Putin’s Principles of Management

If you need more proof that fear in the workplace causes bad decisions, watch this video:

https://www.theguardian.com/world/video/2022/feb/22/speak-plainly-putin-tense-exchange-spy-chief-ukraine-video

Sergei Naryshkin is the chief of Russia’s foreign intelligence service (FSB), a position of great responsibility and authority.  Yet here he is on national television quavering like a whipped dog in front of his boss.  The invasion of Ukraine was launched the next day.

The goal of the invasion was to take Ukraine’s major cities in two days with minimal casualties.  NATO would be fractured with internal bickering.  Ukrainians would welcome Russian tanks as liberators.  Putin wanted to quickly replace the Ukrainian government with his own puppets and present the world with a fait-accompli.

The project did not go as intended:

• The suffering of the Ukrainians is beyond imagination.
• Ukrainians did not want to be ‘liberated’.  They are fighting hard and well to keep their democracy and sovereignty. 
• The Russian army is bogged down with insufficient fuel, uniforms, and food.  8000 Russian soldiers are estimated to have been killed. 
• NATO is unified as never before. 
• Sanctions are ruining the Russian economy.

Andrei Kozyrev, Russia’s foreign minister from 1990 to 1996, tweeted: “The Kremlin spent the last 20 years trying to modernize its military. Much of that budget was stolen and spent on mega-yachts in Cyprus. But as a military advisor you cannot report that to the President. So, they reported lies to him instead.”

Even a casual observer of Ukraine over the past decade would have realized that Ukrainians would fight.  Certainly the FSB knew that and would have reported it to Putin.  But Putin didn’t want to hear it.  So, out of fear, they told him lies.  Two high ranking officials in Russia’s foreign intelligence service have since been arrested.  The fear is now amplified through another cycle.

Putin wanted to return Russia to its cold war standing as a world power.  Now it’s unclear whether Russia can even conquer Ukraine.

This is intended as a business post.  The horror that Putin has perpetrated on Ukraine, and even on his own conscript soldiers, is too unspeakable to mention here.  Rather, the lesson for business from this tragedy is that Putin’s failure is an inevitable outcome of a management style that forecloses messages that the boss doesn’t want to hear.  In Russia they have a name for it, the ‘Vertical of Power’.  It’s not even a pyramid; it’s a pole.

Fear as a management style might have been effective in some distant past.  In today’s turbulent business environment, timely and correct information from the market and your own operations are critical to survival.  No matter how smart the leader is, Garbage In = Garbage Out. 

One last thought:  it’s not just that the middle managers always willfully lie to the tyrant boss.  Raw data from the field needs to be analyzed and pruned before it can be useful.  This requires clear thinking that is free from confirmation bias.  Remember Naryshkin in the clip.

Fear and thought are incompatible.  They cannot inhabit the same space.

Deming says that you cannot produce a quality product if your workplace is ruled by fear.  He goes on to say that management must actively drive out fear or it will fester.  Putin has not just allowed fear to fester.  He has actively driven fear into Russia.

If you are managing your organization according to Putin’s Principles, you will get the same results that he is getting.

How about you?  Do you have a similar story?  What has worked best for you?  Comment below.