First, Break All the Rules: What the World's Greatest Managers Do Differently

by Gallup Press

we will describe where the world’s great managers start laying the foundations for a truly productive workplace.

You are the manager who so loves your work that you get tears in your eyes when asked to describe how you helped so many of your people succeed. Whatever your role, at the summit of this mountain, you are good at what you do, you know the fundamental purpose of your work and you are always looking for better ways to fulfill that mission. You are fully engaged. How did you get there? If a manager can answer this, he will know how to guide other employees. He will be able to help more and more individuals reach the summit. The more individuals he can help move up the mountain, one by one, the stronger the workplace. So how did you get there? How did you make the climb?

Put on your employee hat for a moment. This may be a psychological mountain, but as with an actual mountain, you have to climb it in stages. Read in the right order, the 12 items can tell you which stage is which and exactly what needs must be met before you can continue your climb up to the next stage.

Base Camp: “What do I get?” When you first start a new role, your needs are pretty basic. You want to know what is going to be expected of you. How much are you going to earn? How long will your commute be? Will you have an office, a desk, even a phone? At this stage, you are asking, “What do I get?” from this role. Of the 12, these two fundamental items measure Base Camp: Q01. I know what is expected of me at work. Q02. I have the materials and equipment I need to do my work right.

Camp 1: “What do I give?” You climb a little higher. Your perspective changes. You start asking different questions. You want to know whether you are any good at the job. Are you in a role where you can excel? Do other people think you are excelling? If not, what do they think about you? Will they help you? At this stage, your questions center around “What do I give?” You are focused on your individual contribution and other people’s perceptions of it. These four items measure Camp 1: Q03. At work, I have the opportunity to do what I do best every day. Q04. In the last seven days, I have received recognition or praise for doing good work. Q05. My supervisor, or someone at work, seems to care about me as a person. Q06. There is someone at work who encourages my development.

Camp 2: “Do I belong here?” You keep climbing. By now, you’ve asked some difficult questions of yourself and of others, and the answers have, hopefully, given you strength. Your perspective widens. You look around and ask, “Do I belong here?” You may be extremely customer service oriented. Is everyone else as customer driven as you? Or perhaps you define yourself by your creativity. Are you surrounded by people who push the envelope, as you do? Whatever your basic value system happens to be, at this stage of the climb, you really want to know if you fit. These four items measure Camp 2: Q07. At work, my opinions seem to count. Q08. The mission or purpose of my company makes me feel my job is important. Q09. My associates or fellow employees are committed to doing quality work. Q10. I have a best friend at work.

Camp 3: “How can we all grow?” This is the most advanced stage of the climb. At this stage, you are impatient for everyone to improve, asking, “How can we all grow?” You want to make things better, to learn, to grow and to innovate. This stage tells us that only after you have climbed up and through the earlier three stages can you innovate effectively. Why? Because there is a difference between “invention” and “innovation.” Invention is mere novelty. Like most of us, you might have devised 17 new ways of doing things a few weeks after starting in your new role. But these ideas didn’t carry any weight. By contrast, innovation is novelty that can be applied. And you can innovate, you can apply your new ideas, only if you are focused on the right expectations (Base Camp), if you have confidence in your own expertise (Camp 1), and if you are aware of how the people around you will accept or reject your new ideas (Camp 2). If you cannot answer positively to all these earlier items, then you will find it almost impossible to apply all your new ideas. These two items measure Camp 3: Q11. In the last six months, someone at work has talked to me about my progress. Q12. This last year, I have had opportunities at work to learn and grow.

The Summit If you can respond positively to all of the Q12 items, then you have reached the summit. Your focus is clear. You feel a recurring sense of achievement, as though the best of you is being called upon and the best of you responds every single day. You look around and see others who also seem to thrill to the challenge of their work. Buoyed by your mutual understanding and your shared purpose, you climbers look out and forward to the challenges marching over the horizon. It is not easy to remain at the summit for long, with the ground shifting beneath your feet and the strong winds buffeting you this way and that. But while you are there, it is quite a feeling. If this is the psychological climb you made (or failed to make) from the moment you began your current role to the moment you felt fully engaged in this role, then where are you? Camp 1? Camp 3? The summit? Ask yourself to respond to those 12 items. Your answers can give you a read on where you are on the mountain.

