Micro-Managing?

[Retro Rob]

We have a new CIO heading up IT at my company. He's a really good manager in general in my opinion, but unlike the last guy who was very technical, extremely hands-on, and would allow us to work without interruption, this new guy is a technical flop, is disengaged technologically speaking, and appointed a "lead network admin" to basically generate detailed reports at 8:30am everyday on what the rest of the support staff was doing and to give the reports back to him.

Before appointing this "lead network admin" to "manage" the other admin(s), he volunteered the explanation that this wasn't micro-managing, but was professional development.

Now, I am not wholly sure on what constitues a micro-managing boss, but I can tell you now that now I feel as if I am not trusted to be left to my work, and I feel that having any downtime is being systematically eliminated with the detailed daily reports.

I really disliked my last job because the same thing happened (my old boss hired a "watchdog" to track employee whereabouts as I spent 3 years as a field technician), and most of us thought we were being micro-managed.

Is this really micro-managment?

 

[AViking]

I know that in sales we might do daily reports. This can be very useful but overall what you're doing is plugging daily numbers into weekly reports that are turned into monthly reports and are monitored for improvement and trends. If a company wants to succeed it does need goals, deadlines, and accountability.

How long does this daily report take? Are you able to learn anything from this report? If it doesn't help you then you should get with him and ask him what you're supposed to be gleaming from this activity. A daily report that does nothing for you is a waste of your time and most likely a waste of your companies time.

 

[Retro Rob]

I know that in sales we might do daily reports. This can be very useful but overall what you're doing is plugging daily numbers into weekly reports that are turned into monthly reports and are monitored for improvement and trends. If a company wants to succeed it does need goals, deadlines, and accountability.

How long does this daily report take? Are you able to learn anything from this report? If it doesn't help you then you should get with him and ask him what you're supposed to be gleaming from this activity. A daily report that does nothing for you is a waste of your time and most likely a waste of your companies time.

I think the daliy reports are nothing more than a tool used to track our productivity and eliminate downtime.

All of our technical issues come through a ticketing system or phone calls to my desk, so I cannot see how we can expect to plan an entire 8 hour day and put that into bullet-points in a word doc.

It's similar to working in the field with your work coming through a Blackberry. How can you plan your day out, everyday, to the point of filling a detailed report?

 

[AViking]

How many people work there? As a manager of a small company I was able to "micro-manage" my staff by giving them their assignements and spending time here and there watching them do it. I also had cameras and would check on those as well. I kept them aware of my presense even when I was not there by coming in and calling them out if they were not working the way I wanted or were taking 10 bathroom breaks. It worked quite well.

With a larger company though I can't do that. I need to be able to keep productivity at an acceptable level and I cannot be everywhere at once. With sales this is easy since I can monitor numbers. With your job I don't see how this could be that difficult. How many tickets and phone calls are you responding to? How many are resolved? Time to resolve? Etc.

I don't see why any manager would want daily bullet points. That would take a lot of time to read. I need numbers to analyze. Doesn't your system spit out these kind of reports? He would be able to see through the time clock and your numbers if you're a slacker or not. Add to that customer complaints, having to deal with the same issue twice, and time between calls and I would think that would be fine to figure out the value of an employee.

 

[brandonb]

I would not call it micro managing. This is just monitoring employee productivity. Any company has a right to determine what's their employees are doing, and to expect certain productivity. They are after all, paying you for that job.

I work in development (and I'm a manager) and a few years ago one guy constantly just did his own thing. He wouldn't use our ticket monitoring tools. Therefore I never had any idea what he was working on. Typically he'd work on the things he wanted to work on or were fun, and left the rest sitting there for weeks, if not months or years. That is not being responsible. At some point, I'd have to pick up all the work he didn't want to do and get it done because it wasn't getting done. And as a manager, is that right? That I let my employees pick and choose what they work on, and all their shit work I had to do? No. They work for me, I don't work for them. That's how it works.

Once I fixed the problem and made this employee use the tracking system. Now in our weekly meetings I just tell them to bring in their overdue tickets and discuss what isn't done and why. Needless to say. The problem has resolved itself.

The very fact that you believed you are being monitored is going to make you work harder. I doubt the CIO even looks at the reports, but the fact that he could be looking at this report is going to cause some change in the person. Just because it's an unknown, and they might be looked at. Now all the employees will work harder, even though nothing is actually being done. It's a good tactic.

Personally: I'd just do your job as is. If there is an issue, they'll let you know.

 

[Retro Rob]

I would not call it micro managing. This is just monitoring employee productivity. Any company has a right to determine what's their employees are doing, and to expect certain productivity. They are after all, paying you for that job.

I work in development (and I'm a manager) and a few years ago one guy constantly just did his own thing. He wouldn't use our ticket monitoring tools. Therefore I never had any idea what he was working on. Typically he'd work on the things he wanted to work on or were fun, and left the rest sitting there for weeks, if not months or years. That is not being responsible. At some point, I'd have to pick up all the work he didn't want to do and get it done because it wasn't getting done. And as a manager, is that right? That I let my employees pick and choose what they work on, and all their shit work I had to do? No. They work for me, I don't work for them. That's how it works.

Once I fixed the problem and made this employee use the tracking system. Now in our weekly meetings I just tell them to bring in their overdue tickets and discuss what isn't done and why. Needless to say. The problem has resolved itself.

The very fact that you believed you are being monitored is going to make you work harder. I doubt the CIO even looks at the reports, but the fact that he could be looking at this report is going to cause some change in the person. Just because it's an unknown, and they might be looked at. Now all the employees will work harder, even though nothing is actually being done. It's a good tactic.

Personally: I'd just do your job as is. If there is an issue, they'll let you know.

I can understand your situation, and you had valid reason to. I was thinking micro-managing becasue this came into place before he got to know any of us...it was immediate, which raised that concern.

Like I said, I don't quite know what would constitue someone like that, but for a guy who doesn't even want to download Adobe (heading an IT department?), it popped into my head.

 

[chucky2]

There is something to be said a new person in Leadership coming in and wanting to be brought up to speed. Perhaps I've been jaded by how many times I've gone though what you're doing that my response would be it sounds to me like the typical "Leadership" person: They really have no clue what's going on, have no interest in understanding any detail of it, and want the 'big picture' to be neatly summarized and spoon fed to them. Hopefully for you and your company;s sake this is not your new CIO, but I wouldn't set your expectations too high.