According to a recent press release by the Institute of Leadership and Management (ILM) the top ten bad behaviours witnessed in the workplace were:

• Cutting corners – 72%
• Lying to hide your mistakes – 72%
• Badmouthing colleagues – 68%
• Passing the buck (when you don’t get your work done) – 67%
• Slacking off when no one’s watching – 64%
• Lying to hide other people’s mistakes – 63%
• Taking credit for other people’s work – 57%
• Taking a sickie – 56%
• Lying about skills and experience – 54%
• Taking low value items from work – 52%

This is an extremely worrying set of statistics and despite the source being a press release is very likely to be true.

It’s clear from this that successive governments and do-gooders have been pushing the education agenda too far. If you start telling the workers that they are equal in stature and status to their managers they start getting ideas well above their station and start behaving like one.

These so called ‘bad’ behaviours are the cornerstone of our Mediocre Management culture, a set of carefully honed skills that take years to perfect, requiring practice and effort to ensure they are never spotted and the manager never caught out.

Enabling the staff (sorry, ‘colleagues’), students, interns (!) and Doris the tea lady to get above their station in life and ‘cut corners’ or ‘’pass the buck’ is manifestly unacceptable behaviour and must be stopped or the rot will soon set in. Before we know it there will workers on the Board, the pay gap between them and us will shrink and we may even see a need for accountability for management decisions. This needs to be stopped!

Now in the good old days you could take one or two out and flog them as an example to the others but not today, you can’t even fire someone without 20 warnings and HR crawling all over your back so you’ll need to keep your retribution legal and above board.

My suggestions are:

• An outdoors bonding weekend in February involving a river, a build-your -own raft and 7.00am starts
• Compulsory team meetings every Friday at 5pm
• A Bush tucker trial where employees have to eat insects or work unpaid overtime
• Promote the most disliked member of staff to a supervisory role over the most rebellious department

If none of this works, then fall back to the tried and trusted method of a long-winded re-organisation. Set impossible targets and create a host of ‘challenges’ to be overcome with a gentle hint that winners keep their jobs.

Remember Mediocrity must prevail!

There is an old joke, which is funny as it is based on standard guidance and practice for all mediocre  ‘C’* level executives.

In essence the outgoing CEO leaves his successor 3 numbered envelopes and tells him to open the first envelope when he hits his first crisis, the second envelope for the next disaster and then finally open the third envelope when the next catastrophe hits. This is what the notes in the envelopes said:

In envelope #1: Blame me

In envelope #2: Reorganize

In envelope #3: Prepare 3 envelopes

Practically speaking there is of course a great deal of sense in this methodology so aspiring ‘C’ levels, listen and learn.

1.     Blame the departing executive

This should be an obvious first step as the outgoing boss is usually leaving because they have been at the company for 4 years and one of their first acts was to announce a 5 year turn around plan. This plan now looks likely to be a giant balls up so they have found another highly paid job elsewhere and handed over the reigns to the incoming executive who will now have to try to sort this mess out. As the new boss you could, of course, accept full responsibility for the disaster as it was on ‘your watch’. You will then be applauded by those with a moral compass and then excoriated by stockholders, analysts, and the world’s press, all of whom lost their moral compasses just after puberty. Crises remember impact stock options and executive pay so carrying the can for someone who dumped you, as the new boss, in this mess is daft. Mediocre ‘C’s always pass the buck and then announce a new 5 year plan.

2.     Reorganise the Company:

When an external ‘C’ level is appointed they rarely have a grasp of the detail or the workings of the organisation they are about to take over. This means that they can be outmaneuvered, challenged or run rings around by those who were passed over or just fancy upping the ante. The second crisis is a perfect opportunity to get rid of these people and those who hold opinions that don’t agree with yours and anyone who is effective at things you’re not good at and therefore might show you up. Fill your inner circle with those who appreciate your talents, who see your obvious leadership qualities and who feel they need your approval to do anything.

Then reorganise the company. Good examples are:

• If the company is run from the centre, move the management to the regions or the other way round
• Merge Engineering and Operations or if already in the same department, separate them
• Bring in a new Marketing Director and then change the company logo
• Move 50% of Department heads to new roles outside their comfort zones. For example there’s no reason why the Sales Director can’t run HR
• Downsize the workforce as the last act, getting one of the newly promoted executives to run the process as a way of blooding them
• Have a Christmas party, the (remaining) workers will totally love you for it.

 3] Prepare for your departure:

 A mediocre ‘C’ Level is always going to get found out, so you should always prepare for that eventuality. As soon as the re-organisation is finished, you’ll need to start Networking in earnest. Its also possible to curry favour with suppliers by cutting them good deals and of course don’t forget that your competitor is not your enemy but in fact a potential job opportunity. So don’t upset them by rocking their boat too much. If the opposition is also a Mediocre ‘C’ then they will do the same. In fact you can have quite a good laugh about your ‘spats’ when you read about them in the press, when you both worked them out between you beforehand.

 So as the Boy Scouts say ‘Be Prepared’ for your inevitable departure and remember unlike a captain leaving a sinking ship last, the mediocre ‘C’ is on the lifeboat to prosperity before the alarm even sounds.

* What is a ‘C’ Level executive? They are the CEOs, CFOs, COOs etc and are the 3rd level of  Management.

‘A’ Level Execs:  Ideas people who plan ahead and create plausible strategies

‘B’ Level Execs: Work with ‘A’ Execs and then deliver stuff on time and on budget

‘C’ Level Execs: Have meetings and lunch a lot. Leave the actual work to the ‘A’s and ”B’s