It's Good to Be Queen

Hoy-hoy you crazy kids, I have a bit of a sticky wicket.  We recently experienced a coup d’état within the PMO that has created a major rift in the team.  In February of this year we brought in a new VP over all of IT, which technically includes the PMO, although, not really.  We’ve always worked within IT, but reported to the VP of the company directly, placing us in the corporate business unit for my company.

In a memo that went out back in July, our VP of IT didn’t like that she couldn’t control the PMO.  She especially didn’t like that they live in the IT world, but not be part of the IT world; a strategy that had been employed here for several decades.  To correct this, she split the PMO into two offices, the PMO-Elite, who report directly to her and work specifically for the corporate offices, and the PMO-BT (no one is sure what BT is supposed to stand for, but we call ourselves the PMO-Basement Trolls).  The PMO-BT report directly to the Director of IT, who reports to the IT-VP.  We work for IT.

As you can imagine, this doesn’t work very well.  The Elite group needs the BT group to get work done, and the Basement Trolls need the Elites in order to understand where their work fits in with other business units.  However, now that we are separated, with separate hierarchies, we no longer work well together.  Is this sort of thing common?  The IT-VP is extremely confident in this new structure she’s employed, and even more so the worse the situation becomes.  What are your thoughts, and do you think this is salvageable? 

-        Bitch Pudding

We’ve talked a bit before about people who feel the need to consolidate power.  In our experience (as well as the experience of those on our discord server), it’s typically rooted in inexperience and insecurity.  That doesn’t mean that it’s bad, just that it introduces new problems that need to be addressed.

Having split PMO teams is becoming more popular in organizations, and they take on a different appearance depending on how the organization is structured.  In a company that we advised for we actually encouraged a split PMO (although we didn’t recommend calling them Elites and Basement Trolls). 

In the case of our advisee, they were basically operating as two groups anyway, even if they didn’t realize it.  The one group had to have specialized knowledge in privacy practices, finance technologies, and regulations regarding data encryption.  The other group needed detailed knowledge surrounding the functionality of internal systems, data security, and governance. 

We split the PMO into three.  One that oversees internal systems, one that oversees the finance work, and one that oversees the first two, as well as third-party integrations.  The third PMO, keeps everything and everyone in sync. 

So, let’s talk about what the fuck is going on here.

The Need to Needlessly Consolidate Authority

I’ve found that PMOs function best when their authority and structure is kept separate from the authority and structure of the client.  That is, project teams function best when there exists a wall of separation between the clients and the team.

How many times have you been working on something, and progress is stunted by bureaucratic bullshit.  I can’t tell you the number of times I was involved with something that brought a project to a standstill because we were waiting on feedback from the RVP.  Why do we need feedback from a VP?  They don’t know how this shit works.  Ask a front-line employee, they’ll tell you how important this shit is.

The issue, however, is that the wall that separates authority tends to get viewed as a team going rogue.  No oversight, no checks and balances, just a bunch of hoodlums running amok with company funds.  So, someone is put in charge to keep everyone in line.  Someone who doesn’t have any project experience.  Sometimes it isn’t one person who is put in charge, but a bunch of people, which really fucks the situation up.

It's a matter of trust.  For a lot of senior managers, they see a team that is allowed to function on their own and they see a need to pull them under a higher authority.  It’s why a lot of project teams are falling into this problem: power consolidation.  They strip the PMO from being able to act in the best interests of the project (and by extension the business).  Once the PMO can no longer make decisions autonomously, they are forced to rely on the new manager, be it a director or the VP of IT.  The more they have to rely on this individual, the greater the distance grows between the project leadership and the project work. 

We could go into why the distance grows, but we’ll summarize it by saying that an autonomous PMO is driven by delivering the project.  A project team without that autonomy is driven by making someone else happy.  An autonomous PMO can rely on the expertise of their team, whereas the lack of autonomy leads to dependency.

But that’s kind of the point… usually.

No one likes to imagine that they are the evil villains bent on world domination, but frequently, that’s what new managers are.  Why?  Well…

Insecurity is a Hell of a Drug

I’m not saying this is universally true, but it does have a significant amount of truth behind it.  Many managers who begin to consolidate authority, making themselves into a king/queen of the organization are incredibly insecure. 

Now, psychologists might talk about narcissism, and how narcissism drives a deep need for attention and the admiration of those around them, or how insecurity can make one self-conscious which leads to low levels of empathy which can drive a sociopathic need to fuck others over.

