Robert I. Sutton's Blog, page 21

  

I had the privilege of speaking at the Better By Design CEO Summit in New Zealand last week, which was a delightful event for 300 or so executives.  It was intended to spread knowledge and whip-up enthusiasm about design thinking among businesses in that lovely country.  Our master of ceremonies was the charming and astute Jeremy Moon (pictured above), who is both the Chairman of Better By Design (a New Zealand government group that develops and spreads design thinking), and is also CEO of a firm called Icebreaker, which makes very cool high-tech wool clothing.   Go here to see the line-up of speakers, here for a press report, and here for their blog.  To give you a biased take on the conference, I thought it would be fun to just list some of the cool things I heard people say, as they said a lot of fascinating things that got me thinking.  If you would like to leave a comment, let me know what especially struck you -- positive or negative -- and why.

Most of these aren't exact quotes, rather they are the product of my lousy note taking.  So I apologize for any errors or misrepresentations.

From  Marty Neumeier, author of the The Designful Company:

Design thinking helps close the gap between knowing and doing, which I call "dragon gap:" When the old map makers wanted to represent uncharted territory, they drew pictures of dragons to represent the scary unknown.

"We intend to keep innovating" (How Steve Jobs reportedly answered a question about how Apple plans to keep growing.)

Design is like a sound that only dogs can hear.

Business keeps speeding-up, but our brains aren't getting any faster.

A wealth of information creates a paucity of attention.

Even the lone ranger didn't work alone.

From Dick Powell, Co-founder Seymourpowell, a UK-based design firm:

Anthropolology before technology.

Slow is the new fast.

The never ending now.

You can't make a massive change all at once.  The smartest people and companies find ways to keep winning a little bit along the way.

From Adam Lowry, Co-founder and Chief Greens Keeper, Method Products

Design is the first signal of human intention (quoting William McDonough)

Design advances slowly but not gradually -- there are long periods where not much happens, punctuated by periods of rapid and dramatic change.  It is like the theory of punctuated equilibrium from evolutionary biology; change happens in fits and starts, in step functions.

Good design creates good stories.

We got a lot of free PR, including on Jay Leno's show, for writing advertising copy claiming that our products make your stuff "fricken clean."

We are in "a constant state of make" at Method.

We are "people against dirty" and one of our primary challenges is to "Keep Method weird."

When asked why Method keeps innovating, he answered "our people give a shit."

We had over 300 SKU's in 2007; now we have about 110.

I have a veto, but the most powerful thing I can do is to never use it."

We would rather have a hole (an unfilled position) than an asshole at Method.

From a panel of who described their design thinking study tour to Silicon Valley, which was composed of executives from New Zealand firms and was sponsored by Better By Design -- and was led by Perry Klebahn and Diego Rodriguez:

Think big, but make it happen step by step'

To fail is not shameful.

Teams that do beat teams that talk.

I am going to get rid of my office and sit with my people.

Keeping  and growing good people, and strengthening the culture, those are our biggest business risks.( Heard at Method and Google).

Its hard.

At Google, they told us "above all, we try not to hire bullies."

We started out last and finished first in a tire changing competition -- that was a wake-up call.

We were way ahead in the tire change competition, so we started resting on our laurels and we didn't question our assumptions. So the the team that started out worst beat us in the end.  (The tire changing exercise is something I have written about here at HBR.org) 

Alan Webber, co-founder of Fast Company, author of Rules of Thumb, and Global Detective:

 This conference keeps going back to a pair of themes I hear everyplace I go now, leadership and change.

I went to a conference recently where two CEOs of big companies told their people, essentially, that everything will be fine, there is no need to worry.  They pretended to be for change but were really against it.

The best changes preserve the best of what is already there and get rid of the rest. 

If you want to change things, make hard things easier. Or raise the cost the cost of the status quo. Or do both.

Design thinking plays important roles including serving as a problem poser, problem solver, a sensemaking tool, a source of differentiation. It also can be a source inspiration and aspiration.

When I worked for the City of Portland, Oregon, my boss defined a strategy as anything that solves more than one problem at a time.  That was part of the philosophy that helped transform the city into one of the best places to live in U.S.

The world is thirsty for difference.

Design is too important to be left to designers .

