Let’s talk about the games that (some) supervisees play as a way to cope with the imbalance of power. See if any of these sound familar. I know I have played one or more of these cards in my time, albeit subconsciously (I’m having a hard time admitting that I have ever done any of these on purpose!!).
Kadushin (1968) has identified four games that supervisees play:
- Protect me/treat me – the supervisee uses personal issues to entice the supervisor to fogive their lack of performance. This can draw the supervisor into being more supportive and less challenging. Now of course, we all do have personal issues that we need support with, and there is a balance to how a supervisor responds here…but if it becomes a trend, then the supervisor will not be holding the person accountable for high performance
- Evaluations are not for friends – when the supervisee engages in a friendship relationship with the supervisor, it can become harder for the supervisor to give the feedback that is necessary for high performance
- Head it off at the pass – sometimes, supervisees create crisis situations that need to be dealt with immediately, to prevent the supervisor from addressing something that the supervisor doesn’t want to hear or address
- What you don’t know won’t hurt me – sometimes, supervisees give scant information even when asked about something, not wanting to discuss their fears and weaknesses. They don’t want to be seen as incompetent, so they don’t tell the supervisor about these things. I remember Phil Swallow (MD) saying that we should be encouraging our people to give us the bad news early – that those who give bad news should be rewarded for doing so, to increase the chances they will share bad news again in future. But the percpetion that people have of the power we yield means that they do not always want to share that bad news, for fear of a bad rating etc.
See yourself in any of these? Even just a little bit?
We’ll come onto the supervisor games in the next episode of the series. Then we’ll talk about how to get a better balance, avoiding those games as much as possible.
References: Bass (1990) talks about position power and personal power; Beer (1980) Expert power, Coalition power, Reputation power, Group support, Control of resources and knowledge, information power; J Boonstra and KM Bennebroek – Power Dynamics and Organizational Change; Bouwen and Gusavsen – Democratic Dialogue; Delano and Shah – Professionally Packaging Your Power in the Supervisory Relationship
