Resources — Book Reviews
The Set-Up-to-Fail Syndrome
How Good Managers Cause Great People to Fail
by Jean-Francois Manzoni, Jean-Louis Barsoux, Harvard Business School Press; October 2002
Managers are responsible people. If an employee drops the ball, the manager becomes a coach. Ironically, coaching often guarantees more failure. This book tells why. I have not read the book—it was recommended by a friend—but the following two reviews from Amazon.com make the point.
* “An employee you manage slips up somehow: a missed deadline, a lost
account, or a weak presentation. You decide to oversee that person’s
work more closely. After all, if your direct reports aren’t delivering,
it’s your head that will roll. To further your frustration, the more
you "help," the worse the employee’s performance becomes.
What’s going on?
“In this eye-opening book, leadership experts Jean-François Manzoni and Jean-Louis Barsoux expose a disturbing and surprisingly rampant phenomenon. While common wisdom assumes that so-called poor performers fail in spite of their boss’s best efforts, this book demonstrates exactly the opposite. In many cases, a boss’s attitudes and behaviors actually cause or "set up" certain individuals—including those with great potential—to fail.
“Based on ten years of study into boss-subordinate relationships, Manzoni and Barsoux show that this Set-Up-to-Fail Syndrome is not confined to relationships with the proverbial "boss from hell." Even respected leaders—whether CEOs, teachers, or coaches—get caught up in it. The problem stems from the fact that while most managers empower and encourage star performers, they tend to micromanage and control perceived "weaker" performers in ways that stifle self-confidence and drive. The unwitting result: The latter group lives down to expectations, rather than living up to its true potential.”
** “Many supervisors would vehemently deny that they are "complicit in an employee's lack of success....[by] creating and reinforcing a dynamic that essentially sets up perceived weaker performers to fail." Nonetheless they are. Were they to read this book, they would probably agree that there is such a syndrome and then lament how unfair it is to subordinates who are victimized by it.”
* from Amazon.com, Editorial Reviews, , http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0875849490/qid=1074022943/sr=1-1/ref=sr_1_1/104-9349183-6295940?v=glance&s=books#product-details
** from Amazon.com, The Negative Self-Fulfilling Prophecy, Reviewer:
Robert Morris from Dallas, Texas, May 2003 (for more see the above website
reference).