The business buzzword "Micro-management" has been used much since the "managerial revolution" of the 1980's.

The word is usually used pejoratively... ie., something the modern manager should not do to his/her employees.

* What, to you, would be described as "micro-management"? What behaviors might it include?
* Have YOU ever been "micro-managed"
* Are YOU a "micro-manager" at times?
* What are the benefits-- or negative fallout-- of being micro-managed?
* What's the difference between "micro-management"... and just great enthusiasm and assiduous interest on the part of a manager?


Discuss!

Micro-Managing

Rearranging my desk
Going through my papers and drawers
Clock watching (I arrived at two minutes to 9 one morning and boss said "You're pushin' it!" IMO, as long as it's not 1 minute after, I'm basking in the luxury of 2 minutes early)
Pushing deadlines -- something's not due for a month and they have to have it this minute
Monitoring my phone calls
Nit-picking my overtime
Hovering

In my experience, micro-managing comes from insecure people who don't really know what they're doing, so they're even more terrified that their assistant doesn't know what she's doing. They also have generally not had assistants before, so they don't know what to expect or how to treat them. Or worse, they've had assistants who were not professional assistants and didn't care about their own quality of work, and been burned. I give them about six months to learn to trust me and learn to leave me alone, and if they don't, I leave them.

Hasn't been an issue for the past decade, thank God.

Not so much now. I've been doing my job in the government for a long time. Most people leave me alone and let me do my thing at work.

When I was new...yes, I was micro-managed to a point.

It has been tried. It failed.

I have worked under it for many years in the Insurance Claims field. I luckily do not work under it on my current job in Insurance Underwriting, THANK GOD!!!!!

Fulltilt summed it up quite well.

Micro-managing makes it feel like even the smallest decisions are taken out of an employee's hands. It results in nothing but resentment and lower productivity. At least as applied to me. I agree that people who micro-manage are more often unsure of their own abilities and, by micro-managing, then feel free to blame the micro-managed when something goes wrong.

I see no upside to micro-management. Some concepts of it would be applicable to training someone new to a job type, but only for a limited amount of time.

I've never engaged in micro-managing people working under me. Getting the job done right and safely is more important than how you get there. Most of the time. Giving people free reign over how they do their work also often comes up with some new, creative ideas in approaching work.

I've always believed that people who micro-manage others at work very likely micro-manage most everything else in their lives.

They're not really 'managing' anything. They're control freaks.

My thoughts exactly and most folks really dislike/abhor these individuals from my experience. I can think of some abdominable/oppressive supervisor and managers that were like this.

The only they ARE managing is their own yearly bonus for being "on everyone's rear-end" for being a micro-manager. Because it's all about NUMBERs. Nothing more, nothing less.

As for Five-O, it's been tried here, too, without much success. I'm good at what I do and not afraid to walk (so usually I don't have to).

In my experience, micromanaging backfires in the end. I'd rather have a staff that will rally, and do whatever I need them to do when I need them to do it. A micromanaged staff will only do the bare minimum. Also, what happens when a micromanager takes time off? Not much.

I read that if your boss is a M-M to constantly update them every step of the way. Then they can see that you know what you are doing. They also won't have time to do their own work because you will be bugging them, so might leave you alone!

I find it really helpful to ask the person giving the work to say when they need it (and I mean a time with numbers, not "soon," or "tomorrow" etc.) and let them see me write it down. Sometimes it's just a matter of getting clear instructions in the first place - who what where when. It helps them learn to manage their work, too, if the problem is their inexperience. If it's somebody who times you when you go to the ladies' room, then it doesn't matter what you do. You should just find another job.

It's worse when they go away. Then they're on the phone to you all day or leaving 16 voice mails and emailing you to death.

You know, we here sometimes malign those Indian young people to whom computer tech problems (and what-not) are fielded.

They literally have a script set out before them to which they must adhere. They're not to say anything that isn't on the script... I think they've been coached in things like accent and vocal tone, as well. What kind of JOB is that one, anyway?

That's the kind of job where you want to strangle the people who force the people to read a script to you like an automaton instead of being trained to listen and respond to the person on the other side of the phone or screen. It's true in more and more service industries, not just the ones farmed out to India. Local businesses do it, too.

