I’ve never been shy about my disdain for management “theory” — because let’s be honest, it’s not really that complicated. Have a plan, reduce complexity, take punches for your team, chip in. I’m not saying it’s easy, but the right move is usually pretty obvious. MBA strategies are just cover for folks that don’t want to do the hard work.
But sometimes they’re worse than just passive noise — they’re evil. Of course, disciples of evil strategies don’t call them that. But they’re pervasive and, for some folks, undeniably personally effective. After writing about memecoins the other day, it occurred to me that the worst of these could best be called “pump and dump management.”
Pump and dump managers are usually (but not always) hired from the outside. They parachute in with a lot of sound and fury, often show positive results in the short term by destroying long term value, and get out of Dodge while the getting’s good. Off to their next adventure, they ride these “successes” while avoiding blame for the true impact of their actions. It. Is. Infuriating.
Please, make sure you don’t hire these folks. But if it happens, send them on their way as quickly as possible — and pay your learning forward by warning that next hiring manager looking for a reference! Some key things to watch for:
The last guy sucked
PDMs love to talk about how bad everything is — and how lucky you are they’re around to fix it. Monoliths should be microservices; or perhaps microservices should be monoliths. Misaligned vendors need to be replaced with FTEs; or perhaps FTEs should be let go for more nimble vendors.
If schedules slip, it’s because they’re still “cleaning up” after their crappy predecessor. They probably need to swap out existing managers for folks they’ve worked with before. Things that somehow have supported the business for years need to be re-written from scratch. Sometimes they’ll dress all this up with false praise, like “it was probably ok back when the company didn’t have many customers.”
The best part of this dynamic is that it never ends. Nothing is ever the PDM’s fault; everything can always be traced back to sins of the “before” times.
Metric manipulation
Two things are true: (1) every good business runs on metrics, and (2) every metric can be gamed. It’s easy to increase sales if you start selling everything at a loss. Recruiting numbers can always be met by hiring underqualified people. Q1 costs look great if you stiff your vendors until Q2.
PDMs use their teams as personal labor — work harder, work longer, for ME. They claim personal credit for success, passing failure up the chain as if they had nothing to do with it. They flatter their bosses and never say no — even when it hurts their teams.
Honest leaders understand this, and use metrics to guide behavior with constant fine-tuning, interpretation and improvement. PDMs hit metrics at any cost — even at the expense of the company’s real goals. Slash and burn.
Punch down, kiss up
The best PDMs are master manipulators. By bottlenecking all communication through themselves they control the narrative, playing the savior while throwing all sides under the bus.
This always collapses eventually — but of course, a savvy PDM sees it coming and jumps to their next opportunity before they’re exposed.
Destroy relationships
Productive relationships require give and take. Trust and respect develop over time, as each side proves to the other that they’re committed to win-win exchanges. One party may get a bit more in one trade, knowing it’ll balance out in the next.
But PDMs don’t care about relationships, only transactions. And they typically have exactly one negotiating style: bully the other guy, spend positive capital created by others and call it “the art of the deal.”
- Make an outrageous first offer, so extreme that it knocks the other party off balance. Threaten and bully and generally be an unpredictable a**hole.
- Act like you’re doing them a favor by reducing your demand a bit.
- Declare victory.
The thing is, this often works — once. Or maybe even twice depending on the relationship. So it’s great for the PDM, who signs a few “great” deals and jumps ship for the next opportunity before the destruction catches up with them. The companies they leave behind pay the price.
I’ve been lucky through most of my career; only a few times was I on the receiving end of a PDM. But those times were the worst (friends, IYKYK). And now there’s a PDM in charge of my country. Blaming his predecessors, destroying long-won relationships, pointing fingers at everyone but himself, jumping from issue to issue so he never pays the price of failure. Truth is, he’s really good at it — and we’re left holding the bag.
Endnote: I get that the “evil boss” images I’ve scattered about here don’t really represent the specific PDM phenotype — they’re bad in all kinds of different ways. But we see suffer with enough photos of the master PDM every day, and I’m not about to add to that sorry display. So just enjoy some great movie memories … maybe a rewatch is in order!