Chapter 6

Are You a Boss or Just Bossy?

Authority

What does a good leader or CEO look like on a Birkman?

There is no one answer. Because of the complexity of people and workplaces, a wide variety of leadership styles will suit many types of organizations and the many types of work that have to be done. No formula exists that can predict leadership success. You can lead from any combination of traits.

At best, we can find some common denominators that will suit a particular industry or organization—or at least the task at hand. More important than trying to predict successful leadership, the Birkman will show the type of leader you are and what you can do to become a more effective boss. Everyone exercises authority in several ways, and the Birkman can measure that in specific terms.

Overall, the Authority Component gives a leader a sense of how a higher or lower dominance style will be received by those being led. It answers questions about why a person may either accept or resist the way he or she receives messages from a boss. As with other Birkman Components, knowing this natural difference of command style can remove personal blame and diffuse defensiveness in a working relationship. Authority is about verbal dominance: speaking up, speaking out, arguing, liking to debate, being comfortable saying, “I told you to be here at 8:00. Where are you?” In short, the relational Component showing Need for Authority tells the degree to which people like to assert themselves by being verbally commanding.

High Authority leadership is choosing to lead people in a more overtly authoritarian way. These bosses are not necessarily barking commands, but the volume of their orders can be ramped up in a person who is also high Empathy, meaning that he or she tends to be expressive anyway. These people are typically described as more “in your face,” because they are comfortable giving orders in a forceful way. They do well in roles that involve immediacy and risk, such as construction crews, factories, emergency workers, and, as you might expect, the military.

Still, the stereotype of the authoritarian boss doesn’t hold sway anymore as the workforce becomes more diverse, more skilled, better educated, and well informed. An effective boss stays focused and in control but does not dominate employees. In popular culture, the “whisperer” phenomenon suggests that the best path to authority over man or beast is to see yourself through the eyes of the ones you wish to lead, forming a nonthreatening relationship that is ultimately more effective. In Birkman terms, such a leadership type is called a low Authority style. These leaders let others know who the boss is without being bossy.

THE CHANGING FACE OF AUTHORITY

After nearly twenty years as a management consultant to many chief executives in big companies, Esther S. Powers, PhD, of Greater Atlanta can speak from experience about generational changes in leadership styles, as revealed by the Birkman. When she started coaching in large, heavy-industry companies, “the leaders were like military: they were Red, high Authority, high Structure, high Activity, low Thought, low Advantage, low Empathy,” she recalls. “They were the traditional managers in the plants. They didn’t listen much and they were not collaborative.” These high Authority executives were commanding leaders and tended to be good speakers, but they often lacked diplomacy and weren’t at all welcoming to the changes that were coming as a result of competition, participatory management, and the explosion in high-tech entrepreneurship and information, Esther says. In the early 1990s, companies were starting to create high-performance work teams in an effort to become nimbler. She was brought in to do organizational redesigns at traditional manufacturing companies that wanted to stay abreast of the changes, some wishing to emulate Japanese manufacturing techniques. It was the start of the just-in-time way of doing business, with low inventories and flatter hierarchies.

“It took just a touch for me to win over people on the floor, but the managers wanted to prove everyone wrong,” Esther says. “The managers would try to get me out of there.”

But the economic transformation couldn’t be slowed, let alone stopped. Once the new models were created, however, Esther found many of the senior managers couldn’t lead the new businesses. By the next decade, she says, the chief executives were “altogether different.” She started noticing more Birkman profiles of people who appeared more flexible and optimistic. She also found more Green and Blue types, as leadership increasingly demanded a more democratic and more creative touch. The old-style authoritarian leaders still exist, of course, but they are fewer in number and must share room at the top with a wide variety of people. The precision with which the Birkman has tracked the change speaks to its sophistication.

The Birkman asks executives, “Do others see you as too aggressive or too submissive?” To be successful, bosses have to find the style that best suits the needs not just of the company culture but of various teams, and not just a team as a whole but of each team member. That means moving from the one-style-fits-all leadership model to one that allows you to adopt several styles within your own natural approach.

As with all other Birkman Components, Authority is multidimensional. In addition to revealing how easily a person gives verbal commands, the Authority Component also measures how much a person will tolerate being on the receiving end of strong orders. How much do you actually need, and want, to be bossed? Many people, though they might not readily admit it, prefer a boss who is direct and authoritative. They thrive only when they know who is in charge, feeling most secure with supervisors who let them know what they want done and give some idea of when and how to do it.

