It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends on his not understanding it.
Upton Sinclair
Take a good look at the people who tend to surround autocratic/authoritarian bosses. I worked for one autocratic university president who assembled a cabinet consisting largely of incompetents and sycophants. The president compounded matters by regularly setting them up for failure so he could rant and rave at even their smallest errors as though he were infallible. People just rolled their eyes, rationalizing his clownish behavior as the price of working for such a “visionary.”
As the president, he set the tone for the whole culture. My boss—one of his vice presidents—behaved much the same way as did most of the other managers. By the time I left, that university had deteriorated from a dynamic institution into a fetid, stagnant swamp.
So, why? Why do people put up with this nonsense? Why does the autocratic workplace—that gulag of ineptitude—still hold such appeal? Why are workers willing to overlook their broken cultures and the fecklessness that accompany them? I’ve addressed the mythology of autocratic bosses before, but why do we allow or even want our entire workplaces structured in their image?
The ineptitude-by-design of my former university is a common feature of autocratic institutions. Historian Ruth Ben-Ghiat calls this phenomenon “engineered incompetence” and argues that the underlings’ fecklessness makes them “more dependent on the leader.” Since dependence is a weakness, there’s less chance the authoritarian boss will ever face significant resistance.
Also, since they’re so compromised, the underlings become complicit enforcers of the boss’s authoritarianism, standing in as fun-size autocrats themselves. For employees at lower levels of the command structure, between the opacity of the operation and the disbursed authoritarian behavior, it’s difficult to discern just who’s the culprit. Some even imagine the top boss as above it all while blaming the boss’s lieutenants for the oppressive culture. Rest assured that the top boss always owns the culture.
Meanwhile, nothing in this arrangement smacks of competence or efficiency. It may appear as though decision making is clear and precise and that lines of authority are direct and even high powered, but think about it. How could surrounding yourself with incompetents ever result in effective leadership or even management let alone inspire confidence?
Before I continue, let me assert the fact that many workplaces are indeed top-down oppressive operations. A podcast I listened to recently suggested such little dictatorships were rare in our “modern workplace” with our “modern notions of leadership” as though bad bossing were an exotic curio. My own experience, that of many of my clients and friends, and my wide-ranging reading suggest that this “rarity” is actually quite common. In fact, we regularly tolerate it because of its familiarity.
Also, many workplaces adhere to the superficial trappings of modern leadership but actually practice command-and-control bossing. For instance, I had a boss who listened carefully (good leadership) only to later twist and use people’s words against them (bad bossing), thus sowing mistrust and stifling communication. Another manager would praise employees publicly (good leadership) but berate and denigrate them in private (bad bossing). This trick may have made the boss look good to the outside world, but it undermined morale and rendered the employees passive and obedient. One supervisor regularly delegated work (good leadership) but withheld proper direction and authority (bad bossing). Since employees had no idea what the boss expected and tolerance for errors was low, every assignment became a major source of anxiety.
These are just a few examples from my past. I’m sure you have plenty more. I know I do. In each case, since good leadership practices were just a veneer, the workplace culture slipped into utter dysfunction.
Which leaves us with our question: why do we put up with it?
The answer is deceptively simple really. So many autocratic workplaces exist because they’re what we expect. When I wrote about the myth of the strongman recently, I compared their appeal to that of a flame to a moth. I suggested that—like the flame—strongmen draw us by promising “clarity and warmth.” Of course the result of touching that flame is annihilation.
Similarly, autocratic workplaces offer the cozy comforts of the flame—heat and light—but cloak the peril within. They seem disciplined and efficient, but they rarely are except in the most superficial sense. In fact, that apparent discipline is really just the indecent demands of command and control. The warm glow seems like illumination, but it casts impenetrable shadows. Autocratic efficiency often masks cruel austerity. And the solace of control and simplicity obscures the chaos and convolution beneath the surface.
Nonetheless, the mirage of control and simplicity can be alluring and may have its antecedent in family dynamics. The philosopher George Lakoff’s description of “the strict father model,” bears a remarkable resemblance to carrot-and-stick management approaches. Despite the lip service we pay to the more benign “nurturant parent model,” like autocratic workplaces, the strict father model retains a powerful emotional hold over our assumptions as the “right way” to parent.
In the same vein, we emphasize the efficacy of values-based servant leadership in the workplace, but command-and-control bossing techniques remain rampant despite vast evidence of their ineffectiveness. Frankly, like strict fathers, authoritarian bosses just “feel” correct to many people—easier, more direct, and less involved.
In education there’s a similar disconnect. Educators regularly deride the “sage on a stage” or lecture model of teaching as opposed to interactive discourse-based models. Interactive teaching engages students’ attention better, so students learn and retain more and can be pushed to higher levels of cognition. Lecturing requires little of students, so learning and retention drop.
Then why do so many instructors, particularly at the college level, continue to lecture? For one thing, lectures seem clearer and more straightforward. Also, the lines of authority couldn’t be more identifiable as the instructor literally commands the stage. Moreover, the lecturer takes no risks and evades responsibility for outcomes, shifting the burden of student learning to the students.
On top of all that, while students often decry lectures as “boring,” they actually reward lecturers by flocking to their classes. With lectures, they can rely on notes, recordings, textbooks, and classmates to obtain all the material without the challenge of annoying questions or activities designed to get them thinking. Both lecturing and authoritarian bossing render people passive absorbers rather than dynamic interactors.
I am loathe to simply conclude that the reason we have so many autocratic workplaces is because we expect and even want them, but it’s a difficult reality to ignore. As with the appeal of straight-up lecture classes, autocratic workplaces offer the illusion of ease. You can just kick back and let things happen without having to care. After all, caring is hard. Unfortunately, the consequence of not caring is ever-mounting dysfunction.
If you’re an employee, beware the lure of authoritarian bosses. The price of a little false comfort is a lifetime of complicity and worse. If you’re a manager, consider the same. The moth’s flame glows alluringly, but we know it’s a catastrophe. The strict father model has its attractions, but we know it’s a fraud. Command and control appears direct and uncomplicated, but we know its efficiencies are an illusion. And the penalty that individuals and organizations pay for such mirages may seem bearable and even acceptable at first, but we know that little flame will soon flare up into a dumpster fire.
Have you ever worked in an autocratic workplace? How did people respond to it?
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I’m Dr. Jim Salvucci, an author, keynote speaker, coach, and consultant. I served higher education for 30 years as an English professor, dean, and vice president before founding Guidance for Greatness to guide young bosses to become the next generation of great leaders. I’m a certified Tiny Habits coach as well as a certified Thrive Global coach and life coach and hold leadership certificates from Harvard University and the American Council on Education in addition to my Ph.D. from the University of Toronto. Central to my leadership philosophy is that all great leaders are decent humans as well as great teachers, guiding their people and their organizations through values toward success. My goal is to guide today’s young leaders to become the next generation of great leaders by offering practical strategies on values-driven leadership.
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