I, however, would point out that a core trait that tends to be universal among those consolidating power is a need to control all variables.  If they control all of the variables, then they can cover up the insecurity.  If they are leveraging the consolidation of power as a way to make themselves look good, they can demand the admiration of those around them thereby absolving them of any wrongdoing.

I know it doesn’t make a ton of sense.  I’m insecure, therefore I want to stand out and take on all of the responsibilities, but how our brains work very seldom makes any sense.

For these narcissistic bastards, their insecurity and low self esteem paired with the accomplishments where praise is heaped on them acts as a driving force to pursue more praise. 

“I was praised for taking over this set of responsibilities, I will get more praise for taking on more responsibilities.”

The problem: when things start to fall apart, the onus to keep things afloat falls on those below the narcissists, but the narcissist gets the praise for being so good at their job, driving the need for praise, pushing them to consolidate more power, leading to higher levels of stress on the team, leading to them working harder to keep the ship sailing, leading to more praise for the narcissist, leading to… well, you get it.

The Exponential Rise in Corporate Propaganda

We do our fair share of shitting on shitty propaganda machines Inc., CEO, Entrepreneur, Fast Company, and the like (to be honest, we do our share, your share, the homeless guy at the corner of Wall and Broad streets share… we shit on them a lot).  Here’s the thing: for every good article they post, there are a handful of shitty ones with bad advice that do nothing but further shit on company employees. 

At Astutely Obtuse, we have found that more and more people are quoting these shitty magazines in order to defend their shitty behavior.  Looking back at one of our earliest articles, we discussed a manager who fired someone to establish dominance, something he read in CEO magazine.

It goes beyond these magazines though.  It’s the self-help books, written by billionaires who are only where they are at because they exploited people, and took their mummy and daddy’s money.  Where the advice to becoming a self-made billionaire is to: Step 1, be a millionaire.

Many of those who are pulling the consolidation of power bullshit in these organizations are doing so because they learned it from Napoleon Hill, Suze Orman, or attended a sales lecture by Jordan Belfort.  Who is better at running everything, than the person who has so much self-help knowledge in their corner?  It’s bullshit, and should be called exactly what it is, propaganda. 

What happens, then, is an organizational culture that rewards narcissistic behavior, because those at the top need that to keep in control.   That’s right, the shit comes from the top down. 

As those in the director’s positions consolidate more and more authority, and take on more and more responsibilities, those at the top have to do less to consolidate power.  Instead of manipulating 10 people, they are manipulating one. 

Is it Going to Stick Around

In short, yes.  In long, yeeeeeessssssss. 

The problem is that it started with an insecure narcissist being promoted, maybe moved into a CEO position.  That authority then began to trickle down.  It’s the slow erosion forming the Grand Canyon of business culture.  Next thing you know, director and higher positions are overpopulated with insecure mother fuckers, who are desperately trying to consolidate authority, so that they can control everything.  It’s a culture that has left its mark on the world, and at this point, there is no easy fix, short of eating the rich.

Is There Any Way to Salvage Things?

Yes, and no.

The most important thing is to call this behavior out, when you see it.  If you are an employee of a company where someone is pulling this shit, or if you are a shareholder in a company that employs these tactics, you need to call it out, and not reward or support it in any way. 

There are strategies that we can employ to ensure that these bastards don’t get rewarded for their misbehaviors.  One strategy is to shift the positive focus from the manager to the team, and the negative focus from the team to the manager. 

This doesn’t mean saying that the consolidator is a bad manager.  Instead, call out the struggles your team is having because the manager is too busy with everything else they are doing.  Say it enough, and people will start to see that they have stretched themselves too thin, and that the team is doing their best to survive.

The second tactic is to overwhelm and document.  Everything (and we mean everything) goes through the manager.  Difficult decisions that need input, manager.  Easy things that require barely any input, manager.  Things that don’t need any input, manager (these are especially great, because they can be worded in such a way that it conveys that you are looking for sign-off, without expressly asking for it).  When higher ups want to know why you haven’t delivered, you have email documentation on all the things you are waiting for feedback on.  It’s not your fault things aren’t getting done, your new super-manager is just not responding in a timely manner. 

It's malicious compliance, and the purpose is to shine a light on a broken system but understand this: it probably won’t fix the problem.  The best bet in situations like this… find a new job.  It’s sad that it would come to this, but ultimately, your mental health and well-being are more important than stroking some narcissists ego.

Edit: Apparently, it’s not basement trolls, but actually it’s Business Technology.