Have you ever been managed by a bureaucrat-technocrat? A bureaucrat, in simple terms, is a person whose management style is dominated by a concern about rules, procedures, and protocols. A technocrat is a person whose management style is dominated by a reliance on numbers and data.
By themselves these management styles can make for an unpleasant manager. Put them together, and you have a person whose least concern is the human impact of their decisions.
It’s Just Business; We’re Still Friends, Right?
An interesting phenomenon I experienced with a bureaucrat-technocrat I encountered as a manager was the ability to compartmentalize. “It was just a numbers decision,” I can imagine this person saying to themselves. Or: “I was just following the company’s rules and policies. It was nothing personal.”
This compartmentalizing ability then leads a manager who has taken a destructive action against an employee, such as terminating them with little-to-no communication beforehand, to continue commenting on social media on the employee’s “cute” hairdos from years past or their latest pet photo. They see nothing inconsistent. Actions taken as a manager following the dictates of rules and numbers are on one side of their life, and the employee’s personal photos posted to social media are on the other side. A neat dichotomy.
When the bureaucrat-technocrat manager who underhandedly terminated me continued trying to make small talk with me, I told friends it felt like I had been pushed over a cliff and the person who pushed me was leaning over the edge yelling down the gulf to me: “So how’s it going? Are you looking forward to your vacation?”
Corporate Tin Man: If Only I Had a Heart
This management style can be efficient (where the ability to communicate with emotional intelligence in a difficult situation is not required) but lacks an understanding of the human impact that comes from “just following the rules and numbers.”
I’m reminded of stories of cruelty committed and the perpetrator stating as a defense, “I was just following orders.” I also am reminded, much less seriously, of the Tin Man in The Wizard of Oz: “If only I had a heart (when conducting business in difficult situations),” the bureaucrat-technocrat should say to themselves in a quest for self-improvement.
How Do You Help the Bureaucrat-Technocrat Improve as a Manager?
My mother always taught me to treat other people the way I would want them to treat me, known to Christians as the Golden Rule, or, in the Old Testament, to “love thy neighbor as thyself.”
I grew up in a mostly secular Jewish household, but this rule with its ancient roots found its way into my mother’s teaching. A management style that prioritizes rules and data above all else often leads to outcomes that affect other people badly. The bureaucrat-technocrat is so consumed with following the rules and data, though, that they don’t consider whether the actions they take are actions they would want committed against them.
In management training, assessments that determine people’s natural management styles should be administered as a starting point.
Those with bureaucratic and/or technocratic leanings should be asked to participate in role-playing exercises that force them to consider the results of blindly following rules and data when making decisions.
In some cases, the orders come from on high in an organization, so the manager really will be “just following orders,” but the approach the manager takes in following those orders can make a huge difference in the human impact of those affected.
The budding bureaucrat-technocrat managers, who likely have low emotional intelligence, can be taught the value of communicating as openly as possible with those who will be adversely affected by a decision, and to avoid being duplicitous as much as possible.
“Sharon, I can’t make you any promises about job security right now,” a boss who knows this employee’s job is in danger but can’t say so might respond when she expresses concern that she may be terminated. “I would say that if a good career opportunity presents itself to you, you may want to explore it. You may want to explore the full scope of your options right now.”
The manager training to gain a heart in decision-making then could be asked to reflect on how they would want to be communicated with if they were in Sharon’s position. “Would you want to be lied to or have a perfunctory, oblique conversation after the decision to terminate was already made?”
If there’s any hope at all for the bureaucrat-technocrat, they’ll start to catch on that rules and data only take you so far as a manager. The other half is compassionate communication—even when the all-important rules don’t require it.