These contrasting styles can be seen and measured by Birkman on a Component continuum by looking at the Authority Need. The Birkman will help you determine under which style of Authority you work most effectively, whether you prefer to be led by an in-charge style or by a more self-directed style where you are being asked politely. Many people respond well to direct commands, and just as many prefer some personal autonomy. The low Authority Need types are at their productive best when left in charge of themselves. They prefer to collaborate with a boss who offers suggestions rather than orders, and so work better when the boss is laid back, low key, and less directive.

Most people are a nuanced blend of Authority styles in their preference for leading and being led, and this is clearly seen on the Birkman. A person might have a highly directive personal style (commonly seen in entrepreneurs and solo practitioners) yet not want to be told what to do or how to do it. In just as many cases, a person may be affable and congenial in daily demeanor yet work best with a boss who is clearly in charge and forceful in making decisions and giving orders.

THE DIRECT APPROACH

Jeffrey P. Haggquist, a Washington osteopath specializing in pain and sports medicine, found the Birkman to be reassuring during a time of crisis in his clinic. He is an unapologetic high Authority boss in his small clinic of about nine core employees. His nonmedical staffers, he says, were getting lost when he gave directions, trying to follow them to the letter rather than using what he said as a basis for doing their own problem solving. “People miss the forest for the trees,” he says. “They do what I say rather than understanding.”

His staff, for their part, felt they were getting mixed messages on what to do—not daring to take the initiative when their boss had been so explicitly and highly directive. They were becoming easily discouraged in their daily routines. The Birkman showed a significant gap between the physician’s Authority Usual Behavior and his Authority Need (81 versus 37).

“He would not like to be managed the way he manages,” says his consultant, Barbara Robinson. “And he is likely to become domineering and oppositional under stress, given his Authority Stress score of 75.”

The doctor wasn’t eager to change his approach. The Birkman, however, helped him and his staff members immediately by showing how they might work within the realities of his authoritative leadership style. “Globally, it grounded me in letting me know that I am who I am; it’s my personality . . . and that it’s okay,” he says.

He has decided to hire more staffers who are medically oriented, he says. For any new personnel, he says, he uses his Birkman to explain to them his leadership style and expectations and has them complete the assessment to highlight Issues and Differences to Watch when working with him. He has learned how to prevent confusion and ward off potential issues before they become personal: “I just tell people who I am up front.”

Meanwhile, Barbara continues to conduct regular meetings with staff to improve communications and the work environment.

ONE-MAN SHOW

A Houston lawyer with an even higher score on Authority—in the 90s for Usual Behavior—found he had a similar problem in his firm. The fact that he led a two-person staff didn’t make communication any easier. In this case, the high score manifested itself in shouting, aggressive behavior, and high-volume commands.

“I want them to know who is in charge,” he told Birkman consultant Bob Brewer.

“You’re doing that by shouting and being demanding. You’re yelling at educated people like they’re third-graders,” Bob told his client. “They already know who is in charge.”

It was hard for the lawyer to change his overbearing behavior. The business was, after all, a one-man show in a firm that bore his name. He seemed to fear that unless he was domineering, he would lose the respect of his staff. “We all have blind spots, and that was his,” Bob explains. “It’s the way you wound people—verbal clout.”

The consultant convinced the lawyer that it was in his best interest to try a more democratic approach. “This was a journey of a thousand steps, or at least several conversations characterized by compassionate candor,” Bob says.

Bob coached the attorney to own up to several aspects of his work relationships. First, he had to admit to his tendency to go over the top in the way he gave directions and responded to employees’ job performance, which typically failed to meet his standard; second, he had to acknowledge that the staffers’ response to his high Authority style was normal, and not the reaction of “wimps who couldn’t take the heat,” as he described it; and third, he had to acknowledge the Authority Needs of his small staff for a boss who was firm but fair and would offer more suggestions and bark fewer orders. Bob reports that the attorney eventually “made progress in better managing his own ‘unrealistic’ expectations of others.”

The consultant had similar discussions with the staff to help them better manage their responses to their boss’s behavior. He coached them to accept their boss for who he is, a work in progress; avoid oversensitivity when he reverted to his high-handed methods; cut him some slack in his efforts to improve; expect progress to come incrementally; and affirm his best efforts to make the changes that everyone wanted to see, “because behavior rewarded is behavior repeated.”

“It wasn’t a pretty fix,” Bob says, “but with patience on the part of the staff and sincere commitment to change on the part of the boss, they discovered how to work together better for mutual benefit.”