You don't have to it all in one bite (talking about change)

 Rob Fyfe, CEO of Air new Zealand, is a national hero for leading the airline from financial ruin, deep despair, and shame to a place infused pride and excellence -- not just among its employees but among every New Zealander I talked to about the airline (which was dozens, as everyone from taxi drivers to teenagers brought it up).  It was just named ATW Airline of the Year, the industry's most prestigious award.

The airline suffered from a loss of self-belief and pride.

All the smiling people had left.

My challenge is to bring people to life.

It would be like going to a Greenpeace rally in a Hummer (on the challenge of claiming that an airline is green)

We had delusions of global dominance.   Yet, in the end, we realized that all we had was our New Zealandes --  not so much the beauty of the country, but the charms and quirks of our people.

I don't spend a lot of time on spreadsheets; I spend it  with my people or thinking about my people.  Several members of my board thought that was all wrong and I should be spending most of my time on financials, but they have come around.

I spend a day each month doing a job on the airline -- working as a flight attendant, a baggage handler, anything but a pilot!

We use real words, not business language or jargon.  That other stuff sounds fake.

One of our most successful campaigns featured our people "body pai nted;" it started with one of our pilots on a billboard and the motto is that our "staff have nothing to hide."

This isn't meant to be a linear post that makes a clear and integrated point-- rather it is a kind of like a Rorschach Test, one of those projective tests where personality and hidden conflicts are allegedly revealed when a person is asked to describe what he or she sees in abstract pictures, images, or artwork.   But I can say that the main thing I was left after the conference and my other social activities with was that the people in New Zealand are an intriguing mix of proud and modest, and competitive and cooperative, and as Diego Rodriguez pointed out, they have a can do attitude in combination with a no asshole rule.  So New Zealanders are well-suited to the design mindset and methods and are a lot of fun to work with.

Finally, a big thanks to my hosts from Better By Design including Judith Thompson,  Vijayan Kutta, Miriam Wilkins, and Nicky Toresen.  They were fun and extremely competent -- and I appreciate their tolerance of my various quirks.

  

I had the privilege of speaking at the Better By Design CEO Summit in New Zealand last week, which was a delightful event for 300 or so executives.  It was intended to spread knowledge and whip-up enthusiasm about design thinking among businesses in that lovely country.  Our master of ceremonies was the charming and astute Jeremy Moon (pictured above), who is both the Chairman of Better By Design (a New Zealand government group that develops and spreads design thinking), and is also CEO of a firm called Icebreaker, which makes very cool high-tech wool clothing.   Go here to see the line-up of speakers, here for a press report, and here for their blog.  To give you a biased take on the conference, I thought it would be fun to just list some of the cool things I heard people say, as people said a lot of fascinating things that got me thinking.  If you would like to leave a comment, let me know what especially struck you -- positive or negative -- and why.

Most of these aren't exact quotes, rather they are the product of my lousy note taking.  So I apologize for any errors or misrepresentations.

From  Marty Neumeier, author of the The Designful Company:

Design thinking helps close the gap between knowing and doing, which I call "dragon gap" because when the old map makers wanted to represent uncharted territory, they drew pictures of dragons to represent the scary unknown.

"We intend to keep innovating" (How Steve Jobs reportedly answered a question about how Apple plans to keep growing.)

Design is like a sound that only dogs can hear.

Business keeps speeding-up, but our brains aren't getting any faster.

A wealth of information creates a paucity of attention

Even the lone ranger didn't work alone.

From Dick Powell, Co-founder Seymourpowell, a UK-based design firm:

Anthropolology before technology.

Slow is the new fast.

The never ending now.

You can't make a massive change all at once.  The smartest people and companies find ways to keep winning a little bit along the way.

From Adam Lowry, Co-founder and Chief Greens Keeper, Method Products

Design is the first signal of human intention (quoting William McDonough)

Design advances slowly but not gradually -- there are long periods where not much happens, punctuated by periods of rapid and dramatic change.  It is like the theory of punctuated equilibrium from evolutionary biology; change happens in fits and starts, in step functions.

Good design creates good stories.

We got a lot of free PR, including on Jay Leno's show, for writing advertising copy claiming that our products make your stuff "fricken clean."

We are in "a constant state of make" at Method.

We are "people against dirty" and one of our primary challenges is to "Keep Method weird."

When asked why Method keeps innovating, he answered "our people give a shit."

We had over 300 SKU's in 2007; now we have about 110.

I have a veto, but the most powerful thing I can do is to never use it."

We would rather have a hole (an unfilled position) than an asshole at Method.

