More than two decades ago, after about a year in a new job, my manager informed me that my job did not belong on the salary scale it was placed. He said it belonged on a higher scale, so I needed to be promoted.
In order for this to happen, the job had to be re-evaluated to find its appropriate salary band. Since I was the one on the job, he told me to rewrite the job description to reflect what I was actually doing. As a starting point, he gave me the existing job description which was written about a year earlier when the position was created.
Excited, I worked feverishly on the task for about two weeks to ensure that all bases were covered. I delivered my final product to him and then . . .
Nothing happened.
For several months.
Then, I discovered that the set of documents I had produced was sitting at the bottom of the stack of his physical inbox of documents. Those were the days when there were physical Inbox and Outbox trays containing piles of papers on most managers' desks.
Thinking the documents got where I found them by accident, I moved them to the top of his Inbox.
But a week later, they had miraculously found their way back to the bottom of the pile. That's when I knew it wasn't a mistake. It seemed he was just going to seat on it. The urgency with which he had told me to prepare the documents was gone.
I gave it another couple of months to be sure I wasn't mistaken.
When I was certain he wasn't going to do anything, I took my case to his boss, who was the head of our department. I was careful not to accuse my manager of anything. I simply asked his boss about the status of my job re-evaluation which was supposed to have started about 6 months prior.
His boss told me he knew nothing about it. Then he asked me to give him a copy of the information I had put together.
A week later, he walked into my office and told me we had a strong case and that he would be taking it up with Human Resources. The promotion happened within a reasonable time.
My manager knew nothing about the entire long and arduous process it took. He only found out when he was copied on a letter sent to me by HR, inviting me to the promotion interview. He was furious but said nothing to me. I found out how he felt about a year later when he told me himself.
But he had proven to me that I couldn't trust him.
So, when I decided to leave the company about a year later, I didn't tell him. I sought advice instead from his manager and his manager's supervisor, who was my functional head. These people were great allies who supported and advocated for me every step of the way.
My manager's modus operandi was to suppress those he believed were threats to his own position. I saw this behavior not only in how he dealt with me but with most of us who reported to him. He was a toxic manager in an otherwise good company.
I've seen a lot written lately about toxic workplaces. Most of the blame for toxic workplaces have been placed at the feet of toxic leaders, and rightly so.
But I think this blame is misplaced.
It's true that toxic leaders are responsible for creating toxic work environments. They're the main reason for low levels of employee engagement. Many people leave companies because of them. Still, I don't think they're the root of the problem.
I don't think we should blame them completely.
𝑰 𝒃𝒆𝒍𝒊𝒆𝒗𝒆 𝒕𝒉𝒆 𝒖𝒍𝒕𝒊𝒎𝒂𝒕𝒆 𝒓𝒆𝒔𝒑𝒐𝒏𝒔𝒊𝒃𝒊𝒍𝒊𝒕𝒚 𝒍𝒊𝒆𝒔 𝒘𝒊𝒕𝒉 𝒕𝒉𝒐𝒔𝒆 𝒘𝒉𝒐 𝒑𝒖𝒕 𝒕𝒉𝒆𝒎 𝒊𝒏 𝒕𝒉𝒐𝒔𝒆 𝒍𝒆𝒂𝒅𝒆𝒓𝒔𝒉𝒊𝒑 𝒑𝒐𝒔𝒊𝒕𝒊𝒐𝒏𝒔.
These are the real architects of toxic workplace culture.
When an organization has a flawed approach to evaluating leadership potential, most of its leaders will be flawed and crooked. I have seen situations in which being arrogant and brash were seen as positive leadership traits. They mistake such arrogant display of confidence for competence.
So they elevate these people, who in turn bring down the fortunes of their organization. It's only after their dysfunction is easily apparent that they realize their mistake. Then they hurriedly get rid of these toxic leaders.
And replace them with other toxic leaders.
Why?
Because toxic tend to use flawed approaches to pick the next set of toxic leaders. What this ensures is that the vicious cycle of toxic and incompetent leadership continues full throttle. That's until sanity is restored, or the organization is destroyed.
This then begs the question: How should an organization evaluate leadership potential?
I recently came across an interesting and simple assessment. It calculates your probability of being an incompetent leader. The assessment asks 9 simple questions and takes less than a minute to complete. Yet, it's been found to be surprisingly accurate.
As a leader or aspiring leader, I dare you to take it!
You can also encourage your entire leadership team to take it. Here's the link to it.
And if you're bold enough, share your results in the comments below. Tell us your probability of being an incompetent leader.
