Beware the office derailer

Iain McCormick

Some people have such severe personality flaws that they are unfit to be managers and end up causing tremendous damage when they are put into positions of authority.

Dr Iain McCormick, managing director of the Executive Coaching Centre, says there are several different types of bad managers or 'derailers', the worst of which is the office psychopath.

"There are people who are not just derailers but people who are really very noxious. These people are typically very good at managing up and are very poor at managing down. They are known as psychopathic personalities," he says.

McCormick says that although many people have a degree of ability to live their lives outside of the norm, these people take it to the extreme. They are cold, manipulative and resourceful. But the worst part is that they fit in quite well in the modern workplace.

"In our fast-paced world sometimes these traits are seen as, or mistaken for, leadership. They can be competent but often are deeply insecure. What they tend to do is to overcompensate for that insecurity by being bullying, pushy and manipulative."

Many people might be able to identify this type of person in their own offices but people who are actually working for an office psychopath are in big trouble.

"There is very little that staff can do. You need to understand what you're dealing with. I think it needs to be dealt with at a relatively high level and staying out of their way as best you can and finding something else or changing departments or something is generally the best thing that you can do."

It is not possible to reason with them and you should never plead with them because they will only take advantage. Logic is not of any value, McCormick says. If staff decide to act, they should be prepared to suffer the consequences.

"If you're going to exercise power against these kinds of people then you need to do it with care because they typically will want to get back at you."

McCormick says they are able to demoralise people, decrease productivity and thwart people's careers. They can function in the workplace for some time before being discovered. "These people are superficially rather pleasant but when you confront them, then they turn into something completely different.

"Power and prestige and money and all the other things that draw most people into management draw these people in as well."

However, New Zealand workplaces may have an upper hand in flushing these people out.

"New Zealand companies are quite attuned to it because for better or worse New Zealand has this kind of egalitarian ethos in it. Whether it's egalitarian in reality is another thing. But our egalitarian ethos means that we're sensitive to people who are bullying."

McCormick says there are clues one can use to identify an office psychopath.

"Typically the way in which they come to my attention is through senior people who have been manipulated by them or occasionally boards who've hired a CEO where it all suddenly turns very difficult."

But not every dysfunctional manager is a fully-fledged psychopath.

David George, organisational psychologist and director of Cerno, has identified six other less sinister flaws or derailers which regularly come up in his work which make people unsuitable to be managers.

The first one is 'the impostor syndrome'. These managers, he says, are unconfident and never feel good enough for their role. They are self conscious and anxious and dismiss their achievements. They dwell on decisions to find out what went wrong and don't take necessary risks.

Then there is the person who sees everything in 'black and white'. They can't see shades of grey and rely solely on logic. They perceive everything as right or wrong and have disproportionately strong views on things.

The 'better and faster' derailer sees managers doing too much and pushing people too hard. These are the micromanagers who are never satisfied. They are super efficient and depend a lot on themselves while demanding too much of others.

"They consistently try to do more. They whip themselves and therefore others at top speed. People don't want to work for them."

'Thank you' is a difficult thing to say for these managers and they end up repelling staff.

"For the organisation it turns into a huge problem around not being able to achieve or get staff into the area or be able to deliver. The person works themselves into the ground. All the company can do is take that person out of that management role if they persist to behave like that."

One of the most common derailers in New Zealand is 'avoiding conflict'. The manager will go out of their way to avoid an uncomfortable situation.

"The pain of actually confronting the issue is a lot more daunting for them than the pain of the continuing problem."

Managers with the 'pessimistic outlook' derailer fear making mistakes to the point where it stifles innovation and creativity. They spend their time being constantly worried about things going wrong.

But the worst derailer is the 'Mr Spock' - a character in the 1960's sci-fi show Star Trek. These managers are emotionally tone deaf and have no idea how their behaviour impacts on others.

"We regard it as the most fatal derailer. They will never respond as needed to the person. They will only respond to the issue. Therefore workers do not feel valued, listened to, considered or even respected."

The 'Mr Spocks' are not unkind people but are simply incapable of picking up social cues. George says they are great at delivering the difficult messages but also end up causing a lot of damage.

"They often respond without a trace of social empathy. They don't waste time on social niceties."

Often managers are typically promoted into management because they were good at the type of work they were doing at the company. But a good worker does not necessarily make a competent manager.

"The impact on staff of almost any of these derailers is significant which is the reason we see them as derailers. But managers can have elements of these derailers and still be successful."

George says good managers view themselves as a work in progress and are always looking to learn and improve. They acknowledge their own weaknesses and put in place strategies to address them. They also get good people around them to compensate.

But managers with entrenched derailers in their personality who do nothing to address the issues will need to be removed from their positions.

However, George says the New Zealand employment laws make it harder to deal effectively with these people.

"When you're getting somebody who's just refusing to cooperate or recognise that they have these flaws, it makes it very difficult to get rid of them.

"As a result, organisations know that to go down that track is going to cost them in a way in which they perceive they cannot afford. So, they deal with it by tolerating the problem."