From a panel of who described their design thinking study tour to Silicon Valley, which was composed of executives from New Zealand firms and was sponsored by Better By Design -- and was led by Perry Klebahn and Diego Rodriguez:

Think big, but make it happen step by step

To fail is not shameful

Teams that do beat teams that talk

I am going to get rid of my office and sit with my people

Keep and growing good people, and strengthening the culture, is the biggest business risk.

Its hard

At Google, they told us "above all, we try not to hire bullies."

We started out last and finished first in a tire changing competition -- that was a a wake-up call.

We were way ahead in the tire change competition, so we started resting on our laurels and we didn't question or assumptions. So the the team that started out worst beat us in the end.  (The tire changing exercise is something I have written about here at HBR.org) 

Alan Webber, co-founder of Fast Company, author of Rules of Thumb, and Global Detective:

 This conference keeps going back to a pair of themes I hear everyplace I go now, leadership and change.

I went to a conference recently where two CEOs of big companies told their people, essentially, that everything will be fine, there is no need to worry.  They pretended to be for change but were really against it.

The best changes preserve the best of what is already there and get rid of the west. 

If you want to change things, make hard things easier. Or raise the cost the cost of the status quo. Or do both.

Design thinking plays important roles including serving as a problem poser, problem solver, a sensemaking tool, a source of differentiation. It also can be a source inspiration and aspiration.

When I worked for the City of Portland, Oregon, my boss defined a strategy as anything that solves more than one problem at a time.  That was part of the philosophy that helped transform the city into one of the best places to live in U.S.

The world is thirsty for difference.

Design is too important to be left to designers .

You don't have to it all in one bite (talking about change)

 Rob Fyfe, CEO of Air new Zealand, who is a national hero for leading the airline from financial ruin, deep despair, and shame to a place infused pride and excellence -- not just among its employees but among every New Zealander I talked to about the airline (which was dozens, as everyone from taxi drivers to teenagers brought it up).  It was just named ATW Airline of the Year, the industry's most prestigious award.

The airline suffered from a loss of self-belief and pride.

All the smiling people had left.

My challenge is to bring people to life.

It would be like going to a Greenpeace rally in a Hummer (on the challenge of claiming that an airline is green)

We had delusions of global dominance.   Yet, in the end, we realized that all we had was our New Zealandes -- and not so much the beauty of the country, but the charms and quirks of our people.
 

I don't spend a lot of time on spreadsheets; I spend it  with my people or thinking about my people.  Several members of my board thought that was all wrong and I should be spending most of my time on financials, but they have come around.

I spend a day each month doing a job on the airline -- working as a flight attendant, a baggage handler, anything but a pilot!

We use real words, not business language or jargon.  That other stuff sounds fake.

One of our most successful campaigns featured our people "body pai nted;" it started with one of our pilots on a billboard and the motto is that our "staff have nothing to hide."

This isn't meant to be a linear post that makes a clear and integrated point-- rather it is a kind of like a Rorschach Test, one of those projective tests where personality and hidden conflicts are allegedly revealed when a person is asked to describe what he or she sees in abstract pictures, images, or artwork.   But I can say that the main thing I was left after the conference and my other social activities with was that the people in New Zealand are an intriguing mix of proud and modest, and competitive and cooperative, and as Diego Rodriguez pointed out, they have a can do attitude in combination with a no asshole rule.  So New Zealanders are well-suited to the design mindset and methods and are a lot of fun to work with.

Finally, a big thanks to my hosts from Better By Design including Judith Thompson,  Vijayan Kutta, Miriam Wilkins, and Nicky Toresen.  They were fun and extremely competent -- and I appreciate their tolerance of my various quirks.

I wrote a post a couple weeks back about some intriguing (although flawed) surveys that suggest the downturn may have resulted in better relationships between employees and their bosses.   An article just came out at Human Resource Executive called "Is the Recession Making the Boss Friendlier" that digs further into these rather surprising findings and quotes some of my arguments about why relationships may have improved better, especially that incompetent bosses of all kinds may have been shown the door as part of the workforce cuts that so many organizations have made.  I was rather disturbed, however, by an argument at the end of the article by a management consultant that seems to be arguing for the virtues of tough bosses -- and that downplays the importance of compassion, treating people with respect, and treating them with dignity.  The article says:

But Alan Weiss, an organizational development consultant, author, and president of Summit Consulting Group Inc. in East Greenwich, Conn., says the results of the two surveys won't change one simple fact.

