By promoting the ideal of a family-like culture in their organisations and promulgating therefore values such as “brotherly love”, “support”, “security”, “stability”, aren’t these leaders simply enticing their employees into a false sense of security? Are organisations stable, secure and safe environments that employ staff for life – as the family model implies and demands? Are companies environments where emotions can surface freely and abundantly as they do within families? And if you say no, then how will managers cope with emotional implications such as “We look after our own flesh and blood first”, “We support and trust one another because we have the same genes”, “We don’t wash our dirty linen in public”, and so on – when tomorrow, they have to fire Vijay or Elizabeth for their sheer incompetence? How will managers juggle the danger of promoting their personal loyalty (as is the case in all families) as compared to promoting professional loyalty to the organisation? Will this not end up promoting favouritism – the very scourge of this island?

The bottom line here is simple: in an organisation we can’t always love the people we work with – in the same way that we love our parents, wives, children, brothers and sisters. We have to be able to reward the good performance of people we don’t like and discipline those we like. If we can’t say, “I love you – and you are fired”, then we shouldn’t be in management. The cynics amongst us would go further and argue that what all these leaders are in fact attempting to do, is to control even more their employees. In other words, instead of issuing the traditional policies, rules and regulations and insisting next that these be obeyed without fail, these leaders are promulgating instead a set of family-based values – and next reward or punish these employees who do or do not conform to them.

<B>Team model</B>

I have a similar concern with the widespread use of the team concept in a work context. Although the value of a dedicated team and its success in improving productivity has been validated the world over, here again one should bear constantly in mind the potential dangers of using this sport-based term when referring to the work context.

When this happens and the concept of “team” takes a firm grip on the organisation, these teams become unassailable entities – entities that cannot be challenged or questioned. Instant obedience and conformity, with all the inherent suppressions and fears that this term implies (remember the famous, “One for all and all for one” motto of the Three Musketeers?), is expected and demanded of all team members. Next, managers begin to think of themselves as “coaches” (instead of individuals paid to carry out a function) and of some of their employees, as “superstars” (with all the favouritism that this term implies). Next, the team-based organisation becomes fragmented and disjointed, with people thinking in terms of “he is–is not one of us”, “winning vs losing”, “crushing the competition”, and so on.

Wise leaders are acutely aware of the dangers of transposing in the work context both the family and team concepts. They realize that we are all part of the same community and our abilities span a broad spectrum of competence – there is no need for either blood ties or forced inclusion. They believe that their job is to make their people’s strengths effective and their weaknesses irrelevant – to use one of Peter Drucker’s favourite expressions.

<B>Prof E. Charoux

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