Motivation by Eyeball Management

If you manage people, you probably worry that sometimes they might take advantage of your good nature and relax a bit on company time.  Here’s a story from many years ago that even today will make you think.

As you will see THIS STORY IS APOCRYPHAL and everyone who passed it on knew it.  The amazing thing is that after many decades people are still telling the story.  I believe there is a powerful message here.

According to the story there was once a highly competent foreman – yes, I KNOW THAT’S AN OBSOLETE TERM, but it was a long time ago and I want you to feel the time that this occurred.  His work gang was much more productive than any of the other work gangs in the company.

The company sent an efficiency expert around to all the work gangs to find out what made this particular foreman so good.  When he got to the best foreman, he saw the work gang assiduously digging ditches, laying brick or whatever they were supposed to be doing.  But no sign of the foreman.  He asked one of the workers where the foreman was.  The worker replied, “Oh, he’s in that bar over there where he always is.”

Mystified, the efficiency expert walked into the bar and asked for the foreman.  There he was sitting at the bar drinking a beer. He was easy to spot because he had an eye patch.  The expert introduced himself and asked the foreman if it was true that he just sits in this bar all day and drinks beer.  “Yes,” the foreman said.

“Well, how can you supervise your work gang without knowing what they’re doing?” he asked.

“Easy,” said the foreman.  “I have this glass eye.  When I want to leave for the bar, I take it out of my eye socket and put the eyeball down on a post or something overlooking the work site.  Then I tell them that I can still see them even though I’m not there.”

“Amazing,” said the expert, taking furious notes.  “Wait ‘til they hear about this back at the office.”  Sure enough, the bosses in the office were curious to see this phenomenon.  A few days later the expert returned to the work site with his boss in tow.  This time there was no flurry of work going on.  Everyone was lounging around or playing cards. 

“Where is your foreman,” he asked.

“In the bar,” said the workers.

“Why aren’t you working?  Aren’t you afraid he’ll see you?  Where’s his eyeball?”

“Over there on that post,” said one of the workers.  “We put this tin cup over his eyeball, so he can’t see us anymore.”

So that’s the story.  Literally true?  No.  But its staying power conveys a deeper truth, especially if you’re a command and control manager.  Want to explore better ways to delegate?  Go here.

What's been your experience?  Comment below.