Using People
Peter Drucker said that "managing is all about getting things done through other people". People are not easy to manage. Each individual has different idiosyncracies, wants, cravings and beliefs in life. Motivation is a powerful tool to apply. In Disney's A Bug's Life, we saw how smart the ants worked, gathering food for the grasshoppers. Did the grasshoppers have to motivate and manage these laborious ants? Yes and no. So managers and corporate captains may lightheartedly want to ponder upon these two posers advocated by "much ado about nothing" believers:
1. There isn't any use in rewards and performance management system, because the natural instinct of people is that they desire toil freely and willingly.
2. Work is a hobby and a rewarding past-time.
Group Discussion
One strategy for managing is to hold meetings to iron out issues and come to collective decisions. The "much ado about nothing" management-style tells us that meetings are unnatural and inorganic. They achive nothing. Look at tigers. They are the loards of the jungle but never once had tigers held any
Status Symbol
"Much ado about nothing" management practitioners regard meetings as a status symbol. Why? Look around, there has never been a worker who had to go to a management meeting. Managers and executives do not permit it. Meetings, therefore are reserved for the powers-that-be. They seem unable to give up this addiction. While an organisation suffers, they continue to hold meetings that in effect, impede growth. It could be likened to a driver stripping the tyres off his car to figure out how to get it to cruise faster. If you want to know what crops up at meetings, the "much ado about nothing" proponent would tell you that they are the same stuff that you regularly clean off your rug.
"Much ado about nothing" managers believe meetings accomplish nothing worthwhile. The most one could expect to achieve, perhaps is a good grade from the few bigwigs attending. It could pay by not speaking at a meeting unless you have to. Instead, the more powerful and offensive weapon is the nod. The trick is to wait until someone comments on something seemingly profound, then nod. If the meeting chairman agrees, you are associated. If he does not, play it cool by subtly transforming your nod into a neck massage.
Knowledge And Power
These days, k-economy rules and the person that has the knowledge or information dominates. Here is advice from the "much ado about nothing" guru. At meetings, act as if you understand what is being discussed. You could even sleep (but no snoring) with a pensive look and furrowed brow. Bite the end of your pencil, eyeglasses, anything, but the door handle. Keep in mind the adage, "silence is golden". But if you have to speak, talk about a management bestseller book you have just finished digesting.
Keep meetings you can control as long as possible. Schedule the event an hour at 4.50pm on a Friday. If you hate meetings, try an aversion therapy. Hold meetings every day in the week, or even into the night. Everyone will then end up getting sick of them and protest by not attending; or even resigning from organisation. This saves an organisation from having to pay for expensive voluntary separation schemes (VSS) for the deadwoods.
Time Scheduling
Time is not compressible. We cannot bend it to different shapes. Nobody could chisel it into a variety of designs or patterns. Outlandish management dogma tell us to outwit time, do nothing in a certain order, keep records and diaries, block out interruptions, plan your goals, and so on.
There was a time when I skimmed through (who has time to read line by line nowadays?) 11 chapters and three appendices on smarter ways of organising one's time. To apply all guidelines religiously, one would need to start when the Messiah was born some 2,001 years ago. Adam and Eve's way with time is best, they just simply "use it". We do not see an African lion making a time schedule. Go visit a zoo. Do you ever see a "things to do schedule" in the chimp's enclosure to tell him when to play with the loop-and-swing, pick insects from his mates' fur, beat its chest in a show of teamwork and power-display, or eat
Use The CEO's Name
A division or group head might not get the support or co-operation of his departmental managers. Deadlines are not met, tasks do not get done properly when he directs managers to accomplish them. But amazing results could crop up if he says "The CEO wants this done". So the trick is an effective tool for honchos to
"much ado about nothing management" outcome could be different. Here is a real life incident.
Henry Adrian is a departmental head in his company. He was earlier attached to the strategic communications division in his company; but was transferred to product development later on. The company was developing a new product to market. The group head of product development, when directing his subordinates to perform certain tasks or jobs, is said to be fond of saying, "The CEO wants this done".
One day he told Henry, "The CEO wants you to complete that development project within two weeks". A week later, Henry bumped into the CEO in a lift.
"How do you find your job so far at strategic communications?" asked the CEO.
"Oh, I have been transferred to product development division, sir", replied Henry.
"Gee, I didn't know that. Since when?" said the CEO.
The truth - the CEO didn't know that Henry was moved to product development, so how could he have instructed Henry to undertake the project as alleged by the group head? To get the project completed, he instilled fear into his subordinate.
List-Making
The "much ado about nothing" managers recognise list-making as ludicrous and unnatural. "Why bother?" they ask. Yet list-making appears everywhere in books on time management. Instead of producing lists, just do what you have to do in any way you fancy. The time you would use to make the list could be used to play pinball wizard, or watching ants parading.
The Fuss In Scheduling
Often, time-management people require several extensions. Every time the departmental head calls for more information and facts, he gets another list.
On any office wall or corridor you will see a silent proclamation:" Look how efficient we are; we have a
Wandering managers promote the mystic that scheduling is hassling and difficult. It serves no tangible
objectives, so they wisely omit it.
The "much ado about nothing" manager on the other hand is more audacious. He wants people to be unafraid of scheduling; taking it to be a natural process in managing just like a good herd rancher is not scared of manure. Scheduling would be a manager's breezy duty. He takes every assignment and writes the day, month and year after it. Whoever gives him that assignment might not be satisfied with the date; so he pleads and pens down another date. With so much ease and frequency in hanging dates, why bother scheduling in the first place?
The Unorthodox Works
There was a story about a man inheriting his father's mansion. When his father passed away, he moved in and was cleaning the attic when he stumbled upon a crumbled watch-repair docket dated 49 years ago. He took the docket to the watch shop. The repairman gingerly inspected it, went to the backroom, and came back promising, "Your watch will be ready Wednesday".
hollering.
You might say that the "much ado about nothing" management style is lackadaisical. The hard truth is that it is no more careless or irresponsible than any other managerial style. Since time began, no assignment has ever been completed on cue. No morning papers or milk ever got delivered on time every dawn. Indeed no child is born in precisely nine months. My one-for-the-road parting jest is: There simply is no documentary evidence of any fatal schedule ever having been evolved. Anything that does not click has got to be faulty; hence why bother dithering on it? Dithering, after all, is much-ado-about-nothing in essence.
