by Tim Beyers

Created on: August 17, 2008

No, it is not important for managers to be liked. If it were, Apple CEO Steve Jobs - whose name plus the word "tyrant" yields more than 40,000 hits in a Google search - would today be a mid-level marketing cast off enduring a Dilbertian existence at some Silicon Valley start-up. Instead, Jobs is a tech superstar worth $5.7 billion, Forbes reports.

Jobs is hardly alone. History shows that while plenty of genuinely good human beings strike it rich - Jeff Bezos and Oprah Winfrey come to mind - the (ahem) no-so-nice crowd is just as successful. Oracle's Larry Ellison is a billionaire manager infamous for his brash behavior. He hired private detectives to buy Microsoft's trash for competitive research in 2000. Three years later, he began a very public feud with former lieutenant Craig Conway when Oracle sought to acquire PeopleSoft. The gambit succeeded and Conway was fired. Shares of Oracle have nearly doubled since.

Then there's former General Electric CEO Jack Welch. Widely considered one of the business world's tough guys during his rein, a man unafraid of candor, Welch is considered among the greatest ever in creating value for shareholders. GE's market capitalization - otherwise known as the composite worth of all outstanding shares - grew from $14 billion at the time of Welch's becoming CEO in 1981 to nearly $400 billion at the time of his retirement 20 years later.

Value creation of that magnitude is the result of a relentless pursuit of better performance. But to achieve it Welch knew he had to cultivate talent. "The market is rewarding you like Super Bowl winners or Olympic gold medalists," Welch is quoted as saying in a 1998 BusinessWeek profile. "I know I have such athletes reporting to me. Can you put your team against my team? Are you proud of everyone who reports to you? If you aren't, you can't win."

Notice the language. Welch didn't ask his subordinates if they liked their colleagues. He wanted them to build winning teams as he had. Several of his former understudies are today CEOs of Fortune 500 firms, including James McNerney of Boeing, Bob Nardelli of Chrysler and current GE chief Jeffrey Immelt.

How did Welch do it? By eliminating ambiguity; Welch left no one on his staff confused. "There are carrots and sticks here and he (Welch) is extraordinarily good at applying both," a GE executive told BusinessWeek. "When he hands you a bonus or a stock option, he lets you know exactly what he wants in the coming year." You might say that Welch sought respect and earned it by being clear and by rewarding those who achieved or exceeded his expectations. Follow his example via these three strategies for dealing with employees:

1. Have a plan that's clear and measurable.
2. Reward success at least as much as you punish failure.
3. Evaluate progress constantly and communicate changes as soon as they're needed.

Work is personal and it's great when employees come to like each other. It's even better when those teams - including managers - get along swimmingly. But likeability is not, nor has it ever been, a prerequisite to management success. Just ask Steve Jobs.

Sources:

Steve Jobs profile - Forbes 400
http://www.forbes.com/lists/2007/54/richlist07_St even-Jobs_HEDB.html

Ellison's feud with Conway
http://www.fool.com/investing/general/2004/10/ 01/peoplesoft-pushes-out-conway.aspx

Ellison hires detectives to search Microsoft's trash
http://news.cnet.com/Oracle-chief-defends-Micro soft-snooping/2100-1001_3-242560.html

Welch's training program at GE
http://www.businessweek.com/1998/23/b3581001.htm

Da ta on Welch's tenure at GE:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Welch#Tenure_as _CEO_of_GE

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