POWER VERSUS EMPOWERING

It is preferable to take care of Authority issues early on in a professional relationship, before workplace patterns become entrenched. Sonya Shields, executive national vice president for Arbonne, a cosmetics and health and wellness company, needed to hire an assistant who was organized and could take charge of handling day-to-day appointments and paperwork. It seemed a simple task, but she was going through one personal assistant after another. “She would hire people, and they would last three or six months and they’d be gone,” says her consultant, Ian Whitfield, of Calgary, Alberta, Canada. “She’s a sweet person, so it wasn’t that.”

Filling a position is never as simple as it seems, because every post is critical, especially for a small company. Sonya runs her business from her home in Canada, doing network marketing and direct sales in four countries. With her husband and two children in the house, the new staff member “had to fit the family,” she says.

Her leadership style scores showed a low Usual Behavior score of 37 for Authority with an even lower Need score of 23. “She doesn’t use authority as a stick . . . and needs an environment where she is treated warmly and is shown concern for her feelings,” says Ian. Sonya’s day-to-day style was amiable and cooperative. However, another important aspect of her Birkman results was apparent in her polar-opposite Stress reaction. The Stress score on her Birkman showed she would typically acquiesce if someone became domineering but would “tend to bark” when she felt under pressure and might even explode into self-defense mode if she got pushed too hard, too often.

Also significant was that Sonya’s Acceptance score showed she “is great with groups and great with sales . . . but gets her energy back by being by herself or around people she feels close to.” She adds, “I tend to be a social person, but [the Birkman] showed me I’d revert at some point and need solitude.”

Seeing Sonya’s Birkman in detail caused Ian to suggest adding a dimension to the qualities she was seeking in the assistant she wanted to hire. The consultant told Sonya that she didn’t need to hire someone with a strong command-and-control style, but she did need someone who would communicate well and not demand much interaction. “A person who was very direct would run over me,” Sonya admits. She says the aspect of her Birkman that most surprised her was getting a grasp of her low Authority Need.

The professional recruiter Sonya was using planned to send three candidates, but then asked if he could send a fourth person to give her practice interviewing. Sonya agreed, and had the Birkman consultant sit in on all the final interviews.

The top candidate was experienced and competent, but observing her, Ian guessed her Authority score would be high. She was assertive, very confident, and had the attitude of, “I can, I can, I can,” the consultant says. He watched the candidate interact with Sonya and noticed that the more outspoken the candidate became, the less engaged his client was in the interview.

After the other candidates were interviewed, the fourth, a less experienced young woman, came in. Although she seemed confident enough, she appeared to be a lower Authority type. She was reserved and easy to talk to. Ian saw Sonya lean in during the interview and noted a connection through that body language.

The first candidate would likely “do a great job,” Ian suggested to Sonya, but “you’d be walking on eggshells,” and it was likely that the candidate would have become just as frustrated by Sonya’s lower-key style.

You guessed it: Sonya hired the fourth candidate, who was just there to get practice. She says that knowing her Birkman helped her formulate questions for the candidates about matching values. “Without knowing how I act and who I can work with, I think I would have hired 2what was on the résumé rather than the person. The Birkman helped me realize I love to empower people. The one I hired was willing to take a pay cut to work for things and people she loved,” Sonya says of the inexperienced twenty-three-year-old. “On paper she wasn’t as attractive a candidate as she was in person when we interviewed her.”

As soon as the woman was hired, Sonya had her fill out a Birkman. “That added depth, because it helped me realize her personality and what drove her. She had to know that I was a boss who would help her strive.” She also found out her assistant was a high Structure list person. “So when I want her to do things, I make a list.” Armed with her assistant’s Birkman, she says, “I know what would be frustrating to her.”

“I’ve done a couple of personality tests,” says Sonya, “but this is the one that has hit home in real-life—not just my personality but my needs.”

Three years later, the personal assistant was still on the job.

NO ONE SIZE FITS ALL

Some highly capable bosses lead with a low Authority approach. They tend to have a “suggest rather than tell” style, which can also get good results. These are people who prefer to interact with a less direct style of communication. They would much rather make recommendations and suggestions than be required to issue commands or give orders.

Consultant Bob Brewer had to get one boss to master both styles of leadership to direct a small sales team for a home appliances company based in Shreveport, Louisiana.

Joe was “a great sales manager from Oklahoma, a slow-talking, low-key, good ol’ boy,” is how Bob describes him. He had a low Authority style, preferring a collegial approach to leadership. His reports said they loved it that Joe just made suggestions for how they should work their territories rather than make demands about his own preferences. The sales staff was performing well, except for one salesman who was not part of the boss’s fan club and was not as successful as his colleagues.

“I’m not sure he cares,” was what the others told the consultant about the salesman.

