Over a third (36%) of line managers have not received any training for their role, according to new research released today from the CIPD.
Time for effective line management is also de-prioritised in favour of mission-critical and goal-orientated tasks.
The research also found that 24% of managers face situations where they must put the company’s interests above those of their team, which could leave them confused and vulnerable. It may also encourage them to seek easy wins rather than the long-term wellbeing of their team.
Furthermore, 28% of organisations have not taken any action after receiving poor feedback on line managers.
The CIPD survey, ‘Real-life leaders: closing the knowledge-doing gap,’ said that efforts to nurture progressive behaviours from managers is being damaged by a lack of clarity and consistency over what organisations expect from managers.
Ksenia Zheltoukhova, Research Associate at CIPD, said: “We hear organisations lament the lack and quality of leaders, but we aren’t seeing evidence of their commitment to drive good leadership and management practices. For 29% of managers in the CIPD survey ‘other priorities’ stand in the way of ensuring that the interests of the team members are supported, raising questions about the priorities that managers– and the organisations – attach to the wellbeing of their staff. These findings are a wake-up call for businesses to re-align the systems and structures in place in their organisations to support leadership development.
“Businesses address issues such as poor customer service or faulty machinery straight away, whereas bad management across organisations is tolerated to a shocking degree. In the CIPD survey, 28% of organisations failed to act upon poor feedback on line managers; and nearly half (48%) confessed that individuals were promoted into managerial roles based on their performance record rather than people management or leadership skills. It’s time for business to identify and address the roots of bad management, recognising that a more consistent approach to training and supporting leaders at all levels of an organisation is needed to drive sustainable performance.”
Methodology and details on survey sample size can be found in the report.
