Making the Team: A Guide for Managers

Conclusions

Most of us have been socialized in bureaucratic organizations. In these organizations, participative management of the sort we have described seems antimanagement or an admission of failure at one's own job. One senior-level banker from an international banking firm put it this way: “If I do the kind of things you are describing here—inviting other people who are supposed to be under me to make suggestions about how to accomplish my division's objectives—I am going to work myself out of a job.” This bank official was worried about others doing his job better than he could. This is perhaps the most often cited reason against participative management. The irony of this example is that the company would probably be better off if all ...