ABSTRACT
Having now provided a theor et ical basis and a working definition of a good enough manager, it is important to see how the idea reveals itself in practice. In an effort to discover the under lying themes of the behavior of a good enough manager, the following research study documents an exploration of how managers function in their roles from the standpoint of their employees.
There is a segment in my Interpersonal Relations in Management course when I ask students to recall the “best” and “worst” bosses or managers with whom they have worked and identify signi fic ant aspects of their behavior. After they record their individual observations, I then open the discussion to the entire class and note common themes. Each semester, vari ations on sim ilar basic themes for the “best” managers emerge: trust, honesty, sup port, encouragement, listening, and respect. More experienced graduate students often add comments such as “encourages me to take risks” or “allows me to fail,” highlighting a willingness of their most admired managers to grant a certain level of autonomy in the authority relationship. The worst managers are generally described as the opposite of each of these themes: unresponsive, selfish, insecure, manipulative, and in dire need of people skills. I have obtained very sim ilar response patterns from participants in management development seminars in companies.
