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WithholdingInformation

The first and second level management of Daddy-War-Bucks (DWB), a large financial institution, graded the quality of service from WidgetsR'Us (WRU), a key supplier. Rather than grading overall support, DWB's management gave every WRU support person an individual grade, but NO grades were given to the support personnel's management (I don't know why). The grades formed a normal distribution. One person stood out. And it wasn't the person with the highest grade.

The managers of WRU's support team decided to appease DWB by removing Jonah, the support person with the lowest grade, from the team. This decision was a shock to both Jonah and his teammates. His colleagues hadn't heard a single bad thing about Jonah's performance and they wondered if they would be removed next. WRU's management chose to NOT tell any member of the team that their performance had been graded by DWB. When Jonah asked why he was being removed, he was told that it was purely a financial decision.

Through back channels, Jonah heard his removal might be more than a "fiscal" decision. Jonah pleaded with his management for feedback so that he could learn from the experience, but management denied that anything was wrong.

Behind closed doors, Susan, the second level WRU manager for the support team, says that she will not reveal the real story to the team. She is afraid that the the grades received from DWB will further lower the fragile morale of the support team, who are under continuous pressure from DWB, a Pattern 1.5 organization who demands perfection and constant fire fighting.

Have you had an experience like Jonah's -- where information about your performance was intentionally withheld from you? Please share your story.

Have you had an experience like Susan's -- where you intentionally withheld information about an employee's performance from him or her? Please share your story.

Under what circumstances is it appropriate to withhold information about a teammate's or employee's performance from him or her? Please share the circumstances.

SteveSmith 2004.09.09

I have worked in places where information has been withheld, but not performance based information.

I think performace feedback is falsified, at times, to circumvent the apparent difficulties of congruent communciation. But under such circumstances, I think, an opportunity to attend to the deeper issues is wasted.

- HuwLloyd 2004.09.10

Note my emphasis on what we see from our perspective. That may explain why Jonah's colleagues were shocked. DWB doesn't see everything. The idea that WRU managers would fire someone based on DWB's limited perspective is a bit wierd. The idea that WRU would lie to Jonah about why he was fired is also a bit wierd.

Well, sometimes people act a bit wierd.

As to the questions, yes performance information has been withheld from me. Why? Because some people lack the self esteem to tell me to my face what they think about my performance. They are happy to tell other people their opinion when I am not present. I have had the same weak moments when I ran my mouth behind someone's back, but couldn't say constructive words to a person directly. A common human failing.

Individuals fail. That is one reason why organizations are run by more than one person. Someone in the manager group should be able to speak directly to Jonah (or whomever) in an honest, direct manner.

DwaynePhillips 09-11-2004

I've been trying to understand this problem from the manager's perspective. I wanted to see Susan's mental model. My tool for analyzing my perception of her model is the following Diagram Of Effects (DOE):

Susan believes that by withholding information about internal problems she can eliminate wasted time that she and the other members of the team would spend working through the internal issues triggered by the grades. She therefore prevents any increase to repair time, which would have lowered customer satisfaction. Furthermore, by withholding information about internal problems she thinks she has prevented an increase in the number of internal problems, which would lower team morale, which would reduce customer satisfaction.

If the secret can be kept, the approach will work in the short-term. But it's a subscription to long-term failure. In my experience, there is a 95% likelihood that someone in organization will reveal the secret to someone who will reveal it to someone else. For instance, I found out about the grades through the back channels without even being a direct member of the support team. Although I haven't told anyone, I'll bet every member of the team knows by now that they have been graded.

Susan does not see the long-term effects of her action. By withholding information, she has increased mistrust in the management process, which will increase the the number of internal problems and non-linearly decrease team morale. And no matter how hard the members of the support team try to be professional to their customer, their attitude will leak out, which will reduce customer satisfaction, which will further erode team morale.

Susan believes that she has helped the team stay focused. But the mistrust she created is a much bigger problem than the revelation of the grades would ever have been. Creating trust in the management process takes many months to years to achieve. Destroying it takes seconds. Susan's management team will invest months of efforts trying to bring morale back to the level it was before this incident. Their efforts may or may not work. Jonah's morale may take years to recover.

There is much more to creating customer satisfaction than maximizing repair rate and minimizing the number of external problems. I believe support team morale has the biggest impact, but its effect is underestimated.

And yes, Dwyane, I agree people display weird behavior. I suspect that Susan thinks that in addition to saving people time that they would have wasted, she also believes she has spared their feelings. Susan doesn't recognize that people are crushed, rather than merely hurt, when they feel betrayed by someone they trust.

SteveSmith 2004.09.17

I looked back at the start of this discussion and noticed the following statement. I have emphasized what I believe are the key words.

Susan, the second level WRU manager for the support team, says that she will not reveal the real story to the team. She is afraid that the the grades received from DWB will further lower the fragile morale of the support team...