"The role of a boss is not to be friendly, but to direct, give instruction, lead and make hard decisions. You can't give honest and tough evaluations to friends," he says.

The lesson for HR is simple, he says: "Help managers to manage, not to merely try to influence; help employees understand that a tough boss who helps them succeed is far better than a friendly one who just wants to be 'one of the crowd.' "

Alan's last line bugs because it sets up a false choice, sort of like arguing that it is better to be kicked in the head than to have your eye poked out.  Yes, all good bosses need to do tough things -- negative feedback, giving people assignments they don't want, and implementing firings and layoffs when need be.   But as I have written here before, write in Good Boss, Bad Boss, and talk about at the McKinsey site, there is a difference between what a boss does and how he or she does it,  The best bosses do the dirty work with humanity and compassion. And providing support to people to help them succeed includes a big dose of emotional support. 

Bosses who push for performance above all else and don't give a hoot about the dignity and respect of their people do a poor job of developing their people and -- as much research shows -- will be condemned to have subordinates who are less likely to make an extra effort to work harder and longer and who leave for new jobs at higher rates,   Yes, I agree with Alan that your boss isn't always your friend (but sometimes this does happen, and it can be a good thing) -- but I get sick and tired of people who celebrate tough and heartless bosses.  I don't want to work for one and, as much research shows, most employees don.t want to either. And, as I have suggested here before, a hallmark of such bosses who do succeed is that they pair up with a "toxic handler" or two to soothe those they damage and to clean up the messes they leave in their wake. 

I have written extensively in The No Asshole Rule, in Good Boss, Bad Boss, and numerous posts (like this one) about the dangers of power poisoning, about how when people hold positions of authority over others, it often leads them to become more focused on their own needs, less focused on the needs and reactions of others, to act like the rules don't apply to them -- along with a host of unattractive responses including the lack of impulse control and the tendency to dehiumanize others.   In this vein, I worked with the folks at BNET to do two posts (which just appeared) on a particular form of power poisoning, which I call "penis poisoning."  The first post is called "Would You Let Lust Ruin Your Career?"  Here is the opening:

An old Yiddish saying in Portnoy's Complaint – Phillip Roth's lewd classic – describes the misguided behavior of all too many powerful men: Ven der putz shteht, ligt der sechel in drerd, which means "When the prick stands up, the brains get buried in the ground." From recent academic research and press reports, it's clear that power can poison even the most intelligent and well-meaning people when they take influential positions.

I then explain a bit about the effects of power poisoning and offer advice for powerful men, starting with "Accept that you, as the owner a penis, are at risk."  The second post is what BNET calls a "rogues gallery"  called "Sex, Lies, and Stupidity;" which considers men who have apparently had impulse control problems of this kind ranging from former senator Larry Craig, to Bill Clinton, to Tiger Woods, to former HP CEO Mark Hurd, to pedophile Catholic priests.

Sex is always fascinating to us human beings and so these posts are already generating comments. Yes, it is an entertaining topic, but it is also a serious one.  Penis poisoning ruins many people's lives -- and is something that many organizations handle badly. 

 
You may recall that, about a month ago, I asked readers for examples of clueless, comical, and cruel bosses.  You did a wonderful job -- via comments and emails -- of sending in over 100 awful actions.   I promised I would list my favorites -- the worst of the worst -- here.  It took me longer than I expected to get to it, but I finally did this week.  The top 14 are presented at Huffington Post as a slide show, with all sorts of bells and whistles (you can vote on each boss and other things).  The call it "Horror Stories About The World's Worst Bosses."   The first slide is pictured above.  The caption is:

1.      "Giving the first employee of the month award to himself."

Below are the other 14 I sent them (they cut one) followed by a bonus example:

2.      Showed appreciation by giving an employee an ipod (except he's deaf)

3.      My first boss was the founding partner of a mid-sized law firm in Boston….He used to come in every morning, vise-grip my head with his hands, kiss the top of it, and say "hello my luv, ho-e-you, ho-e-you". Then he'd proceed to shred me all day long. His best moments were after I was sick and lost too much weight, used to walk around screaming "where's the damned stick with t*ts?." Really. I worked for him for 15 years. Then I went to one of the biggest firms in Boston, worked for the chairman of a big department. He started farting really loud when they made him not be chairman anymore. The special times were when he got really mad, and people would try to talk over it, and he'd push even harder, and they'd jump an octave.

