dpwilliams

Reading through a couple of articles by Ruth Spellman, Chief Executive of the Chartered Management Institute, a few issues she raises rang alarm bells, and I imagine they will do for hundreds of people across the UK’s publishing industry.

In an article about management style Ruth wrote.

If we are serious about pushing the UK towards economic recovery, businesses need to be innovative, accessible and empowering. It’s what employees need and want.”

Ruth Spellman, 2010

I couldn’t agree more, Ruth.

Detailing the plight of the managers Ruth goes on in another recent article to detail the following.

Yes, managers are currently under a great deal of pressure to restore their organisations back to pre-recession health, but there are no excuses for pushing employees so hard that the health of the individual is sacrificed for the health of the business. Work should be a place where people are built up, not broken down.”

Ruth Spellman, 2010

Read the last sentence again, it’s remarkable but it really shouldn’t be, it should be standard practice; we should take it for granted this will happen.

“Work should be a place where people are built up, not broken down.”

Imagine working in a business where the driving force was to build up employees, make them better, bring them a wealth of experience and look after them. That would be good for employees and for the business, especially in these hard times.

The requirement for good management steps up a level and becomes a lot more serious when you look at the implications bad management can have on the health of employees and what that means for the business.

If employers need a financial incentive to develop smarter processes to avoid putting pressure on their workforces to deliver more for less, they should bear in mind that presenteeism — underperforming at work due to ill-health or stress — costs the economy £15bn each year, almost double the cost of absenteeism. This fact alone should encourage employers to do more to manage increased workloads, keeping morale and staff productivity levels up.”

Ruth Spellman, 2010

Management is a two-way thing. Most managers don’t get this, they don’t realise they are managing humans, they think they are just managing a spreadsheet. Most managers don’t innovate, and they aren’t accessible or empowering because they don’t understand the employer/employee equation involves delicate unpredictable human emotions not raw data, which can be manipulated at the click of a button to tell them what they want.

And why does this happen? Because only one in five managers have any type of professional management qualification. A lack of qualified managers has bred a class of authoritarian, bureaucratic and secretive managers obsessed only with the maintenance of their own seniority. This doesn’t work, it isn’t productive, and it ultimately leads to failure for all involved.

All employers have a duty of care to employees and are legally required to assess the risk of work-related stress, it is a duty of care the UK publishing industry does not take seriously, this needs to change if the task managers have of “restoring their organisations back to pre-recession health” is to be achieved.

In an industry that has taken big hits and suffered harshly at the hands of the recession we need innovative, accessible, honest and open managers who can create an environment where the people left after the streamlining process of the last two years can be built up and bring the UK’s publishing industry a new lease of life.