Micromanagement in the workplace

Abstract

Micromanagement is a toxic management style where the executive or manager oversees the smallest of workplace details. Organisation members are subjected to a soul stripping process where their thoughts, feelings, and actions are closely scrutinised. This dynamic collapses interpersonal space and personal integrity. The micromanager strips others of their self-confidence and self-efficacy leaving them uncertain what they should think, do, or feel without permission. Organisational performance is compromised. Micromanagement is an all too common but under examined feature of organisations. It is explored here for its toxicity and underlying individual, group, and organisational psychodynamics using object relations and group relations theoretical perspectives. Consultants, executive coaches, govern-ing board members, executives, and employees will benefit from this systematic exploration of micromanagement in the workplace by developing better apprecia-tion of the underlying psychosocial dynamics of micromanagement that can be a way of life at work.