4.      A very attractive female direct report was working while sick. He shouted "! You're looking mighty ugly today!" Saying it once wasn't enough. He said it very loudly about 3 or 4 times.

5.      My wife's boss eats pork chops in team meetings, then picks her teeth.

6.      He kept me from conferring with the doctors that were treating my mother for a brain tumor.

7.      I had one boss who used to call meetings, invite a bunch of people, and of course there was no agenda so we didn't even know what we were supposed to be discussing. Then, just as everybody arrived, his cell phone would go off and he would excuse himself to go take a lengthy personal call while the rest of us just sat in the conference room twiddling our thumbs. What a waste of time!!

8.      When flying on the company plane, (facing seats), if her feet are cold, she just jams them up under the ass of the person across from her.

9.      I once worked for a firm whose chief executive made promotion decisions based on graphology, astrology, and a variety of pseudo-scientific techniques. For instance, she would secretly acquire handwriting samples from new staff and decide on appropriate placement and position for each person based on the results. This activity was shared only with her direct reports. I learned all this to my horror when I was promoted into her staff (evidently I unknowingly passed the "tests"). I wanted to promote a very talented subordinate to a junior management position; a promotion she vehemently opposed on the grounds that an analysis of his handwriting and "aura" had revealed him to be deceptive and deceitful.

10.   He gave his employees used, counterfeit designer watches to reward them for their efforts.

11.   Clips finger nails in meetings.

12.   When a group of us were checking into a hotel for an out of town customer meeting, hitched up his pants and asked, young, female desk clerk: "Where can a man go to get some in this town?

13.    One boss I had used to start meetings with, "I can't sit down, I've just been ass-raped." In an ocean of inappropriateness, that one stands out!

14.    I worked as nurse a few years back at a facility where the manager encouraged nurses to order extra valium when placing narcotic orders with the hospital pharmacy so staff "could have few for personal use.

15.    My boss ordered her best friend (also her subordinate) to collect money from the other subordinates to buy a $600 bracelet for her birthday

Finally, perhaps my favorite bosshole of all time apparently "water boarded" a subordinate at company picnic to increase motivation is his sales team. As the Washington Post reported in April of 2008:

No one really disputes that Chad Hudgens was waterboarded outside a Provo office park last May 29, right before lunch, by his boss.

There is also general agreement that Hudgens volunteered for the "team-building exercise," that he lay on his back with his head downhill, and that co-workers knelt on either side of him, pinning the young sales rep down while their supervisor poured water from a gallon jug over his nose and mouth.

And it's widely acknowledged that the supervisor, Joshua Christopherson, then told the assembled sales team, whose numbers had been lagging: "You saw how hard Chad fought for air right there. I want you to go back inside and fight that hard to make sales."

Thank so much for sending in all those stories!  I think it is time for a list of good bosses! These stories are fun in a sick kind of way, but it is important to remember that most bosses out there are doing a pretty good job and are aiming to get better.

On Wednesday, I was lucky enough to be invited back to give a second Good Boss, Bad Boss talk at Pixar.   I love Pixar. Not just because they are so cool, but because of the deep and relentless commitment to quality and humanity. If you have not heard it, I urge you to listen to this Fresh Air interview about Toy Story 3 -- if you listen closely to how they approached their work, you can hear almost everything you need to know about design thinking and leading creative work.  As one little example, which illustrates "Failure Sucks But Instructs," note that they had 60 different drafts of an especially crucial scene.  Also, as an illustration that creative people and companies have a kind of "storehouse" of rejected ideas that they keep trying to apply to new problems (sort of like a bin of old parts), listen to the example of Lotso, a character who was invented but discarded for an earlier film but who worked great in Toy Story 3 (See Andy Hargadon's book if you really want to dig into this perspective).

I could go on and on, but this post is about the new phrase I learned at Pixar.  I was speaking at an internal event, which was meant to help people at Pixar get to know each other better (I am going to omit names so I don't break any confidences). Before my talk, there was a hilarous interview with a Pixar insider, and one of the best parts was when she was asked her favorite swear word.  She mentioned a traditional one, but then added her new favorite was "shit show."   As with the rest of the group, I was quite taken with it.  Of course, shit show is already in the Urban Dictionary.  There are 13 definitions, but I like the most popular best:

A description of an event or situation which is characterized by an ridiculously inordinate amount of frenetic activity. Disorganization and chaos to an absurd degree. Often associated with extreme ineptitude/incompetence and or sudden and unexpected failure. Similar: fiasco clusterfuck

"The picnic turned into a real shit show because that bozo decided to throw rocks at that hornet's nest."

