Managing Micro-management 

Micro-management occurs in many organisations and can be a barrier to effective growth, productivity and performance within teams in organisations. Micro-management is exhausting both for the micro-manager and the team subjected to micro-management.

The article will help you to identify micro-management and gives some tips on how to manage it effectively.

What is micro-management

The online dictionary, Encarta defines micromanagement as "attention to small details in management: control [of] a person or a situation by paying extreme attention to small details".

‘Micromanagers often affirm the value of their approach with a simple experiment: They give an employee an assignment, and then disappear until the deadline. Is this employee likely to excel when given free rein?

Possibly – if the worker has exceptional confidence in his abilities. Under micromanagement, however, most workers become timid and tentative – possibly even paralyzed. "No matter what I do," such a worker might think to himself, "It won't be good enough." Then one of two things will happen: Either the worker will ask the manager for guidance before the deadline, or he will forge ahead, but come up with an inadequate result.

In either case, the micromanager will interpret the result of his experiment as proof that, without his constant intervention, his people will flounder or fail.

But do these results verify the value of micromanagement – or condemn it? A truly effective manager sets up those around him to succeed. Micromanagers, on the other hand, prevent employees from making – and taking responsibility for – their own decisions. But it's precisely the process of making decisions, and living with the consequences, that causes people to grow and improve.

Good managers empower their employees to do well by giving opportunities to excel; Bad managers disempower their employees by hoarding those opportunities. And a disempowered employee is an ineffective one – one who requires a lot of time and energy from his supervisor.

It's that time and energy, multiplied across a whole team of timid, cowed workers, that amounts to a serious and self-defeating drain on a manager's time. It's extremely difficult, if not impossible, to keep up with analysis, planning, communication with other teams, and the other "big-picture" tasks of managing, when you are sweating the details of the next sales presentation.’

Micromanagement can be distinguished from the manager who tends to do the tasks assigned to his or her subordinates.  This is generally just inappropriate level management or mismanagement:

•     With mismanagement, the workers job is still performed well, but the company loses out on the benefit of the manager operating at a higher strategic level.

•     In micromanagement, the manager not only tells a subordinate what to do but dictates that the job be done a certain way regardless of whether that way is the most effective or efficient one.

The behaviour of a micro-manager

1.    Micro managers want complete control. They devote their time to monitor and evaluate each step of the business process and this often results in a failure to focus on the strategic issues.

2.    They tend to want too much detail in reports and constant detailed performance feedback.

3.    Their management approach is generally a bullying one and they use their position power to instill fear in those around them to ensure cooperation.

4.    They tend to not allow subordinates to make decisions without consulting with them first, even if such decisions are within the scope of authority of the subordinate.

5.    Following procedure is important to them and often they focus more on the minute detail of the process rather than the requirements and quality of the overall output required. This focus often delays decisions, restricts initiative, and the flow of information between employees and confuses the outcome required.

6.    When they delegate, they retain control over subordinate performance. They delegate accountability but not the control to take initiative to follow alternative actions that could improve the result or prevent a negative result. This enables them to take credit for positive achievement and also to blame the employee for negative results.

7.    Many micromanagers are unable to recognize their dependence on the control over others, despite this behaviour being easily recognisable to those around them. Similar to an addict in denial, they will argue against being called micromanagers and find ways to justify why their activities are not those of a micromanager. They will justify their activities by labelling them as, for example ‘organised’, ‘structured’ or‘ perfectionism’.

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Why do people become micromanagers?

1.     Detail orientation

2.     Emotional insecurity

3.     Doubts around the competence of others.

4.     An organizational culture that shuns mistakes, encourages blame and shame or is based on power struggle.

5.     Severe time constraints and pressure

6.     Instability of the management position

7.     The manager feels that he or she lacks the competence to do his or her own job, and take on the increased responsibility required by their position.

8.     A person who is hypercritical of him or herself and others.

9.     To eliminate unwanted employees

Recognizing and working with micromanagement in yourself.

1.    Use the listening techniques to listen properly to your subordinate and acknowledge his / her viewpoint and if you do not agree, maintain awareness around why and question the validity of your own reasoning process.

2.    Practice awareness around how much you are trying to control and actively work at minimizing the interference and the prescribing of task execution.

3.    Question your reasons for required detail and information

4.    Check on the amount of decision-making responsibility you are allowing in your subordinates and compile a level of authorisation guideline ensuring that you minimize the amount of decisions which have to go through yourself. Bear in mind that some decisions with extreme consequences would need to go through you, but together with the team interrogate the validity of the levels of authority and responsibility.

5.    Delegate using an effective briefing guideline and consciously restrict yourself from over-involvement. A good way to do this is to give a clear objective, have certain check measures where appropriate, but to minimize the monitoring, ensure understanding and competency up front and then let the person use their initiative as to how they will do it.

6.    Where an official template is necessary, ensure the subordinate has the template, if not, then consciously prevent yourself from prescribing exactly how you think the information should be displayed.

7.    When a subordinate submits or completes a task incorrectly, do not take over the task, ask them to go away and review the task and indicate to them that you need them to check the reliability of the information.

8.    When a subordinate comes to you with a problem, consciously retain awareness of your tendency to give a solution and practice not giving a solution, rather guide them to find a solution through appropriate non-leading questions. (care must be taken to avoid steering the person towards your solution). Remind yourself that people tend to learn less if you give them the answers, they learn if they have to apply thinking skills and with time they will be able to do it on their own.

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Working with a micromanager

It is difficult to manage a micromanager and his expectations. However difficult it is, as a subordinate, you need to endeavour to manage the expectations of your micromanager, or suffer the consequences and stress of being employed for your brain, but not allowed to use it. Some tips for dealing with a micro manager are:

1.    Volunteer to take on work or projects that you're confident you'll be good at. This will start to increase his confidence in you– and his delegation skills.

2.    Make sure that you initiate regular progress updates to keep your manager informed and minimise his requests for information.

3.    When you encounter a problem, brainstorm an appropriate solution before discussing it with your manager. Ensure that you show your manager that you have thought of a solution and considered various alternatives and their impact. Remain firm and point out to the manager that you would like to solve the problem yourself and remind him or her that your handling the issues will give him more time in his busy schedule to concentrate on other work.

4.    Concentrate on helping your manager to change one micromanagement habit at a time. Remember that he's only human too, and is allowed to make mistakes.

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The potential effects of micromanagement include

1.    Creation of resentment in both manager-subordinate and "horizontal" (subordinate-subordinate) relationships

2.    Damage to trust in the team relationships

3.    Interference with existing teamwork

4.    Because a pattern of micromanagement suggests to employees that a manager does not trust their work or judgment, it is a major factor in triggering employee disengagement,

5.    Can lead to a dysfunctional and hostile work environment

6.    Disengaged employees invest time, but not effort or creativity, in the work in which they are assigned.

7.    Can eliminate the trust relationship in a team.

8.    Micromanagers often rely on fear in the employees to achieve more control and can severely affect self-esteem of employees as well as their mental and physical health.

9.    Severe micromanagers can affect subordinates' mental and/or physical health to such an extreme that the subordinates' only way to change their workplace environment is to change employers or even leave the workplace.

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