Nhi Diep

BADM 535
Book Critique
Nice Guys Can Get the Corner Office

A. How useful are the concepts presented in the book for organizations and leaders?
Having worked for a year in a government agency environment after graduation, I had
experienced almost every symptom that the book discusses about nice guys in corporate office.
The Nice Guys Bill of Rights offers suggestions on how to balance between being cooperative
and being productive. The book also placed me in the perspective of leader of organization to
think further of what I could do in the shoes of managers when my employees are nice guys.
There are several points I learnt about how to effectively set a friendly and fostering working
environment in which all my nice employees can shine and achieve what they deserve while
still being nice with coworkers.
Firstly, organizations need to develop programs that allow and encourage nice guys to
assess their full potential and understand their weaknesses. Additionally, evaluations are critical
in increasing the individuals self-awareness of how he/she is performing and what could be
done to satisfy higher expectations. Sessions held to share workplace experiences are needed to
present a management view that human is imperfect, and making mistakes are acceptable as long
as employees learn from their and others mistakes.
Secondly, having a working environment in which employees are encouraged to speak up
is essential. I, myself, was born and raised in Vietnam, a high context culture, in which speaking
up and confronting managers or people at senior levels are considered not appropriate. In
Vietnam, confronting manager can cost you the job. This hinders my ability and willingness to
present my comments and ideas in the organization when coming to the States, fearing that I
might say the wrong thing and also feeling unease about how my manager makes judgment
about my statement. Instead, organization should nurture employees motivation to speak up
through exercises and programs incorporating small, medium, and large groups. Only through
this method that nice employees and also employees coming from conservative cultures can
express their valuable contributions and ideas to the group.
Thirdly, organization should set and reinforce boundaries. Setting a firm expectation of
when to say no is critical for both the employees and the organizations. The ones who ask for
help will learn to not rely too much on others and solve the problem on their own while the nice
guys can devote their time to the projects they are responsible for instead of being the pushover.
When the right tasks are assigned to the right people and expected results are achieved on time,
work efficiency is boosted and the organization is clearly better off. This also leads to the next
strategy: confrontation. Being able to say no requires the same courage as being able to
confront the situation and address the issue with coworkers to together solve the conflicts.
Organization should make it clear that conflicts between coworkers or even between supervisors
and subordinates need to be solved thoroughly instead of avoided.
Next, organizations need to involve most or all of the employees in the decision-making
process. This can improve the fairness within the organization and let employees know that their
opinions will be heard and valued. More importantly, this will provide the nice guys the chance
to practice making choices without guilt and being able to bypass the fear of upsetting other
people when making decisions. This will help the nice guys re-attain the power and improve
their ability to make decisions that benefit them and their organizations.
Additionally, organizations should feel the urge to encourage their employees to go
beyond their comfort zone. This ability is essential since it will give the nice guys the courage to
hold others accountable for their commitments. The organizations role in this case is to clarify
the expectations it has with all employees to keep all on the same page. It will also need to push
its employees to their limit potential, fully tap on their ability and encourage them to willing to
take the risk and set the sky as the limit. The encouragement from managers is invaluable, yet
might need no financial incentive involved to achieve the desired effectiveness. Employees self-
empowerment will automatically kick in once they can feel the support and trust from their upper
level management.
Finally, recognition plays an important role in the workplace. However, not all nice guys
prefer the same type of recognition. For example, an individual might like to be recognized in
front of other colleagues in companys meeting while the other would prefer in-person
recognition from the manager. Managers should base on each individuals personality and
preference to provide the suitable recognition, in order to best utilize resources to appraise and
motivate good performances.
B. What are some possible strengths and weaknesses of this approach to leadership relative to
other kinds of approaches?
The approach of establishing resources that can assist and develop the abilities of nice
guys in the organization have several strengths compared to other kinds of approaches. This
approach allows the leaders to spot out the nice guys in the organization and help them fully
understand their employees. The leader would then be able to use and develop the talent and
energy of the nice guys for the benefits of the organization. I realize this leadership approach is
very similar to the participative management approach or empowering leadership in which
leaders empower employees to be in charge of what they do. Decision is decentralized at the top
level and individual responsibilities are increased. This fosters the initiative and creativity within
the organization. At the same time, dependence is discouraged; employees are asked for full
commitment and independence or interdependence. Employees are also motivated to step out of
their specialty and job classes and make a bold move to other areas of interest within the
organization. This will help them discover talents and capabilities that they might not be aware
of, which at the end would be valuable assets of the organization.
From the perspective of the nice guys, following the discussed approach will lead them
to balance their niceness and assertiveness, in a way that can compromise the needs of both
themselves and others, as opposed to servant leadership approach in which leader only focuses
on increased service to others rather than on oneself. This approach will also help develop
interpersonal skills including the ability to listen and ask questions and also learn from the
others mistakes. All of these elements are the fundamental components of the process of
nurturing an effective and powerful leader.
