The Case for Managerial Ruthlessness1
| Author | Shailendra Vyakarnam,Alison Rieple |
| Date | 01 March 1996 |
| Published date | 01 March 1996 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-8551.1996.tb00103.x |
British
Journal
of
Management,
Vol.
7, 17-33
(1996)
The Case
for
Managerial Ruthlessness1
Alison Rieple and Shailendra Vyakarnam
School
of
Management, Cranfield University, Cranfield, Beds
MK43
OAL,
UK
This paper summarizes relevant literature and reports on a study which has examined
the behaviour and attributes of managers in British mid-sized companies in which
growth is a strategic objective. The study used a grounded, interpretive methodology,
which allowed the development of theoretical propositions which have not been
subject to previous empirical examination. This paper deals with one aspect of the
findings, namely ruthlessness on the part of managers in dismissing
or
otherwise
dealing with poorly performing members
of
staff. This aspect of management was an
important factor in the subject organizations’ ability to achieve their chosen strategy,
and is a phenomenon which does not appear to have been developed in any previous
models of effective managerial behaviour.
Managerial ruthlessness influences strategic implementation in a number of ways
-
it
affects control of the organization, team building and the ability to respond to changes
in the environment
or
undo mistakes in appointments. This paper also outlines
attributes and characteristics of both the individual manager and the organization
which allows ruthlessness to be developed and used effectively, for example self-
confidence; the ability to ensure that criticism
or
dismissal is not seen as personal; the
separation of work and social life; and the ability to focus on objectives rather than
the person. Organizational support and training in such behaviour also appeared to be
helpful contributors to the development of such behaviour.
Introduction
The research on which this paper is based began
with an interest in how high-growth companies
are able to achieve this success.
A
large volume of
previous work, mostly prescriptive, suggests that
people are likely to be an important factor in this
accomplishment. However, although there is a
considerable body of research which has identi-
fied the personality characteristics, and to a lesser
degree the behaviours of managers, comparat-
ively little has examined the processes whereby
such aspects feed through to their organization’s
performance. This study attempts to remedy this
gap in understanding by addressing the issue of
We would like to gratefully acknowledge the help
of several colleagues, in particular Malcolm Harper,
Siivana di Gregorio, Gerry Johnson and Sue Vinni-
combe, who have all made helpful suggestions about
the research
on
which this paper is based.
how attributes2 such as the ruthlessness of an
organization’s managers contribute to the success-
ful implementation of its strategy. Because of
the lack of previous research, and the complexity
of the subject matter, an interpretative theory-
building methodology was indicated, and Glaser
and Strauss’s
(1967)
model of the development of
grounded theory was used as the protocol for data
collection and analysis.
In the context of this paper ruthlessness refers
to the way in which managers dismiss or other-
wise deal with poorly-performing staff. This type
of behaviour involves a degree of, often unpleas-
ant, personal confrontation in informing such
employees of their failings, and a final outcome of
The term attributes has been used as a generic term
in preference to personality, characteristics or com-
petences, because at an early stage in the research it
became clear that it was impossible to separate some
reported aspects
of
behaviour into personality or
behavioural elements.
0
1996
British Academy
of
Management
18
A.
Rieple and
S.
Vyakarnam
the dismissal of the employee concerned. Speci-
fically, managers who behave in this way appear
to regard the individual employee as of less
importance than the achievement
of
the team or
organization’s goals, or indeed have a greater
regard for colleagues whose own work may suffer
as a result of the problem individual’s poor per-
formance. In other words, ruthless managers were
able to disregard the feelings of that individual.
This type of behaviour does not appear to come
naturally to all managers, neither is it welcomed
in all organization types, and yet it appeared to be
an important means of achieving managerial
effectiveness in the organizations and individuals
studied. This paper therefore attempts to outline
how one, admittedly narrow, aspect of managerial
behaviour appeared to influence the effectiveness
of managers who adopted it.
All names and place details have been changed.
Theoretical background
Leadership and contingency theory
There appear to be two principal approaches to
research into organizational success. Firstly the
environmental school of, for example, Lieberson
and O’Connor (1972), which claims that the en-
vironment and other constraining factors have the
greatest influence on organizational performance,
and the influence of management is comparat-
ively small. The alternative view is that of the
leadership or ‘strategic adaptation’ school (Low
and MacMillan, 1988), under which much entre-
preneurship and leadership research appears to
have fallen. This paradigm suggests that managers
can lead organizations to success by consciously
identifying opportunities and devising strategies
to realize these opportunities. It is this approach
which underpins this study.
Within this framework
a
number of authors
(for example Miles and Snow (1978), Szilagyi and
Schweiger (1984) and Hambrick and Mason
(1984)) have identified the importance of matching
managers to the organizational and environmental
contingencies in which they work. Organizational
strategic typologies such as ‘build’, ‘harvest’ and
‘defend’, it
is
suggested, may be best achieved by
aligning specific managerial attributes with these
specific strategies (Hambrick and Mason, 1984).
There has been very little research carried out in
this area. A limited amount has been undertaken
on the characteristics
of
chief executives linked
with various strategic typologies, but there ap-
pears to be no research that relates the behaviour
or personalities of lower-level managers to partic-
ular strategies (Guthrie and Olian, 1991), or which
examines contingent links between strategy and a
complete management team. As managers both
implement and influence strategy (Johnson, 1984)
this is an important omission, and is one reason
why an interpretive theory-building methodology
was adopted in this study.
The limited research in the area also appears to
have concentrated on personality or demographic
characteristics rather than behaviours or out-
comes, and there is little understanding of the
processes whereby personality characteristics in-
fluence organizational performance. For example,
a build strategic posture may require managers to
be prepared to take risks, have a high tolerance
for ambiguity and strong internal locus of control,
a marketing or
R&D
background and greater
familiarity with their specific industry. Proactivity
is also proposed as a requirement for this strategic
perspective, an attribute which perhaps comes
closest to the ruthlessness identified in this study.
Harvest strategies in contrast are said to require
conservative, risk-averse managers, with back-
grounds in production or accounting (Gupta,
1988). However, the personality variables identi-
fied tend to be extremely narrow in scope, and
do not take into account those which influence
relationships, or how the organization operates as
a team.
In fact, many of the variables associated with
build postures have been derived from research
into entrepreneurship and the entrepreneurial
personality. Because of the focus of this study
on firms with an orientation of growth, this body
of literature also appeared likely to provide some
relevant theoretical background.
Growth and entrepreneurship
Although the environment has been mooted as
the more appropriate focus for studying entre-
preneurship (Peterson, 1981), a common approach
within the field has been to examine the person-
alities
of
entrepreneurs. McClelland (1967) was
one of the first to introduce the concept of the
entrepreneurial personality based on his back-
ground in trait psychology. This work was devel-
oped further by a large number of researchers,
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