"Everyday Madness"

Where does the shoe pinch for managers? In one-on-one conversations, the answer is not long in coming. Drastically, perhaps representative of all corporate discussions, this answer is often replicated: "We dance with one ass at a thousand weddings, sit our asses off in superfluous meetings, but have neither the time nor the nerves for an in-depth discussion of really important issues, we prefer to contort ourselves in self-promotional dances, put every word on the gold scale and - admittedly - there is less and less time for the actual work. Besides, whoever expresses his own opinion in a really clear and well-founded way puts his head under the guillotine, because contradiction is treason!" Also nice is this sarcastic remark on the subject: "If you are already looked at askance or it is even considered an insult to your majesty if you stand up in a meeting, you know, then a crazy, topsy-turvy world sets in all the more! Well, that's how everyday madness takes on its proportions that no one would have thought possible, ever!" - Phantasmagorias of executives with weak nerves?

Let's take the study "Tunnelblick" by the management consultancy Coverdale Team Management Deutschland GmbH. The title speaks for itself and addresses, among other things, the inevitable narrowing of vision in management due to prevailing circumstances. The study identifies "capacity overload and deadline pressure" as the main triggers for "tunnel vision". And, who would be surprised: fears of failure and of losing one's livelihood. Those who, unfortunately, can only gasp for breath under the tidal wave of the shoulds and musts resulting from the pressure of expectations from above, "sooner or later simply sit there with their pants full and just stare straight ahead". Why don't those in charge understand that with such narrowed-eyed executives, efficient, forward-looking and courageous work is nothing but a substance-less mirage, a kind of blanket four-eyes.

Keyword "Substance"
The study goes on to say that if the prevailing management style is too directive, cooperation deteriorates. The consequences: People close themselves off, tension rises, conflicts increase, reliability and acceptance of responsibility go to pot. What is generally only blamed on the political caste is also becoming increasingly apparent in companies: The speed of decision-making

"No one dared to be unpopular for the sake of it."

is increasing, albeit with decreasing quality. "Whoever has his head in the fog of the hardly really foreseeable should at least have his feet on the ground!" Hence the quintessential question: Is it possible to put into words and bend even more crazily the aloofness of many a decision sold as forward-looking?

"Whom God wishes to destroy, he strikes with blindness" is the saying from "Antigone", a tragedy by Sophocles from the fifth century BC. Do none of those who are definitely responsible actually see what is being wasted in terms of material and immaterial resources? For example, on the one hand "time is money", on the other hand this time money is blown out of the window with full hands in the most nonsensical, often enough solely for self-promotion and self-congratulation serving inhibition and (especially in interpersonal terms) recklessly.

Isn't the overall situation in which companies find themselves today already draining enough?

Efficient thinking required
Does this constellation really have to be exacerbated internally by a colourful melange of counterproductive behaviour? Trivialities are created, trivialities are elevated to priorities that are not justified by anything and everything, and when it comes to showing one's colours and attitude, the flag is waved in the right wind - one step higher according to the mouth of the client. This own opinion has all too often something of a harakiri quality.

However, an excerpt from Deutscher Taschenbuch Verlag reads: "Make yourself unpopular and happy and take from life what you want!". The book of the same name with the curiously long title, however, gets to the point: "More and more often I had the uneasy feeling that something was going wrong ... The people who were now in charge talked polished talk but no longer dared to make courageous decisions. (...) No one dared to make himself unpopular for the sake of it."

Diana Dreessen, the author of this book, thus puts her finger on an open wound in corporate management: the fear of speaking out, of calling a spade a spade and thereby making oneself unpopular, which characterizes the behavior of all companies. The art of conformist behavior, of hedging and of keeping one's head down is in full bloom. However, the courage to speak out clearly and openly is being blocked in companies - as it is in society as a whole under the rule of political correctness - and the conditions for growth are correspondingly negative. With what social consequences?

Isn't Dreessen, who essentially worked as a securities trader at the Frankfurt Stock Exchange for twenty years before she became a self-employed management trainer in 2002 - because she could no longer stand the environmental conditions at work described above - right when she states: "Whether it concerns your private associations, your business context or your circle of acquaintances, family and friends - it's always the same: (...) If something goes wrong and you don't say anything, not nothing happens, but the grievance gets worse and worse. If no one intervenes, the whole enterprise gradually goes down the drain, often with serious consequences for everyone." And there are a lot of things going wrong in companies.

The study identifies "capacity overload and deadline pressure" as the main triggers for "tunnel vision".

Dreessen is a great spitter. For example, with this: "You're sitting in a business meeting. Some of your colleagues are philosophizing about the company's visions and goals, developing ten new product ideas in no time at all, lost in their musings, adulating each other to top it all off (...). And you? You would love to stand up, shake the self-appointed gurus and point out to them that, in view of the fact that the warehouses are filled to the top, it would be more important to take care of this right now,

Helping non-tactical communication in companies get on its feet.

that the produced goods are finally sold. Instead, you take new tasks for yourself out of the meeting, which are the result of your colleagues' musings and unfortunately have nothing at all to do with your day-to-day business, with which you are already behind schedule anyway."

Therefore, only one thing must apply: To help the freedom of opinion, the open exchange of ideas, the non-tactical communication in the companies on their feet. First and foremost, to recognize that increasing efficiency is by no means only an organizational problem, but rather primarily a behavioral one! The aim of Dreessen's book is by no means, as the title might suggest, to train ruthless behaviour and to go over dead bodies for one's personal advantages and goals.

Reader's Digest
Diana Dreessen: "Make yourself unpopular and happy ..." (Deutscher Taschenbuch Verlag, Munich 2014)