Perhaps you have just been promoted. You felt as though you were at the summit in your previous role, but now you find yourself right back down at Camp 1, with new expectations and a new manager. (“I wonder what he thinks of me. I wonder how he will define success.”) Yes, even when good things happen, you can quickly find yourself at the base of a new mountain with a long climb ahead. Of course, the climb toward the summit is more complicated than this picture. Not only will people trade one stage off against another, but each individual will also place a slightly different value on each stage of the climb.

This metaphorical mountain reveals that the key to building a strong, vibrant workplace lies in meeting employees’ needs at Base Camp and Camp 1. This is where you should focus your time and energy. If your employees’ lower-level needs remain unaddressed, then everything you do for them further along the journey is almost irrelevant. But if you can meet these needs successfully, then the rest — the team building and the innovating — is so much easier.

over the last 15 years, most managers have been encouraged to focus much higher up the mountain. Mission statements, diversity training and self-directed work teams all try to help employees feel like they belong (Camp 2). Total quality management, reengineering, continuous improvement and learning organizations all address the need for employees to innovate — to challenge cozy assumptions and rebuild them afresh every day (Camp 3).

Five years ago, the Baldrige Award for Quality was the most coveted business award in America; today, only a few companies bother to enter. Diversity experts now bicker over the proper definition of “diversity.” Process reengineering gurus try to squeeze people back into process. And many of us snort at mission statements. When you think about it, it is rather sad. An important kernel of truth lay at the heart of all of these initiatives, but none of them lasted. Why? An epidemic of mountain sickness. They aimed too high, too fast. Managers were encouraged to focus on complex initiatives like reengineering or learning organizations without spending time on the basics. The stages on the mountain reveal that if the employee doesn’t know what is expected of him as an individual (Base Camp), then you shouldn’t ask him to get excited about playing on a team (Camp 2). If he feels as though he is in the wrong role (Camp 1), don’t pander to him by telling him how important his innovative ideas are to the company’s reengineering efforts (Camp 3). If he doesn’t know what his manager thinks of him as an individual (Camp 1), don’t confuse him by challenging him to become part of the new “learning organization” (Camp 3).

The Focus of Great Managers Great managers take aim at Base Camp and Camp 1. They know that the core of a strong and vibrant workplace can be found in the first six items: Q01. I know what is expected of me at work. Q02. I have the materials and equipment I need to do my work right. Q03. At work, I have the opportunity to do what I do best every day. Q04. In the last seven days, I have received recognition or praise for doing good work. Q05. My supervisor, or someone at work, seems to care about me as a person. Q06. There is someone at work who encourages my development.

Securing 5s to these items is one of your most important responsibilities. And as many managers discover, getting all 5s from your employees is far from easy. For example, the manager who tries to curry favor with his people by telling them that they should all be promoted may receive 5s on the item “There is someone at work who encourages my development.” However, because all his employees now feel they are in the wrong role, he will get 1s on the item “At work, I have the opportunity to do what I do best every day.”

the manager who tries to control his employees’ behavior by writing a thick policies and procedures manual will receive 5s on the item “I know what is expected of me at work.” But because of his rigid, policing management style, he will probably receive 1s on the item ...

To secure 5s on all of these items, you have to reconcile responsibilities that, at first sight, appear contradictory. You have to be able to set consistent expectations for all your people, yet at the same time, treat each person differently. You have to be able to make each person feel as though he ...

