managers to give up trying to “fix” people. This is usually a lose-lose management practice. By doing so, organizations will save themselves time and money and they will help their managers feel and be more successful.
Moving from “Direct and Control” to “Leveraging”
Finally, many managers fundamentally misunderstand their jobs. The old style of management was to direct and control the people who worked for you. The problem with this idea is that it easily leads the manager to over manage, sometimes called micromanaging, instead of learning how to leverage themselves and their knowledge and skills.
If I assume that I need to tell you day after day what to do and when to do it, I spend most of my time controlling your behavior. I begin to treat you as though you can not figure out what to do on your own. This is another manifestation of the parent/child management paradigm.
The alternative to this is to work with you to help you, the employee, understand what it is that your job is expected to produce and let you figure out how to deliver that “product.” The manager’s job then becomes one of supporting the employees in getting their jobs done.
In this scenario, the manager is leveraging his or her capabilities by getting more work done with less effort. This frees the manager to do his own work and figure out how to move the unit forward.
In addition, the employee who is working in the leveraged environment will feel more independent and valued. The micromanaging, directing and controlling manager is demotivating to say the least.
All of these management practices depend on the manager and the employee being able to work together as two adults. Managers may need training to learn how to do this well. Employees may need to grow up and learn to take some risks by refusing the temptation to get permission from “mommy” for everything that they do.
Companies that encourage the adoption of these management practices will find that they can get more work done and have more satisfied and successful employees.
K. Palmer Hartl, MDiv graduated from Grinnell College and earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in Biological Sciences. He graduated from Virginia Theological Seminary in 1968, where he received an MDiv, with a concentration in Counseling and Group Dynamics. While in his first parish, Rev. Hartl began additional training in group work, team interaction and Transactional Analysis. This eventually led to a career as a Pastoral Psychotherapist and a Leadership and Management Consultant to for-profit and not-for-profit organizations.
In 1980, Rev. Hartl began working for Ernst and Young (formerly known as Arthur Young) as a member of their management and leadership training function. This career later led him to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, where he worked as Senior Vice President of Training and Development for a bank holding company. In 1991, Rev. Hartl left the bank and began working as an Independent Consultant to many businesses and nonprofit organizations.
In addition to consulting work, Rev. Hartl is a Parish Associate at Christ Church Philadelphia where he teaches, counsels and preaches.
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