How do some people make it into very senior roles while being so utterly crap

[StealthPolarBear]

I need to know how it's done :o

I think interview processes are all geared around people who can "talk the talk". Quieter but more capable people are often overlooked.

Talk the talk, without being able to walk the walk

Several things:

Having a cock
Being a gobby twat
Being supremely confident

Dilbert/Peter principle abounds! I work with mostly men and boy are there some tossers in high places. A lot of them are there to keep them out the way.

Take your pick from golf, rugby, masons.

1. Have a cock
2. Have confidence

That’s it.

The confidence to apply. Most people who are crap at things don’t think to apply to do them at a higher level.

Definitely agree that the incompetents get moved up to keep them out of the way-certainly in the civil service anyway.

Its easy! If you are an intelligent person you are likely to question stupid procedures and suggest more efficient ways of carrying out a task. Therefore you would be classed as a radical. Radicals are not in vogue. Only if you are completely dumb and totally compliant can you carry out repeated tasks without question or complaint. That way such people stay in one job for a very long time as they would not be employable doing different tasks. To ensure that they remain - they are promoted. Got it? If you want promotion act dumb and stupid!

Educator while that does sound good I don't agree. I've applied for a couple of jobs recently and not got them, I have no problems putting myself out there. The people who have got them are both very good.

No! There are many people who did not excel at school. They find one job and stay in it just doing what they are told. They learn company rules by rote and can recite them repeatedly - which they do having been promoted as a long term employee. These people are not managers - managers are born intelligent, competent and confident - no, todays managers are 'controllers'. Anything that requires a decision to be made outside company policies and they are at a complete loss.

They talk a good game and are promoted by people who don't work with them day to day and aren't particularly interested in what happens day to day.

They are useful in some small way, usually they 'do' lots of stuff, just not in a particularly effective or strategic way. They periodically threaten to leave, the top brass love a do-er, so they get promoted.

In a broken and fearful culture where change isn't welcomed, they are fully institutionalized in the company's way of doing things.

One or more of the above are the most common reasons ime.

It does happen somehow. Mate had a 'boss' who was calling her on Christmas Eve once because she couldn't manage some very basic aspect of email and needed mate's help to sort it out!

I think there are some people who project confidence and know how to get people to like them or admire them from a distance but are actually organisationally hopeless, and their talent is getting others to do the heavy lifting and then taking the credit.

I think this several times a day when I'm at work...

In some cases the big boss will promote someone fairly incompetent in order to make them look relatively more competent. Also, it's an easier ride to promote a yes man than someone who challenges the status quo. Bitter, moi?

Confidence
Arse licking
Changing jobs often
Play golf (or whatever sport the big boss man is into)
Ruthlessness

I think two sort of people get promoted - those that genuinely deserve it and those that say or do the right things, but are no threat to their “superiors”. Weak/incompetent/insecure people promote the latter

Being conventionally good looking helps

StealthPolarBear - Don't put yourself down, you probably have as much if not many more talents. There are a large number of jobs advertised where there is no intention of employing outside people - they transfer existing employees. But because of employment law they are obliged to advertise publicly for employees.

I also don't think it's limited to men, I've had lots of different jobs in my life, and several of my worst managers have been women.

I think it's a combination of:

1. Being born in the right circles, going to the right schools, attending the right university. Anyone who thinks this isn't a factor needs to "give their head a bit of a wobble", as the saying goes; unconsciously they're betraying the fact that they have enjoyed, or do enjoy, white (or other) privilege.

1. Living in the right place. Again, you can be the best manager in the world, but if you live in a teeny tiny out of the way place with few opportunities, your options are fewer than if you live in a teeming metropolis where companies are desperate for staff and jobs are ten a penny. Apparently such places do exist.

1. The gift of the gab and self-promotion. Without substance, usually. Empty vessels do make most noise, especially if there's someone senior and important about to hear it. Most senior senior managers are either too stupid or too busy to collect evidence to the contrary, in my experience.

1. Schmoozing and politics (internal).

1. Their face fits. They're also unlikely to rock the boat or argue with senior management.

1. Nepotism. This is still widespread. Those who benefit may or may not actually be related.

1. They've been there a LONG time and getting rid of them would be more expensive than promoting them out of harm's way. They may also be very good at many aspects of their jobs.

1. Equally, some organisations like to bring in new brooms periodically to sweep the stage clean.

1. Vanity and self-belief.

10. Someone who was very good at, say, the technical aspects of their job who then gets promoted to manager and discovers they can't do the job. Sometimes this is because they haven't been trained properly, sometimes it's because their skills are in a different area. In some parts of the world there is a "skills" route to the top as well as an HR route to the top. In the UK, in my experience, it's ONLY HR and personnel or financial management that allows you to progress.

11. Sometimes they are overloaded and are actually good at the job they were hired for, but due to scope creep over the years they are under too much pressure to do the job effectively. If their face doesn't fit this can also be a management reputation thing - a nursing friend of mine was regularly belittled as being crap at her job. When she left, thanks to stress, they replaced her with four people, two at a grade two levels above hers. Her request for additional staff was repeatedly turned down and one of the seniors, who had always disliked her honesty, constantly blocked every request. So sometimes there is more to the situation than meets the eye. (Oh, and the organisation now spends far more £££ on the function she was responsible for than they did when my friend was in post, and the turnover in that department has more than quadrupled.)

Personally I also got vilified by the management of a ghastly little private company I had the misery of working for, for just over a year; the management really disliked me as a lot of my colleagues would come and confide in me about things rather than them. I've also had LOTS of really awful managers over the years, in temporary and permanent positions. They've usually been the reason I've moved on.

I've also been a manager (around ten years' experience in those roles) and I do understand some of the pressures some managers are under. I personally never want to have to manage people again.

12. They're in the wrong job or the wrong organisation.

Addendum to previous post - turnover in the post mentioned in point 11 is staff turnover, not financial turnover. And where we live is known for being a difficult place to recruit, so you'd think organisations would want to keep their staff where they can.

I think it's a combination of gift of the gab and absolutely no self awareness

I've known two colleagues like this - both female. Both were full of themselves and both were shagging the boss! Separate workplaces btw, they weren't shagging the same man!

"Then the head's friends saw that she was no good at being a head, so they arranged for her to teach other heads. Then they saw she was no good at that either, so they sent her into parliament where she lived happily ever after.

If you just substitute ‘local education authority’ for ‘parliament’ above, then you’ve got the entire ethos of promotion in English state education explained.

Most of the ones I have met are older men. A couple were women from "connected" backgrounds who spoke, looked and schmoozed right. I've come to the conclusion that it's a talent pool issue and that their time is up. But I do work in an industry that is known for its elitism.

I think a lot of incompetent people get promoted just to move them on and make them someone else's problem.