Oh yes. I work for a micro-manager at the moment. I am a manager but I work for an officer who manages several managers. And, it doesn't stop when my boss leaves, from what I hear, this goes on in the personal life. I love FullTiltRedhead's post, so true. It makes me cringe because this is exactly the type of thing that goes on here.
No deadline is ever good enough or fast enough. Everything must be done now, or yesterday. (Why? who knows. I think insecurity and control issues.) Everything is top priority, everything is on a rush. I occasionally have to take days to work at my home office because sometimes I just need some time to actually get projects done, instead of spending my day writing over 200 follow up and status-update emails, that often don't get read, and I am summoned to respond to in person anyway, even though the email response is a *must* and if it doesn't arrive, then I'm said to be unresponsive or unavailable. It drives me crazy. Now the middle-managers like myself have blackberries so there is no escape. It's horrible. I don't do this to my employees, but I hate it when I am gone because then it can trickle down and they might get the brunt of some of it. It's very counter-productive. Micro-managing, really isn't managing, IMO. It clogs up the system, and takes away productivity, like many OCD workhabits of today, like checking your emails every 10 minutes, never letting a call go to voice mail, people who leave multiple messages on voice mail, email, and blackberries or PDAs, not respecting a closed door or conference call, people who try to talk to you while you are on the phone, etc.

LisasAura, I can relate to all of your post, but this particular line rings especially true. Fortunately, my immediate boss is not a micro-manager, but there are a couple of other managers/directors in the sidestream that I must sometimes supply information to, and they do this.

If I start out by carefully composing a written response to their email (which sometimes takes several hours to research and write), then this is ignored... we'll have a meeting, and it will be quite clear from their questions that they haven't bothered to read it (though they say they have). This will be followed by more phone calls that make it clear they still don't get it, even after the meeting.

If I decide not to waste my time composing something that won't be read, and just give them the answer verbally at a meeting, then even though they say they understand it, I'm asked to put it all down in writing anyway. And after I've done that, this is still followed up by phone calls. So what was the point of writing it down?

I know I'm being clear. Many people tell me I'm very good at explaining things. My boss understands it the first time I show it to her. So it ain't me.

My feeling is that these people are on some kind of weird circular mental track... they're a hamster spinning madly on its wheel, but getting nowhere. I assume they either (a) don't have enough real duties of their own to keep them busy, or (b ) have plenty of their own duties, but avoid them because they're terrified they don't really know how to do them. So they're magnetically drawn to the people that *do* know what they're doing, and just can't leave them alone.

They're productivity vampires, trying to suck out what they themselves lack....

What would happen if you started to subvert some of that crap? Like, print your emails out before you go to the meeting, and when you get asked a question you've already written the answer to, get out your email and say, "Oh, we discussed that in our emails, but if you'd like me to go over it again, of course ... as I wrote in my email to you of Oct. 7, 2:19 pm, blah de blah." And then next time you're told to go to a meeting say your schedule prevents it but you hope your previous emails will be referenced since you have already discussed the subject in detail.

But I know some of the We Must Meet and Confer people are attention whores, and there is no real purpose to the meeting, so that could backfire because it would squelch their "reason" to gather you all together so you can gaze upon The Great I Am. :-D

Good idea, Rational Thinking Person! That should work, shouldn't it? Nope. Tried it, it makes no impression on them. Such people cannot be shamed. They just blink their little eyes and say "yes please". Might as well be talking to a post...

I confronted it: "I feel as though I'm being micromanaged. Is there some issue with my work that we need to talk about and haven't?" This usually pulls the rug out from under them, because it's one thing to behave in a petty manner but entirely another to have to get clear on all their little "issues". If they happen to get nit-picky in this exchange, I ask for complete clarity of their expectations on each point and they usually can't provide it or get vague, at which point - - game over. I guess it's just turning the tables but it usually works because I employ the element of surprise. The last boss I tried this on came up with a lame problem with my work that she couldn't substantiate with any facts, dates, or examples....but she stopped doing it after the conversation so I let it go.

Well I grew up under it and now I think it's time I started doing some micromanaging of my own ...
Thank goodness our current employer trusts us to do our own thing.