An old parable will serve to introduce the insight they shared. There once lived a scorpion and a frog. The scorpion wanted to cross the pond, but, being a scorpion, he couldn’t swim. So he scuttled up to the frog and asked, “Please, Mr. Frog, can you carry me across the pond on your back?” “I would,” replied the frog, “but, under the circumstances, I must refuse. You might sting me as I swim across.” “But why would I do that?” asked the scorpion. “It is not in my interests to sting you, because you will die and then I will drown.” Although the frog knew how lethal scorpions were, the logic proved quite persuasive. Perhaps, felt the frog, in this one instance, the scorpion would keep his tail in check. So the frog agreed. The scorpion climbed onto his back, and together they set off across the pond. Just as they reached the middle of the pond, the scorpion twitched his tail and stung the frog. Mortally wounded, the frog cried out, “Why did you sting me? It is not in your interests to sting me, because now I will die and you will drown.” “I know,” replied the scorpion as he sank into the pond. “But I am a scorpion. I have to sting you. It’s in my nature.”

Conventional wisdom encourages you to think like the frog. People’s natures do change, it whispers. Anyone can be anything they want to be if they just try hard enough. Indeed, as a manager, it is your duty to direct those changes. Devise rules and policies to control your employees’ unruly inclinations. Teach them skills and competencies to fill in the traits they lack. All of your best efforts as a manager should focus on either muzzling or correcting what nature saw fit to provide.

Great managers reject this out of hand. They remember what the frog forgot: each individual, like the scorpion, is true to his unique nature. They recognize that each person is motivated differently and that each person has his own way of thinking and his own style of relating to others. They know that there is a limit to how much remolding they can do to someone. But they don’t bemoan these differences and try to grind them down. Instead, they capitalize on them. They try to help each person become more and more of who he already is. Simply put, this is the one insight we heard echoed by tens of thousands of great managers: People don’t change that much. Don’t waste time trying to put in what was left out. Try to draw out wha...

Maybe Tony is right. No one knows what being a good manager is anymore. And on top of that, nobody cares. Conventional wisdom tells us that the manager role is no longer very important. Apparently, managers are now an impediment to speed, flexibility and agility. Today’s agile companies can no longer afford to employ armies of managers to shuffle papers, sign approvals and monitor performance. They need self-reliant, self-motivated, self-directed work teams. No wonder managers were first against the wall when the reengineering revolution came.

Besides, continues conventional wisdom, every manager should be a leader. He must seize opportunity, using his smarts and impatience to exert his will over a fickle world. In this world, the staid little manager is a misfit. It is too quick for him, too exciting, too dangerous. He had better stay out of the way. He might get hurt. Conventional wisdom has led us all astray. Yes, today’s business pressures are more intense — the changes neck-snappingly fast. Yes, companies need self-reliant employees and aggressive leaders. But all this does not diminish the importance of managers. On the contrary, in turbulent times, the manager is more important than ever.

managers play a vital and distinct role — a role that charismatic leaders and self-directed teams are incapable of playing. The manager role is to reach inside each employee and release his unique talents into performance. This role is best played one employee at a time — one manager asking questions of, listening to and working with one employee. Multiplied a thousandfold, this one-by-one-by-one role is the company’s power supply. In times of great change, it is this ...

the manager role is the “catalyst” role. As with all catalysts, the manager’s function is to speed up the reaction between two substances, thus creating the desired end product. Specifically, the manager creates performance in each employee by speeding up the reaction between the employee’s talents and the company’s goals and between the employee’s talents and the customers’ needs...

great managers all excel at this catalyst role. Think back to the six items measuring Base Camp and Camp 1. Q01. I know what is expected of me at work. Q02. I have the materials and equipment I need to do my work right. Q03. At work, I have the opportunity to do what I do best every day. Q04. In the last seven days, I have received recognition or praise for doing good work. Q05. My supervisor, or someone at work, seems to care about me as a person. Q06. There is someone at work who encourages my development. These items provide the detail for the catalyst role. To warrant positive responses to these items from his employees, a manager must be able to do four activities extremely well: select a person, set expectations, motivate the person and develop the person. These four activities are the manager’s most important responsibilities.

You might have all the vision, charisma and intelligence in the world, but if you cannot perform these four activities well, you will never excel as a manager.

