How To Look Incompetent As A Leader

Before I get into this article, I want to start with a statement.

There is a difference between Perception and Reality.

What I will be diving into for this article is "Perception".

Specifically, the Perception of looking Incompetent based on recent happenings around an organization.

Now, are the Leaders at these organizations - specifically Amazon - actually Incompetent?

I'm sure there are people who would argue one or the other way, but for the purposes of this article, it doesn't really matter.

Instead, what I want to get at is how what is being said by these Leaders makes them "appear" incompetent, and this in turn is negatively impacting their Return-To-Work Mandates.

This is on top of, and separate from, all of the other challenges that already exist with these Mandates that are working against these Leaders.

Here's the problem though, Perception often becomes reality if you are not careful.

I'll get into that more shortly.

Now, what is happening at Amazon?

Amazon is one of the companies making demands for employees to Return to the Office.

However, what is perhaps unique about this is "how" they are going about their "demands".

From Amazon

Andy Jassy has recently become a bit of a meme in the business world with what he recently stated.

Specifically, he said to his employees that if they don't return to office per his edict that has already been in effect for some time, "It's probably not going to work out for you."

So, he has already made the call, people don't seem to be listening, and his response is it's "probably" not going to work out.

As you can see, the statement leaves a lot to be desired.

It sounds like a thinly veiled threat.

However, if the call has been made to return to the office, and people aren't listening, you are past the point of threats.

The Perception

From an outside perspective, it sounds like Jassy hasn't been able to get employees to accept the forced return to office.

Due to this, it appears (aka could be perceived) that he doesn't actually have the ability to actually let go of these employees.

If he did, with the size of Amazon, and how strong of an HR department they should have, it should be easy to let go of employees who aren't following the requirements of work.

Of course, that is unless he has such a weak grasp over his demands that there are far too many employees who are refusing to return.

In that case, it would lead to a major layoff, extreme amounts of severance, and would probably severely increase the workload of those who remain which could lead to more individuals choosing to quit.

Not to mention the exceptional difficulty of hiring new people given the currently extremely low rates of unemployment and the large number of employees only seeking work-from-home positions.

The Reality

This also wouldn't surprise me given other happenings around Amazon.

Specifically, there recently was a staged walkout by 1,900 employees citing a "Lack of Trust" in Leadership over the Back-To-Office Mandates.

These employees also stated that Amazon, "must return autonomy to its teams, who know their employees and customers best, to make the best decision on remote, in-person, or hybrid work, and to its employees to choose a team which enables them to work the way they work best."

What this shows to me is quite a few things from a Leadership Perspective.

Amazon has at "least" 1,900 Actively Disengaged employees - aka employees actively working against the intentions of the company because they don't agree with them.

In all likelihood, the number is probably significantly larger than this, as these are just the employees brave enough to actually stand up and put their necks on the line for what they believe.

If we take the 80/20 rule into account (which generally works well for estimates) this would mean there are likely closer to 10,000 Actively Disengaged employees at the company.

Based on what I have seen previously from the company, I would personally suspect that this is an exceptionally low estimate of how many employees are truly Actively Disengaged though.

It wouldn't surprise me if the true number was closer to 200,000 or close to 15% of the organization.

We are also seeing that employees don't feel like they are trusted or have autonomy.

Lacking both of these strongly indicates a hostile work environment which will also prevent the supposed benefits of working in the office.

All of these things will combine to create a large amount of challenges for Andy Jassy.

Even if he was a competent leader in theory, these perceptions will spread quickly around the organization making it significantly more difficult for him to actually get the organization to move as he wants.

In reality, these perceptions have likely been spreading for a long time which is what has led to what we are seeing.

When the employees work against you, it is an extremely difficult uphill battle for any leader.

With the size of Amazon, it will only make it that much more difficult.

In a company that size, Perception can become what makes or breaks your efforts as few people will actually ever have direct interactions with the Leader.