Why empowerment does not always succeed

Citation

(2002), "Why empowerment does not always succeed", Measuring Business Excellence, Vol. 6 No. 2. https://doi.org/10.1108/mbe.2002.26706bab.006

Why empowerment does not always succeed

Why empowerment does not always succeed

It has been well documented that there is a plethora of meanings attributed to empowerment and increasingly such programs are being adopted by organizations across the globe. Much has been made of the potential rewards such an initiative can bring, but does the reality of empowerment always match up to such models? What are the direct experiences of the employees and managers involved?

Parcelo (a fictitious name) provides a nation-wide distribution and delivery service across the UK. In 1992, the organization introduced an empowerment program. Although this initiative was restricted to managers and supervisors, it was hoped that empowered managers would then adopt a more involvement-centered approach to their relationships with subordinates. The training scheme comprised a short course but there was no formal evaluation system presented.

Owing to the lack of formal monitoring systems, it was difficult to measure the success of empowerment in quantitative terms. As a result, qualitative methods were utilized, such as interviews and surveys.

Negativity among employees

Ultimately, employees were far from impressed by management performance:

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  Morale among staff was low, having subsided since the introduction of the empowerment initiative.

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  Employees had little confidence in management capabilities – one-third of the workforce believed that managers had no strengths at all.

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  Employees felt that the management approach was actually hardening (as opposed to encouraging openness and commitment). One employee noted how managers used "bullying tactics and if you don't like it you know where the door is".

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  One-third of those surveyed felt that their commitment to their employer had significantly decreased.

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  No one believed that their employer commitment to them had increased significantly.

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  About half of all respondents claimed that the organization treated them "like a number" and it was more interested in short term profit than long term commitment.

Line managers assess the empowerment program

The view of line managers and supervisors was unquestionably one of disillusionment and disappointment:

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  The most common feeling was frustrated managerial expectations. As one line manager observed: "Empowering the front line, they called it. They just gave you a manual and told you to get on with it … Empowering the front line was flavor of the month. It was like somebody went round with a sword and touched you on the shoulder and said 'you are now empowered"'.

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  Another manager pointed out that real empowerment could not happen until employees were freed from specific rules and given objectives instead. He believed it was a lack of training that was preventing such an approach.

Evidently both employees and managers had negative views of the empowerment program. But could this have been avoided? Are all empowerment initiatives doomed to failure or were there certain factors that affected the program at Parcelo?

Four areas of failure

Initially, there were four areas identified that helped to weaken the impact of the Parcelo scheme:

1. 1.

   Lack of training and development to support the empowerment program. The idea was that line managers would be trained so that they could take on more decisions and better manage their teams. Unfortunately, there was a distinct gap between theory and practice. Owing to the lack of actual training (training expenditure represented less than 1 percent of employment costs), senior management thought that all was well, while three-quarters of line managers felt under prepared for the tasks they were being given. This inevitably created tensions throughout the organization.

2. 2.

   Operational pressures override empowerment. Line managers found that the demands of production process continually conflicted with the aims of empowerment. According to the personnel manager, line managers "face a lot of basic pressures like getting parcels out. There is also a conflict between operations and training. Investors in People (IiP) has gone by the wayside because of other priorities".

3. 3.

   Reduction in the role of the personnel department. The "empowerment of the front line" meant that personnel staff were reduced by half. The department also took on less of a hands on role due to the transfer of all records to the head office. If an employee had been sick too many times, headquarters would inform the relevant line manager and expect them to take appropriate action. The line managers believed that the reduction in size and contribution of the personnel department merely served to undermine the empowerment program as it was interpreted as a reduction in quality. Personnel were now seen as "impersonal" as opposed to part of the "one big family" that they were previously. Of course, another drawback is that a weakened personnel department could be less capable of fighting for more training and other resources needed to maintain an empowerment initiative.

4. 4.

   Cultural change. At Parcelo there was a distinct clash between the "hard" and "soft" approaches to employee relations. One line manager pointed out how the unchanging culture of the organization emphatically clashed with the whole principle of empowerment: My idea of empowerment is taken from that Marriott Hotels advert where the guy asks for a special blend of whisky. When it's unavailable, the receptionist nips out in the rain and gets him a bottle. Now that is real empowerment and it doesn't happen here. It couldn't at present because if you left your work station you would need a written statement as to why.

5. 5.

   In addition, the procedural infrastructure was still in place which meant that line managers were expected to follow rules from a handbook that was distributed from an unknown source. Naturally, this led to role confusion, frustration and perceptions of powerlessness among these managers.