I. To secure “strongly agree” responses to the item “At work, I have the opportunity to do what I do best every day,” you must know how to select a person. This sounds straightforward, but to do it well demands clearheadedness. Most important, you must know how much of a person you can change. You must know the difference between talent, skills and knowledge. You must know which of these can be taught and which can only be hired in. You must know how to ask the kinds of questions that can cut through a candidate’s desire to impress and so reveal his true talents. If you don’t know how t...

II. If you want “strongly agree” responses to the items “I know what is expected of me at work” and “I have the materials and equipment I need to do my work right,” you must be able to set accurate performance expectations. This activity encompasses more than simple goal setting. You must be able to keep employees focused on performance today, no matter how tempting it is to stare at the changes massing over the horizon. You must know on which parts of a job you will enforce conformity and on which parts you will encourage your employees to exercise their own style. You must be able to balance today’s need for standardization and efficiency with a similarly pressing need for flair and originality. If...

III. “Strongly agree” responses to the items “In the last seven days, I have received recognition or praise for doing good work” and “My supervisor, or someone at work, seems to care about me as a person” are driven by your ability to motivate each employee. As a manager, you have only one thing to invest: your time. Whom you spend it with and how you spend it determine your success as a manager. So should you spend more time with your best people or your strugglers? Should you help a person fix his weaknesses, or should you focus on his strengths? Can you ever give s...

IV. The item “My supervisor, or someone at work, seems to care about me as a person” is also driven by your ability to develop the employee, as is the item “There is someone at work who encourages my development.” When an employee comes up to you and asks the inevitable “Where do I go from here? Can you help me grow?” you need to know what to say. Should you help each person get promoted? If you tell an employee to attend some training classes and pay her dues, is that the right thing to say? Perhaps you feel as though you are too close to your people. Can you ever get too close to them? What happens if you have to terminate someone you have come to care about? ...

Select a person, set expectations, motivate the person and develop the person: These are the four core activities of the catalyst role. If a company’s managers are unable to play this role well, then no matter how sophisticated its systems or how inspir...

Healthy companies need strong bonds to develop between each manager and each employee. If the manager has not had a say in selecting his people and if he is not invested in their current success and future growth, then those bonds wither.

the chief focus should be on educating managers on how to use these tools, not on substituting the tools or the department for the manager. The core of the manager role consists of those four activities: selecting a person, setting expectations, motivating him and developing him. You cannot centralize activities that can be done well only one to one, individual manager to individual employee.

“Managers do things right. Leaders do the right things.” Conventional wisdom is proud of maxims like this. As we mentioned earlier, it uses them to encourage managers to label themselves “leaders.” It casts the manager as the dependable plodder, while the leader is the sophisticated executive, scanning the horizon and strategizing. Since most people would rather be a sophisticated executive than a dependable plodder, this advice seems positive and developmental. It isn’t. It demeans the manager role but doesn’t succeed in doing much else. The difference between a manager and a leader is much more profound than most people think. The company that overlooks this difference will suffer for it.

Great managers look inward. They look inside the company; into each individual; into differences in the style, goals, needs and motivation of each person. These differences are small and subtle, but great managers need to pay attention to them. These subtle differences guide them toward the right way to release each person’s unique talents into performance.

Great leaders, by contrast, look outward. They look out at the competition, out at the future and out at alternative routes forward. They focus on broad patterns, finding connections and cracks, and then they press home their advantage where the resistance is weakest. They must be visionaries, strategic thinkers and activators. When played well, this is, without doubt, a critical role. But it doesn’t have much to do with the challenge of turning one individual’s talents into performance.

Great managers are not miniexecutives waiting for leadership to be thrust upon them. Great leaders are not simply managers who have developed sophistication. The core activities...

It is entirely possible for a person to be a brilliant manager and a terrible leader. But it is just as possible for a person to excel as a leader and fail as a manager. And, of course, a few exceptionally talented individuals excel at both. If companies confuse the two roles by expecting every manager to be a leader, or if they define “leader” as simply a more advanced form of “manager,” then the all-important cataly...