Susan thinks the team is fragile. How would you feel if you knew your supervisor thought of you as fragile? Is that a good way to label an adult? Fragile?

Susan is afraid. It seems that fear dominates her thoughts and actions. I think low self-esteem is driving the situation. Susan probably has good intentions, but she isn't thinking clearly.

Like I said earlier, sometimes people like me do wierd things.

DwaynePhillips 18 September 2004

I wouldn't like being labeled as fragile.

Susan is afraid. It seems that fear dominates her thoughts and actions. I think low self-esteem is driving the situation. Susan probably has good intentions, but she isn't thinking clearly.

Dwayne, I think you are right -- she is afraid and fear does dominate her thoughts. I don't know about the low self-esteem as the driver though. She may have high self-esteem and is simply self-centered. I believe she is doing what she thinks is best for her with zero concern about Jonah. She isn't driven by empathy but rather by self-preservation. Sparing her team's feelings is merely a nice side effect rather than a driver.

What is congruent behavior in this situation?

SteveSmith 2004.09.18

I'm wondering here whether the grades formed a normal distribution by themselves, or were manipulated, perhaps by "grading on the curve" scaling, to fit a normal distribution. As a manager in a financially-driven layoff situation years back, I was coached by HR to sort my team into buckets. They even had a helpful powerpoint slide showing a normal curve, in support of their ill-founded notion that the members of a team would follow a normal distribution. They also gave a directive that for "legal reasons" I couldn't explain the sorting process to the team, including the people I had to lay off.

DaveSmith 2004.09.18

Dave, yes, I suspect the grades were manipulated to form a normal distribution.

Like you, management at DWB was trained to rate their prople that way. Why wouldn't they rate their supplier's people using a similar method?

Despite my respect for Jack Welch as a leader, I think his proclamations about trimming the bottom have affected management thinking in too many places. The trouble with the new thinking is that the management of our other companies don't understand the context Welch is working in. The "leaders" transform Welch's desire for weeding out the people who don't fit into a formula. The normal distribution is the centerpiece of that kind of thinking. And the application of a formula to a sensitive human process is a ridiculous method to me.

SteveSmith 2004.09.19

What is congruent behavior in this situation?

I think Susan should tell the team the truth. One day the true story will come out. Then what happens?

DwaynePhillips 20 September 2004

So do I.

One day the true story will come out. Then what happens?

I've seen this happen too many times...

Susan tells the team she did it to spare them from wasting time processing feedback from a screwed up customer. She doesn't tell the team that she chose to withhold the information because she thought it would maintain the status quo, which she perceived best positioned her performance with the customer and thus her management.

Typically, the members of the team listen, nod their heads and say nothing. They withhold information about their feelings and thoughts. Susan leaves the meeting thinking everything is okay. The team leaves the room with confirmation that Susan withheld important information from them. They think she will repeat behavior when it suits her. In other words, they mistrust her.

If the team has placated management for a long time, they angrily tell Susan exactly what they think of her actions. The anger confirms to Susan that they are children and that she did the right thing.

I guess that returns us to the idea that people act in weird, but often predictable, ways.

SteveSmith 2004.09.19

I know a great deal about situations like these. Ain't tellin' you nothing.

<Name Withheld out of Consistency>

S/he with no name.

Under what circumstances is it appropriate to withhold information about a teammate's or employee's performance from him or her? Please share the circumstances.

It's appropriate for a person to withhold information if they don't feel safe.

I don't know how to interpret your message. You may be playing with me/us, which is okay with me. I will say that I did feel a bit annoyed but then I started laughing about your reply. I said to myself, "Ohh... what an appropriate comment for this thread."

SteveSmith 2004.02.20

Gave you a laugh and illustrated how silly withholding information is, all in 13 words. Silliest, of course, is holdng information and announcing that you won't share it. In tech, that often shows up as the: "I knew better." game, after the fact, of course. Not helpful. A hook, of course only if you need to be perfect and all-knowning. Get over that, and it's easy. You won't tell? OK. See ya.

Within organizations I tend to deal with the withholding game like this: "This is something I need to do my job, and so far I'm not getting it from that guy over there. I think I'm supposed to get this from that guy over there. Can you help me with this?" First step is with the person holding the information. Second with my boss / sponsor. Third with theirs. If need be, I'll take it up the org chart until the two reporting trees come together.

As a manager I absolutely won't tolerate this game among the folks who report to me. In general I work to make sure that the folks report to me have the information (and everything else) they need to do their jobs. Don't know / don't got none of that is bad enough. Won't tell? Unacceptable.

Purely practically, the "withholding information" events I see most of the time turn out to be confusion: about what was asked, or about what someone's job is. It's certainly more productive to address the situation in those terms. Apply some clarity, and the game goes away - nowhere for it to hang out.

Of course, it's nearly impossible to talk about the information you are withholding for any length of time without giving away exactly what you are trying to conceal.

<Name Withheld - Likely it's obvious at this point.>

Of course. -- JimBullock 2004.09.21