Theory and practice poles apart

Clearly, Parcelo empowerment practice has not met the initial objectives of heightened employee commitment obtained by increasing employee discretion or decision-making influence as presented in the majority of empowerment models.

There is little structural change within the organization, the culture remains hierarchical (perhaps more so now with the extra control that has been given to the line managers), and training and development is underfunded, poorly targeted, ad hoc and generally inadequate. Ultimately Parcelo is no further away from the process-driven culture than it was before the empowerment initiative. This is well illustrated by the fact that IiP has been put to one side. One senior manager was quite candid in his admission as to why such development programs had to go:

Parcelo is still unprofitable and of course training represents a cost. When we make a loss, this is one of the areas of expenditure to be cut.

As a result of this lack of line manager training, employees experienced low levels of morale in the face of a management style that is harder and more control-centered than facilitative of greater involvement. Empowerment has achieved very little. Employees now feel less committed to the organization and believe that the company has little commitment towards them.

Typical example or one-off failure?

But is Parcelo's experience typical of all empowerment initiatives or simply an isolated example of failed management practice? Is the empowerment concept merely a rhetorical device that serves to disguise the continual conflict between managers and employees operating under severe competitive conditions?

In answer to the first question, Parcelo is not the first and will certainly not be the last to embark on an empowerment program and its results could well be unique to its particular market and circumstances. Empowerment at Parcelo focuses primarily on the role of the managers and other organizations may fare better by encouraging greater all-round employee involvement. In addition, Parcelo had recently undergone restructuring in the face of financial worry and so the workforce had already begun to feel insecure about their positions. This also explains why commitment levels were so low and why training and development was largely neglected.

But focussing attentions on culture change and allocating a generous training resource budget will not guarantee success. In an analysis of 13 other UK companies introducing empowerment it was observed that the overall impact on either employee decision-making powers or on subsequent commitment appeared limited. Parcelo may not be a one off after all.

A common factor in these failures was the lack of organizational commitment towards the training itself. It is all very well to pour money into a training program, but if the enthusiasm and support is not there, then it all becomes an exercise in futility.

And yet it is difficult to be too surprised by these shortcomings as it is hardly uncommon for front-line supervisors and managers to be assigned responsibilities without receiving adequate training or support. And this has implications for the key weakness discovered throughout these organizations – the professed linkage between empowerment and commitment.

Empowerment programs tend to spring from the minds of enthusiastic senior management whose hopes for the initiative are far removed from the realities of every day procedures and employee relationships. And in many cases, this management input fades as soon as the scheme is put into place. There is no ongoing support at a senior level. As a result, middle management receives training that does not always come from a known source and often fails to explain why such a program is needed. Inevitably this lack of understanding, enthusiasm and clarity cascades down through the organization, resulting in an empowerment drive that must be complied to "because the people upstairs say so".

Evidently this was the case at Parcelo, whose experience appears typical of many empowerment initiatives. But how can such a failure be prevented? What steps can you take to ensure your program is more than just rhetoric?

Management implications

The lessons for management from this study are clear:

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  Before considering any sort of empowerment scheme, ensure you have sufficient budget, not just for initial training but also to maintain empowerment over a sustained period.

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  Make sure everybody across the organization agrees on what exactly "empowerment" means. Do you want all staff to make key decisions or just middle management? How much responsibility should be given to front line employees?

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  Listen to front line employees. Before initiating a program, gauge their opinions and ask for their input.

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  Make sure senior management is prepared to invest time and effort into the project on an ongoing basis.

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  Training sessions should be introduced by a member of senior management who should explain: why this initiative is taking place; how empowerment can benefit each department; what measures are being taken to ensure longevity; and how individuals will be directly affected by empowerment.

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  If your business is entrenched in procedure, be aware of your limitations. You cannot change the culture of an organization overnight. However, by adopting a step by step continuous improvement approach, change can be made.

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  Empowerment should be pro-active and not reactive. Introducing this concept in order to overcome immediate financial worries or in the face of a negative takeover is dangerous at best. Employees are likely to feel a sense of reduced commitment, and if your initiative is anything less than perfect, it could have disastrous consequences.

This is a review of the article "The poverty of empowerment? A critical case study" by Ian Cunningham of Middlesex University Business School, London, UK, and Jeff Hyman of Napier Business School, Napier University, Edinburgh, Scotland, UK. It was originally published in Personnel Review, Vol. 28 No. 3, 1999.

Comment: This article is interesting in that it does more than expound the potential rewards of empowerment – it investigates this concept on a very real level. Cunningham presents a concise, unbiased opinion, and although this is a fairly lengthy article, it is a must-have if you are considering the implementation of an empowerment initiative.