Some companies, not wanting to fall into the trap of overlooking the importance of the manager, have rushed to the other extreme. They have tried to define the manager role in so much detail that they have ended up overburdening the poor manager with a frighteningly long list of “behavioral competencies.” Here, for example, is a sample of manager competencies a number of Fortune 50 companies use: • Manage change • Self-knowledge • Establish plans • Compelling vision • Inspiration • Strategic agility • Troop rallying • Risk taking • Take charge • Business practices and controls • Results orientation • Manages diversity • Broad perspective • Calm under fire • Interpersonally sensitive

Creating supermanager may seem like a good idea at the time, but as with Dr. Frankenstein’s plan, the results always end up looking slightly ridiculous and a little scary.

In the end, however well-intentioned, this kind of overdefinition is unnecessary. A company should not force every manager to manage his people exactly the same way. Each manager will, and should, employ his own style. What a company can and should do is keep every manager focused on the four core activities of the catalyst role: select a person, set expectations, motivate the person and develop the person. No matter how many different styles they use, when managers play this role well, they lay the foundations. As far as is humanly possible, they release every single employee’s talent into performance. The company becomes strong.

Conventional wisdom encourages you to: 1. select a person … based on his experience, intelligence and determination. 2. set expectations … by defining the right steps. 3. motivate the person … by helping him identify and overcome his weaknesses. 4. develop the person … by helping him learn and get promoted. On the surface, there seems to be nothing wrong with this advice. In fact, many managers and many companies follow it devoutly. But all of it misses. You cannot build a great team simply by selecting people based on their experience, intelligence and determination. Defining the right steps and fixing people’s weaknesses are not the most effective ways to generate sustained performance. And preparing someone for the next rung on the ladder completely misses the essence of development. Remember the revolutionary insight common to great managers: People don’t change that much. Don’t waste time trying to put in what was left out. Try to draw out what was left in. That is hard enough.

When selecting someone, they select for talent … not simply experience, intelligence or determination.

When setting expectations, they define the right outcomes … not the right steps.

When motivating someone, they focus on strengths … n...

When developing someone, they help him find the right fit … not simply the n...

We’ve labeled this revolutionary approach the “Four Keys” of great managers. Taken together, the Four Keys reveal how these managers unlock t...

For most of us, talent seems like a rare and precious thing, bestowed on special, faraway people. They are different, these people with talent. They are “not us.” Great managers disagree with this definition of talent. It is too narrow, too specialized. Instead, they define a talent as “a recurring pattern of thought, feeling or behavior that can be productively applied.” The emphasis here is on the word recurring. Your talents, they say, are the behaviors you find yourself doing often. You have a mental filter that sifts through your world, forcing you to pay attention to some stimuli, while others slip past you unnoticed. Your instinctive ability to remember names, rather than just faces, is a talent. Your need to alphabetize your spice rack and color-code your wardrobe is a talent. So is your love of crossword puzzles or your fascination with risk or your impatience. Any recurring patterns of behavior that can be productively applied are talents. The key to excellent performance, of course, is finding the match between your talents and your role.

Every role performed at excellence requires talent, because every role performed at excellence requires certain recurring patterns of thought, feeling or behavior.

Whether excellence is celebrated or anonymous, great managers know that excellence is impossible without talent.

Conventional wisdom says: “Experience makes the difference.” Managers who place a special emphasis on experience pay closest attention to a candidate’s work history. They pore over each person’s résumé, rating the companies who employed him and the kind of work he performed. They see his past as a window to his future. “Brainpower makes the difference.” These managers put their faith in raw intelligence. They say that as long as you are smart, you can figure out most roles. Smart people simply figure it out better than the rest. When selecting people, these managers tend to favor articulate applicants blessed with high-powered academic records. “Willpower makes the difference.” This is the “Success is 10% inspiration, 90% perspiration” school of thought. Managers from this school believe that the technical part of most roles can be taught, whereas the desire to achieve, to persist in the face of obstacles, cannot. When selecting people, they look for past evidence of grit.