MICHAEL DEMPSEY - Cranfield University

Modes of management - styles
It would be very easy for me to upset the staff, that would be no
problem at all. I could do that quite easily. But if we do that, we
will kill morale, they won't work for you, they'll go stubborn,
they'll sit on their bottom, they won't say anything, they'll walk
around with pieces of paper doing fuck all all day - dumb
insolence, it's called in the Army. Trade union officials are expert
in doing fuck all. You know that. So they'll only work if they think
they're getting something out of it. And that may not be
individual reward. It might be that' I'm getting something out of
this because I like working, I like being in the trade union
movement. I like putting on members, I like us being more
successful. So why aren't you looking at it that way and not that
way. So I think the style is not to be confrontational. (Interviewee
A)
With the proviso, however:-
I referee more things - I should wear black shorts really - it's like
a doctor's surgery in here some times. What I do as a manager
is to say that it's your call, you sort it out and if you can't, come
to me and I'll sort it out. (Interviewee A)
On the subject of whether there was an appropriate management style
for trade union managers, there was little agreement. Several
managers thought not, one believing that flexibility was important for
any manager:-
I think the trade union in my view is no different from any other
organisations. If you seek to manage it one way you will come
unstuck. I think the whole thing about management and
management skills, perhaps the greatest art of management, is
flexibility. Not necessarily flexibility of the work but flexibility of
the mind. Not just to go into a piece of work with a mind set that
says that it must be done this way. If you can see something
being done another way that's beneficial. You need to accept if
necessary that you're wrong. That you're not always right and
that you can learn each day things that you expect the staff to
learn (Interviewee O)
I think there is a need for a range of management styles in any
organisation. To classify them as I remember them in the old
days is bad but I think that it would be a dull organisation if
everybody managed a particular role, function or people in the
same way (Interviewee C)
Whilst one manager was prepared to express a view on the question:-
I suppose it has got to be consensual, hasn't it? That has got to
be an appropriate management style. Why do I say that?
Because of the amount of interest groups that you've got It's not
266