Then the group’s Birkman results came back.

“We look around the room and six of seven all have low Authority Needs,” Brewer says. “What we found out was that he was a high Need on Authority.”

“I need to know who is in charge,” the salesman said, echoing the language on the Birkman report. “Tell me exactly what you want me to do, and I will do it.”

It turns out that Joe, because of his leadership style, was leaving this one salesman clueless as to what he had to do to perform well. With a high Authority Need, the salesman understood his boss only when Joe ramped up his Authority image. Bob told Joe that when he spoke to the salesman, he needed to put more authority in his voice and speak in a clear, direct, and commanding way.

“Well, that’s not me,” the boss protested.

“Joe, you don’t have to do it all the time, but see how he needs you to be. Can you do that for him?” Bob asked.

“It won’t be comfortable. It won’t be natural.”

The boss had to work himself up to do it, but when he did, both boss and salesman felt relieved.

THE BIRKMAN AT WORK: EXECUTIVE COACHING

Tremendous amounts of money, effort, and time are spent in corporate training rooms teaching business leaders how to manage, and yet such instruction often fails to become part of the fabric of a corporation, especially in smaller companies. Sometimes the training is missing entirely, the presumption being that hiring the right talent is the end of the effort. But getting the right person in the right job is only the beginning of what can be a complicated and difficult relationship.

Aid to Promotion

John B. Lazar, a Birkman consultant based outside Chicago, finds the assessment is ideal for the executive-coaching engagements he is sometimes asked to do in a limited time frame.

One high-potential midlevel manager in a Chicago utilities company found she needed immediate, if short-term, help when she was being considered for a bigger job in the company. She did well in her current job. She and her three direct reports did mostly technical research and client work. But for her to move higher, she had to improve her communication skills. She wanted to get to the point where she could feel comfortable speaking up during meetings to ask questions and express opinions, and be able to authoritatively set expectations and manage goals for a larger staff. Her moderately low Authority Usual Behavior score (37) suggested she was most comfortable communicating with people using a discuss, suggest, and persuade approach. However, she also needed to expand her range and style to be more direct and directive. Her moderately high Needs score (72) likely meant she needed a boss who would recognize and acknowledge her expertise and strengths. That way, she might be more willing and able to step outside her comfort zone and try new ways of managing. John was called in to help her reach those goals, but he was told he had just five coaching sessions to get his client there. Her Birkman showed she was creative, able to take a long view, and was action oriented. She appeared at ease and motivated when working alone or in small groups, but with her low Need for Acceptance, she tended to avoid meetings. Her low Usual Behavior score in Structure suggested she tended to underestimate the extent to which some on her staff needed the security of greater procedural discipline. She was sensitive in dealing with people (high Usual Behavior scores in Esteem and Empathy) and direct when speaking with people about important issues.

First, John used the Birkman to identify how she might best learn new approaches quickly. The assessment’s “how to talk to her” and “the biggest mistakes you can make with her” sections made these suggestions:

• Show appropriate respect.
• Don’t be afraid to disagree openly with her.
• Present the big idea first, then wait for a response before offering more detail.
• Don’t make the mistake of making her conform unnecessarily.

The assessment also informed him that the client “learns by reading and/or writing.”

He then identified how she might act under Stress—for example, “can become silent” in certain situations or, at the opposite extreme, “becomes domineering, even aggressive.” He suggested she begin to try new behaviors on the job: speaking up more in group settings and having regular conversations with her direct reports well before a completion deadline to better manage delegated work. Each week she did a self-evaluation of how well she accomplished each of her goals.

John also had her develop her in-the-moment awareness and confront the choices she made. She preferred one-on-one communication and wasn’t that fond of groups (high Usual Behavior in Esteem, low Need in Acceptance), so her comfort zone was sitting in her office and working. John pushed her to get out of the office regularly to help her reports.

By their fourth session, the manager had the courage to make a bold choice: she would share her entire Birkman report with her manager. It proved to be a starting point for a deep discussion between the two about how he could best manage her, how he should speak to her. They used the Birkman dialogue reports that address universal topics such as, “the biggest mistakes you can make with her,” what motivation she needed to do her best work, and the nature of her learning style.

The client described her conversation with her boss as positive and constructive. The Birkman gave him a deeper understanding of her, and she felt they built a stronger professional connection. With confidence, he gave her opportunities to play a more explicit leadership role, and she shined.

John says he felt proud of his client’s quick progress. “I found it stunning that she was able to use the Birkman as a focal point of conversation with her manager—to provide information and to collaborate and seek guidance to be better managed by him,” he says.

