My reflection on what's influencing human behavior in professional services firms...
I love professional services organizations. I’ve dedicated my professional career to working IN or ON professional services organizations. They employ highly educated and accomplished professionals: some of the brightest people I’ve ever encountered, whom I look up to and learn from… that’s the reason I am fascinated by them.
The recent collapse of Dewey & LeBoeuf brought up a question I’ve been struggling throughout the years: why is it that smart organizations fail or can’t seem to advance beyond a certain point or at a faster pace?
Timing is an interesting thing. I was rereading some of Malcolm Gladwell’s articles for the New Yorker magazine, when I ran into the “Talent Myth,” which contains his observations on talent and organizations. I need to open a bracket here and thank Gladwell for his brilliant research and writing. I can only aspire one day to be half as articulate and elegant in presenting my thoughts as he is. In his piece, Gladwell talks about “narcissistic organization” and among many other sources draws upon an essay, written by Robert Hogan, Robert Raskin, and Dan Fazzini called "The Dark Side of Charisma.” Both the essay and Gladwell’s article talk about three types of managers, whom on the surface seem like the perfect leaders but when studied closer represent real danger to organizations. The authors refer to them as the “High Likability Floater”, the “Homme de Ressentiment” and the “Narcissist.” The latter one grabbed my attention. The authors define narcissists as ones who “resist accepting suggestions, thinking it will make them appear weak, and they don't believe that others have anything useful to tell them.” “Narcissists are biased to take more credit for success than is legitimate and are biased to avoid acknowledging responsibility for their failures and shortcomings for the same reasons that they claim more success than is their due." If organizations and management profiling is of interest, I’d highly recommend that you look up the sources of my inspiration and read more.
Is this narcissistic behavior self-confidence gone bad? After all, confidence is expected from professional service provides, who are hired for their breath and depth of expertise and experience and a level of certitude to comfort clients is natural. I am afraid it’s much more, as narcissistic managers are not only limiting themselves and ignoring new ideas and better ways of doing business, but also fuel negative performance across the firm, especially with the impressionable next generation of leaders and encourages more of the same…a vicious circle. In business development terms, as that's my domain, narcissist managers are the ones who go to market alone, have it all figured out, don’t need the firm’s support with content or connections, and would never admit that a failure might be due to some of their actions. Sound familiar?
Is this my answer? Would such narcissistic behavior be so powerful to lead professional services organizations to ignore toxic conduct and spiral downwards? In the past, I’ve always argued that the compensation model of professional services organizations was feeding the constant pull towards “eat what you kill” mentality instead of fostering a spirit of “for the greater good” – this is what often holds back firms. It now appears that might not be the only reason. The narcissist factor, let’s call it that, would also explain why the business growth skills programs so many professional services firms run have limited and short spanned success. If my answer to why intelligent organizations such as professional services firms fail or get stuck is a combination of the typical compensation model and narcissistic behavior, then what’s the solution?
In full disclosure, I am an admirer of Adam Smith and believe that society and organizations should encourage and compensate those who are willing to take on higher risks, work harder and come up with and implement extraordinary ideas. At the same time, I recognize that when encouraged, or rather when unharnessed by a positive common goal, such actions can lead to destruction. This in essence is the fundamental issue at hand here. Professional services organizations are complex networks of brilliant people, many of whom display narcissistic behavior which is often magnified by the firm’s compensation models. When these organizations are disconnected due to the lack of common strategic goals and systems, they crumble.
When talking about growing professional services firms I emphasize the importance of strategy, systems and skills. It now appears those are vital beyond business growth – their alignment is not only necessary for the development of organizations, but for the organizations’ survival. Firms who strive to endure and moreover, move forward at a significant velocity, should focus on the system not the individual superstar performance. One size fits none. Goals and systems are diverse and vary from one professional services organization to another. However, in the long term, none of this will work if the organization is not working towards a firm-based, common goal which benefits the firm as a whole rather than the individual performer. And, this culture must originate with the leadership team. When it comes to business growth, organizations should encourage and reward collaborative approach, which provides for learning, best practice sharing, better solutions design and a team client approach…for the greater good.
I will elaborate on the merits of collaborative business growth approach in my next post…”one for all - all for one.”
© 2010-2013 Copyright Mira Ilieva Leonard / iStile All rights reserved
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