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Human Resources Q & A
May 1, 2006
By Tim Rutledge

The question:
The bookstore shelves are groaning under the weight of titles about bad bosses, "supervisors from hell". How do these people get to be supervisors in the first place?
Tim's Response:

It's a well known truth that people don't leave companies, they leave supervisors. Supervisors are the most important ingredient in the overall employment experience. Their behaviour will create either engaging or disengaging employment experiences for their staff.
And yet many organizations persist in bringing the wrong people into supervisory positions. How do these bosses get their jobs in the first place? Easy: they walk right into them under the organization's radar.
Who picked THEM? How did THEY get here?
We've known for many years that successful performance in doing the work is not a predictor of successful performance in supervising others who do the same work. The skill sets are qualitatively different. Still, organizations promoting employees into supervisory positions follow the well trodden path called "promote and pray":
"You're the best worker, so naturally you'll be a good supervisor, too. I hereby dub thee Supervisor. Go forth into the department and supervise. (Dear God, I hope he works out okay.)"

What gets overlooked is the most important determinant of supervisors' success: how they use the power that they now have for the first time.
You'd think that this was a closely guarded secret, but it's not being hidden on purpose. Senior managers don't consider the position of front line supervisor to be a powerful one, so they don't take power into consideration when promoting. However, the supervisor's employees view the position as having lots of power. And what separates one supervisor from another, in the eyes of the people they supervise, is how they use the power that comes with the job. With the promotion comes access to organizational power for the first time.
The feelings and opinions of top performers about their supervisors matter. The more those impressions are negative, the more vulnerable top performers are to external recruiters.
Presto! You're powerful!
The day before their appointments take effect, supervisors have no organizational power. The next day, all of a sudden, they have the power to:

Hire and fire
Reward and discipline
Assign work
Schedule people's time
Make pay decisions/recommendations
Evaluate and rate performances
Set policy within the unit
Assign work space
Regulate work loads
Make decisions and enforce them
With the possible exception of rating performances, new supervisors won't be coached or trained on any of these powers.
When supervisors are new, employees take careful note of certain issues that involve the use of supervisory power:

What gets rewarded and what gets punished?
Does the supervisor play favourites?
Who gets the good assignments? Who tends to get the "Joe jobs"?
How does the supervisor interpret company policies (e.g. dress code, code of conduct) for the unit?
Are work loads fairly equal most of the time, or are some people chronically overloaded, while others seem to be underutilized?
How does the supervisor recognize achievements?
Is poor performance tolerated? Is superior performance recognized? Do performance ratings truly recognize different performances? Or is the supervisor's tendency to rate everybody the same?
When someone is being disciplined or counseled, is it done in private or does everybody hear it?
Are employees included in making decisions? Which decisions? Which employees are included?
Are staff meetings held? How well organized are they? Are they productive, or are they a "waste of time"?

The bad boss: the headhunter's best friend
Clearly, front line supervisors are critical to their employees' perceptions of their jobs. And employees are highly attuned to how their supervisors use power. Organizations that want to keep their top performers will also want to assess supervisory candidates for how they're likely to use power. As long as such assessments are left out, the door is open for the boss from hell to waltz in.
"Nearly all men can stand adversity. If you really want to test a man's character, give him power."
--Abraham Lincoln

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Tim Rutledge, Ph.D., is Partner, Retention Services and Director of the Centre for Employee Retention and Engagement Services with IQ PARTNERS Inc., an executive search and human resources consulting firm. You can contact Tim at rutledge@iqpartners.com.

Disclaimer: Advice and recommendations are based on limited information provided and should be used as a guideline only. Neither the author nor CharityVillage.com make any warranty, express or implied, or assume any legal liability for accuracy, completeness, or usefulness of any information provided in whole or in part within this article.