Perhaps most valuable, John says, was that inside and outside her work environment, she began to recognize the fact that what she needed to operate at her best was different from what other people need to operate. It is a core Birkman concept. The only way to understand that is to get to know others and not assume they are like you, John says.

In their final coaching meeting, John invited the woman’s boss to join them for part of the session so they could discuss together what changes had occurred over the two months of coaching. The boss said the manager spoke up in meetings, offered her opinions, and asked questions in ways that engaged others and furthered conversation. She confirmed she was working differently with her direct reports and admitted to the challenges she experienced in beginning new practices. Overall she said her work relationships had changed for the better, although she realized it would take time for the new habits to become routine.

At the end of that final session, her manager said he would be announcing her promotion the following month.

Not Buying the New Boss

A new boss at a large East Coast company was put in charge of about a dozen chemical engineers and research lab technicians. The boss, a man in his early forties who had been put on an executive track, wasn’t a scientist, but instead had a solid background in marketing and sales. As often happens, he had a particular knack for managing up and was well liked among his superiors, but he never got much training or the opportunity to learn how to lead a group of employees.

Still, senior management thought he was just what was needed to lead the research team, which had earned a reputation for being sullen, low key, and at times rebellious. The conflict between the manager and his reports was instant and intense. The employees were mistrustful of their new leader and dismissed him as “sales-y” and too much of a lightweight in the scientific arena.

The company asked Pennsylvania consultant Janice Bergstresser to help the new boss improve communication with the team, as well as boost overall cooperation among the team members. She found the boss under siege. “Engineers tend not to praise,” Janice says. “They enjoy analysis, tearing things apart to see how they work. The new boss took their comments as personal criticism.”

The new leader, a typical high-powered Green, was high Authority in Usual Behavior and liked to talk a lot—he was direct and stuck to the facts. But he was also low Challenge and didn’t like hearing criticism. And he had a high Need for Empathy, which he wasn’t getting from his staffers, who kept their distance from him. To keep himself fortified against the barrage of negative interaction, he kept a “successes” file to look at when he was feeling low and particularly unappreciated. The file had good-news items that he had collected from his years at the company, such as his best performance reviews and letters of appreciation.

The boss’s Birkman profile in fact showed that he was direct and blunt when communicating with others, although his personal Needs required others to be sensitive and considerate with him. His scores showed he was quick to make decisions, but then had to mull them over long afterward. He appeared easy-going and extroverted, but took the criticism of others as a personal affront and always true. He also scored low on his ability to express his feelings. He had several clear strengths. His biggest asset was that he was a strong Green and could be charming and persuasive. In fact, he consistently did a good job of negotiating on his team’s behalf on any number of issues.

Because there was little trust among the group, Janice gave each employee a private Birkman feedback. It gave the individuals a chance to view their own results and understand the Birkman Method process before being asked to share the data—and so build trust. The consultant measured the group’s reaction to the information, pointing out group strengths and vulnerabilities and the role those played in achieving certain goals. She also encouraged them to ask questions about the boss.

Meanwhile, she coached the new leader separately. Her first step was to get him to review and challenge his assumptions about the team and how to move forward. Her aim was to get him to internalize a few new steps in his management style. She suggested he

• Provide complete agendas with facts and figures at least one day before meetings so the analyzers could digest, gripe about, and discuss with colleagues.
• Provide more data, not less, in those reports so no points of contention would catch the team by surprise.
• Wait for a consensus and not to expect quick agreement.
• Say to himself, “They are analyzing the idea, not attacking me.”
• Delegate heavy analysis and research decisions to direct reports to relieve his daily burden, giving himself final approval.
• Ask more questions by e-mail about upcoming meetings so as not to get worn out listening to endless early analyses and first impressions.
• Study the Birkman group report’s “differences to watch” segment between himself and each individual direct report, so he could manage each person as a unique individual and not lump everyone together.

Janice also conducted face-to-face “differences to watch” sessions between the manager and each staffer who asked for it; about half did. Once everyone was comfortable with the individual reports, they agreed to share some of the results. The consultant held two meetings with all in attendance, so they could react to the information, identify their strengths and vulnerabilities, and discuss how their similarities and differences contribute to achieving work goals.

During this process, the team came to the realization that the boss complemented their talents. His ability to communicate easily with upper management was raising the reputation of the unit as a whole and of many of the individuals. They were getting more recognition from above than they ever had in the past. Budgets were approved more often, as were their other requests. The new boss had the negotiating skills they—and their previous boss—had lacked. Understanding their differences as well as their common goals had immediately improved the workplace harmony between the boss and his reports.