Given all the good features of this well-rounded approach, I found it hard to spot out a
weakness relative to other leadership approaches. However, the nice guys approach if not
applied correctly might create a disruption in teamwork, when the nice guys mistakenly take the
approach to refuse cooperating with others. Moreover, there are also situations in which a
persons niceness is indeed his/her personality. Considering that its very hard or even
impossible to change ones personality, the approach might not be effective in changing the
perception and the behavior of the nice guys.
C. Did the book change the students view of leadership or her/his approach to being a leader?
Specifically, how might the concepts presented in the book be applied to the students
organization or to an organization with which the student is familiar?
Working in a government agency organization, which follows a strict hierarchical
structure, I recognize several major limitations within the organization, most of them resulted
from the leadership style of the top executive level. The collective power is centered at the board
of directors while the majority of employees who have no subordinate stay at the base. All
elements of the decision-making process used to lay in the hands of the top executive level.
Employees recognized the authority and levels of responsibility in the organization, thus started
to develop fear for losing their jobs if they didnt strictly follow what the upper management tells
them to do. Therefore, innovative ideas were discouraged and hindered.
Furthermore, employees were developed as specialists, who only focused on their area of
expertise and narrowed their interests and professional development to the specific functions
they were working on. I was the Budget and Data Specialist for the agency and could only work
on developing budget and manipulating data for the division I was working in. Had I had interest
in other opportunities available in the organization, I would have no chance to develop my
interest and expertise in the other field.
Moreover, communications across different departments could not flow smoothly and in
a timely manner. For example, in order for the executive to agree on a project plan, we were
required to fill out a signature form that will be routed to different levels of management from
the budget manager, to the legal advisor, to the department director and so on, until it reached the
executive director. The process would normally take two to three weeks just to get the
executives signature to implement the plan. Obviously, this created a time lap between the
decision-making point and the projects final implementation. This in turn resulted in a waste of
time and financial resources of both internal and external partners. Clients, who are city citizens,
were often left waiting for a long period of time before getting the response from the agency.
However, recently, there are a lot of works done to minimize the impact of hierarchical
leadership style, developing a better evolving organization in which employees are more
involved in the decision making process. Those works are closely related to the approaches
discussed by Nice Guys Can Win the Corner Office. Resources are developed to give the
employees a chance to contribute and raise their voices. Management makes a promise that
employees ideas will be heard and carefully considered in the decision-making process. The
agency establishes an online forum within its network and asks people to leave comments and
ideas on what is best for the agency, ranges from operation streamline to hiring and promoting
decisions. Employees have the options to leave anonymous comments. I think this is an excellent
way to encourage employees and nice guys to speak up without leaving anyone in fear about
risking their job security. The forum is also a venue where employees can express their interest
and capability in other field/department within the company, or present any innovative ideas that
can help move the organization forward. This encourages employees to step out of their comfort
zone and devote their best to the organization. There are also employee-run groups such as Race
and Social Justice Initiatives Committee established to discuss about problems that arise
internally that might negatively impact the equality and impartiality of the organization.
There are also several keynotes I have experienced while employed at the agency that I
didnt fully understand and notice until I read the Nice Guys Can Get the Corner Office book. I
considered myself sometimes being overly nice not only at the work place but also outside of
work. As the Budget and Data Specialist who assisted the Community Service Administrator, the
highest manager of the division, I usually took unpaid overtime to help colleagues with their
projects or fill in the incomplete work they submitted. For example, one of my responsibilities
was reconciling the purchasing card transactions of the team members. We requested members to
submit their purchasing card paperwork by the fifth of the month. This allows me to check the
paperwork and submit to the Administrator on time for his signature. One of the members never
made the deadline and usually submitted incomplete paperwork. I found myself having to go
through her paperwork and complete what left on the plate before submitting to the
Administrator. The Administrator knew what happened and for several time asked me to not
complete someone elses work. He set an expectation that the person needed to be responsible
for her own work. I, at that time, was wondering why the Administrator made a big deal of the
situation. If I decided to return the paperwork to the member, the process will be delayed and her
purchasing card might get suspended. I found it make much more sense to complete the
paperwork on her behalf to avoid her any disciplinary action from the management. I couldnt
quite get the reaction of the Administrator until I read this book. Now I understand that he was
trying to set and reinforce boundary within the agency. Each individual needs to be responsible
for completing what is expected from him or her, without relying on the nice guys in the
organization to finish his/her leftover. By asking me to return the incomplete paperwork to the
member, the Administrator wanted to draft a blueprint of organizations expectation and ask
people to respect others time, talent, and energy.
Overall, I found the book very interesting and applicable to my case. Before, I considered
being nice at work would ultimately advance me in the workplace at the end. That perception is
proved wrong now that Ive read about the possibility that it might hinder my future success and
forsake my opportunities. The book offers invaluable advice, helping me avoid being too selfless
and unfair with the future hold ahead of me, especially when I prepare to re-enter the workplace
and strive to reach the management position after finishing the MBA program at WVU.