The «Vedomosti 225 (3239) newspaper
I like what Georges Benjamin Clemenceau said about cemeteries being full of irreplaceable people. Don't take me wrong. I do believe that each employee makes a unique contribution to the development of the company he or she works for. Yet when a manager says that if a certain employee quits, all work will stop, I take it as an indication of something being wrong with the department.
Companies must be maximally independent of their employees. Each process must be tuned so as to continue uninterrupted if any employee quits or becomes sick or goes on vacation. The show must go on.
This approach to management is quite contrary to the attitudes of many managers. They worry about who does something instead of how to do it. And then do it again. And again with invariable success.
At work, such managers worry about how to motivate Maria or how to get along with Ivan. And, of course, they think themselves irreplaceable. If they stop convincing, managing, supervising and leading, everything will crumble! And they never think about making Maria do her job regardless of whether or not her boss is around. They never think of how to make things go on smoothly when they are on vacations or business trips. For the purposes of this context, we will call their approach – managing people.
It is harder to manage processes and not people. It is not quite so exciting. One cannot convince or motivate a process.
In the beginning, managing processes requires far more work and thinking ahead. One must identify "the owner" of each process and those working for him as well as who can replace whom if need be. One must organize the flow of data so that all information about a project should not start and end with one person and, instead be available to several employees who can replace each other. Every stage of a project or a process should be described by precise success indications, such as the time of completion and qualitative and quantitative results. Each process must be transparent and understood by all involved so as to be improvable and correctable, just as the mechanisms of decision making and budgeting principles must be transparent and easy to understand. Any process must be described as to – who, what, where, how soon and with what result.
I believe that this approach to management is more mature and responsible and that it assures the stable quality of work and even relations within the team, while decreasing risks related to careless work. At this point, I must admit that when a company is just being formed, process management is impossible. At that time, everything depends on enthusiasm and not on precise operation. Normally, process management becomes critical when the company steps over the line separating small and mid-size business.
Besides, process management is not always equally convenient to all persons. Firstly, a number of managers and even rank and file employees like manipulating others for the purpose of self-assertion and proving themselves irreplaceable so as to assure their job security and higher pay. Secondly, people management provides more ways to manipulate others, play policy games and use hearsay and lies. When one hires a people manager, one should take this into account. Thirdly, process management requires good planning skills. While managing people, one "puts out fires" or saves crumbling projects. It is harder to plan ahead the use of resources so as there is never any need to save anything and no lapses may ever occur in principle. Future belongs to process managers and not people managers. The time of those who divide and rule is over.
By Ludmila Shusterova, Deputy General Director, Marketing and Business Development
Outsourcing Division BDO Russia
