Why So Many Bosses Are Lousy Leaders

February 19, 1020

Interview with Terry R. Bacon, author of the book What People Want: A Manager's Guide to Building Relationships That Work

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Mike Carruthers:
A lot of managers are lousy at their job and the process of promoting managers is a big part of the problem.

Terry Bacon:
A lot of managers are promoted because they're very good technically at what they do.  And they're so good technically, they're promoted into positions of management, often without having a real aptitude for people and usually without any real good training on how to manage people.
 

Terry Bacon, author of the book What People Want, says the perfect example is the super salesman who gets promoted and is a horrible sales manager.

You know there is only about sixteen percent of people who really get it about other people. So, if you look at how many people are people persons, it's a fairly small percentage of the population. And when you look at even the business schools and courses that companies offer to new managers, a lot of that is focused on task management and scheduling and prioritizing and planning; it's not really focused on the people themselves.

Retaining good workers is and will be an important goal for businesses and interestingly…

Some retention studies have shown that about seventy percent of the reasons why people leave a company are related to the boss. And they say either, "The boss didn't challenge me", or "The boss was a jerk." And Harvard Business Review just published a article that said that most people would rather work for a lovable fool than a competent jerk. They want to work for people that are good to work for even if they're a lovable fool, that's better than a competent jerk.