One surprising aspect of organizations is how bad bosses continue to thrive. By bad bosses, I mean ones who are deeply disliked by their employees and are not particularly effective. This occurs despite processes like performance management, which are meant to identify poor performers.

We immediately need to admit that bosses don’t need to be loved or even liked by their employees, and sometimes a boss who is a bit mean gets great results. In cases where leaders like what a boss achieves but not how they achieve it, there can be a bit of a dilemma.  Organizations say they care about the “how” not just the “what” but it’s easy to understand why leaders might be slow to get rid of a manager who is getting results.

Even when we put aside the cases of bosses who are disliked but get great results, we can still find many bad bosses who are tolerated by their organizations. Why is that?

Why Leaders Tolerate Bad Bosses

The main reason leaders tolerate bad bosses is that these individuals are nice to the leaders they report to; this is commonly referred to as kissing up and kicking down. The leader may know the employees are unhappy but this just doesn’t jive with their own experience. As much as employees may see the boss as ineffective it may not show up in a performance review. Furthermore, it’s hard to do something about a bad manager, coaching is unlikely to work, and firing someone is a big headache, so leaders simply don’t feel the push to take any action.

Should HR Do Anything About Bad Bosses?

HR leaders have something of a moral and business responsibility to reduce the number of bad bosses however they need to act with a great deal of caution. No one wants HR going out on the warpath trying to get people fired.

One of my favourite management books is Tempered Radicals by Debra Meyerson. She suggests that if you want to drive change in the organization (say, for example, getting rid of bad bosses), then you might be more successful pushing for small changes rather than a radical overhaul of how the organization does things. In our case, a tempered goal would be to reduce the number of bad bosses, and not aim to eliminate them entirely.

HR does have some tools in the toolkit to back this tempered approach – let’s see what those are.

Tools HR Can Use to Reduce the Number of Bad Bosses

You might think the first step is to identify bad bosses; however they usually do a pretty good job of identifying themselves by upsetting all their employees.  Any HRBP or HR manager who talks to the employees will soon learn where the real problem managers are. The question then becomes how to play a role in getting them “managed out of the organization” (i.e. persuaded to go rather than fired).  Here’s what HR can do:

• Create a “No A**hole Rule”
  Stanford professor Robert Sutton wrote a book called “The No A**hole Rule” and what it preaches is clear from the title. Netflix adopted this as one of its guiding principles. If HR says that the organization should endorse a no-a**hole rule—as a general principle—then most leaders will be inclined to accept that.  The value of having this rule is that it gives you something to point to when you raise the view that a manager isn’t a good fit to stay on with the organization because they are an a**hole.
• Collect data from employee surveys
  If you sit down with leaders and say “I’ve heard that employees are dissatisfied with their boss” that may not carry much weight, it’s just a rumour. However, if you have data from an employee survey showing that a manager is soundly disliked by most of their employees on a variety of dimensions, then you have a strong argument that something should be done. Remember you can run one-off pulse surveys to get data if the annual survey isn’t filling this need.
• Get specific stories
  It’s easy for leaders to dismiss employee discontent even when supported by data, so to enliven the case against a bad boss, find some specific instances that illustrate why their behaviour is beyond the pale.
• Harassment reports
  No one likes harassment reports. They often create bad outcomes for everyone involved. However, if employees are truly upset by a boss’s behaviour, and other attempts to rein in the boss have failed, then you might suggest to employees that they need to file a harassment report. On its own this might not be enough to drive action; however, if leaders have already begun to understand a manager is causing problems, then this could be enough to push them over the edge.
• Help leaders with the managing out process
  Getting rid of bad managers is hard and unpleasant. If a leader agrees with your assessment that one of their managers is harming the organization, then you should encourage, support, and nudge them to take the set of actions needed to resolve the situation.

Before you do anything go back and think about the tempered radical strategy. HR leaders shouldn’t be in the business of getting managers fired. You only want to raise the issue of a manager being bad in the most serious cases.

Making the world a tiny bit better

Workplaces are often difficult, and employees will often be unhappy. You can’t change the world. However, if you can make some reduction in the number of really bad bosses, then you are making the world a little bit better.  Pay attention to employees who say they have a really bad manager and if they have a strong case, then gently gather the evidence you need to convince leaders that this manager has to go.

David Creelman is CEO of Creelman Research. If you need help elevating the analytics and business savvy of HRBPs then get in touch. Also, check out his book “Management for Scientists and Engineers.” You can connect to Mr. Creelman on LinkedIn or email him at dcreelman@creelmanresearch.com