As I joked to the audience, while I have resisted doing a sequel to The No Asshole Rule, I am a bit tempted to do a book called The No Shit Show Rule!

I just noticed this little milestone. According to stats supplied by Typepad, Work Matters passed 1.5 million page views this week (1514242 at the moment). Typepad also shows Work Matters has averaged 946.99 page views per day.  I've done 1002 posts (wow... what a blabbermouth) and you've made 4404 comments.

It seems like I just started blogging yesterday, but I wrote my first post on about June 10th, 2006. It just said "hi, I am blogging" basically, and I deleted it (now I am sorry). My first substantive post was called Brainstorming in the Wall Street Journal in which I commented, and challenged, research and stories suggesting that "brainstorming doesn't work." My next post was called Masters of the Obvious, which argued that the best managers don't do magical, mysterious, or massively complex things well -- they use widely known, well-understood, and simple methods, and implement them relentessly and well.  This theme perists in Good Boss, Bad Boss and in this HBR post.

Looking ahead, I am thinking about finding an alternative to Typepad as I find it most user-unfriendly.  The editor is awful and does strange and unexpected things to my text that I can't figureo ut how to repair.  If you have any suggestions, please let me know.  Also, will keep blogging away, but anticipate that my range of topics will get broader as I am starting a couple new projects.  I also expect that I will blog a bit less in the coming year or so because I will start writing one, possibly two, new books. I also expect, knowing me, that at some point I will stop blogging.  I can't predict when, but I give myself standing permission to stop doing things when they are no fun any longer!

As I am in a reflective mood about this blog, it would be great to hear some feedback from readers. What do you want more of? What do you want less of?  Any ideas about how to improve things?

Finally, I want to thank all of you for reading my blog over the years, for your comments and emails, and for all the wisdom you've provided over the years.

Kevin and the gang at Fast Company asked if they could publish a second excerpt from Good Boss, Bad Boss.  They picked my list of 11 Bosshole Busters from Chapter 8 and tuned it into a slide show. You can see it here (that's the first slide above and I like the picture they used below for one of the slides, although I would not want to be that woman).  I confess the slideshow is a lot more fun than the black and white list in the book.

 

I got a note from my book publicist, the relentless and civilized Mark Fortier, about an interesting new study.  Here is what the inquiry said: "A new survey by Adecco (http://bit.ly/9jvwdW) finds that more than three-quarters of bosses say their relationships with workers has improved in the past three years because of the recession."   When I clicked on the link, I saw that, indeed, the survey of 1000 employees and bosses found "78 percent of bosses say they feel closer to their teams than they did three years ago (pre-recession) and 61 percent of employees agree."   I would take this survey with a gran of salt, as it does not appear to use a representative sample, but it is interesting when taken together with other recent research (using better samples) that show about 80% of U.S. employees report feeling respected and supported by their bosses and the 2010 WBI/Zogby survey that shows the percentage of U.S. employees who report being bullied at work has dropped from about 13% to 9% since their 2010 survey. 

Mark asked what might explain these findings, why despite all the fear, layoffs, and extra hours worked, bosses and employees might be feeling better about each other than before the meltdown, and might even be treating each other better too!  Several reasons occlude to me, and I would love to know other reasons that might occur to you:

1. Fewer rotten bosses. The downsizing and such that so many firms have gone through during the last three years mean that bad bosses of all kinds have been weeded-out, or put on notice that if they don't improve, they will be shown the door. So incompetent bosses of all kinds have been shown the door, which includes those who are not respected by their followers and who treat their followers like dirt.  Certainly, plenty of civilized and competent bosses have been shown the door during the downturn, but perhaps organizations have used it to get rid of the rotten apples -- and as I discuss in Good Boss Bad Boss and here at HBR, rotten apples do massive damage.

2. The civility movement.  During the last few years, perhaps the tolerance for nasty and disrespectful bosses has decreased.  I see the popularity of The Power of Nice,  The Civility Solution, The No Asshole Rule as symptoms of this movement, as it would delusional to view a few books as a cause.   Perhaps the weight of one press report after another on bullying and lousy bosses helped with the cause.  And perhaps the lawyers have played a role as there are more cases of bully bosses – even equal opportunity bossholes – getting sued and paying big sums.   So between the "opportunity" to get rid of nasty bosses with the downturn, the increasing society pressure to not tolerate such behavior, and the realization by more bosses that being a good boss entails treating people with respect, a bit of change has occurred in the composition and behavior of the workforce.

3.  Thinking about money less.  Another explanation, which I heard from a CEO of a company that has gone through numerous rounds of layoffs, is interesting. When his company was growing like crazy and competitors were as well there was a sense on strong competition is his firm as people believed that they had to battle to "get mine."  And indeed, this is consistent with research that shows, when the focus in life is on money, people become more selfish and see others as "the enemy." 

4. Compassion and mutual support. The multiple rounds of layoffs that occurred in some companies appears to have encouraged some bosses  and "surviving" employees to their attention turn attention to the "humanity" part of the job, to giving people support who have lost jobs and -- among survivors -- to bond together to get through the stressful times.  An inspiring example from Intel ends Good Boss, Bad Boss:

Intel executive Patricia (Pat) McDonald demonstrated similar awareness in 2006 when managing a factory in Hillsboro, Oregon.  As part of a company-wide reduction, several managers at the plant lost jobs.  An engineer who worked for Pat, Sumit Guha, told me how "she recounted the contributions of these employees in an open forum, wishing them luck, acknowledging that these employees were being let go for no fault of their own, and we all gave these employees a hand in appreciation of their contributions."   Things got worse in early 2009 when Intel announced the factory would cease production at year's end because it was using older technology – and approximately 1000 workers would lose their positions. Pat not only expressed concern and compassion, she took a stance demonstrating that she had her employees' backs.   Pat quickly announced to her team that although output metrics would continue to be important, helping people get through the transition was a higher priority – especially finding affected employees new jobs inside and outside of Intel.  Pat and her team not only provided extensive outplacement counseling and related services, they personally visited numerous local employers to campaign for new jobs for their people. Managers and employees emulated this behavior.  For example, employees shared job search leads and helped each other prepare for interviews, even as they were vying for the same positions. 

Sumit emphasized that Pat's dogged efforts to "earn trust and respect from a process of engagement" and her ability to understand "the implications of decisions from the employees' point of view and adjust her course of action accordingly" were what separated her from ordinary bosses.  This "deep sense of benevolent care" was especially constructive after the end of production was announced because, "At a time when the economy was collapsing, her actions helped maintain a sense of calm amongst us."  Pat's emphasis on people and connection with them not only instilled calm, her priorities helped many find good new jobs.  And plant performance didn't suffer a bit; productivity, efficiency, and quality reached record levels in 2009.

Pat's people admired her because she was in tune with what it felt like to be them and she focused on how the things she said and did shaped their moods, efforts, and loyalty – whether they lost jobs or remained at Intel. 

5. Lowered expectations.  Finally, if I put on my psychologist hat, I could make a more cynical argument -- that even if nothing objective changed between bosses and their charges, people would report being more satisfied.  The average employee has fewer choices of bosses and jobs then before the bust.  So if they believe their boss is bad, but can't exit, it leads to constant unhappiness.  To avoid unhappiness, reality aside, people with good mental health will simply adjust their attitudes and beliefs such that they see the same old boss as OK.  This is so sort of like "If you cant be with the one you love, love the one you are with."  To put it another way, research on happiness shows that it is not so much driven by how objectively wonderful everything is, but rather by the difference between what you have and what you expect.  So the lowering of expectations that comes with a downturn may lead people to appreciate what they have more – so the same old thing, the boss in this case (or the boss's opinion of his her team) may seem better than in the past. 

I offer these five explanations as hypotheses.  I am not really sure why people report liking their bosses more and bosses report liking their teams more, it is an intriguing question.

I am going to be doing a short talk about Good Boss, Bad Boss and do a book signing at Books Inc in Palo Alto on Tuesday at 7PM. The adress is 855 El Camino Real and the Town & County shopping center. Here is the URL.   I hope to see you there. I love their motto for such events: The Experience You Can't Download.

I am also doing a second talk at Pixar (sorry, that isn't open to the public) later in the week,  one of my favorite companies on the planet.  Last time I was there, I heard -- and have since fact-checked and got permission from Ed Catmull to share -- the most inspiring "got your back story" I've ever encountered.  It will come out later in the week at HBR.org and I will alert Work Matters readers when it is posted.