[Management Techniques] Must-See TV

What can “The Office” teach you about managing a sales force at your pest management company? Plenty.

He could be anyone’s boss, but he’s Michael Scott, the fictional regional manager of a paper supply company on the NBC sitcom, “The Office.” On the show, Steve Carell, who stars as Michael, plays his incompetence for laughs. But antics like holding a motivational cruise in the middle of winter to save money, or giving one-word performance reviews are all too real for anyone who has ever had a terrible boss.

The premise of the show, based on the popular British series of the same name, is that a film crew has descended on the Scranton, Pa., branch of the paper supply company Dunder-Mifflin to document everyday office life. Interviews with the characters are interspersed with single-camera shots of the action around the office. There’s no laugh track and the show doesn’t glamorize business-to-business paper sales. But its wry sensibility has charmed fans and critics: For the 2005-06 season, “The Office” averaged 8.9 million viewers per episode, according to Nielsen Media Research, and in August 2006 it won the Emmy for Outstanding Comedy Series.

Abhay Padgaonkar, president of Innovative Solutions Consulting in Phoenix, believes Michael’s ineptitude and the workplace rivalries on the show are exaggerated, but reflect real issues. “The show is a microcosm of what is happening out in the American workplace. And I think it should be a wake-up call for everyone,” Padgaonkar says.

Greg Daniels, executive producer of the show, disagrees. While the typical office types such as the underachiever, the sycophant and the control freak are all there, Daniels believes that at best, the show embellishes office hyjinx for fun. “It’s not a training video. We’re trying to make (the audience) laugh by exaggerating situations that they recognize,” says Daniels, who also writes some episodes and developed the show for U.S. viewers. Whether the show reflects reality or not, the weekly antics at Dunder-Mifflin can serve as a how-not-to for sales leaders.

FROM SELLER TO BOSS? Michael’s rise at Dunder-Mifflin, from a top salesperson to regional manager, reflects one of the most common problems in sales management today: The assumption that successful salespeople are also good leaders. Many companies prefer to promote salespeople to management positions because it cuts training costs, and most pay structures encourage salespeople to move up to management regardless of their leadership skills.

Steve Grossman, the Chicago-based head of sales effectiveness for Mercer Human Resource Consulting, believes that this is one of the most unrecognized mistakes in management today. “There is a very short list of super athletes who went on to become great coaches,” he says. “I think the same thing applies in the sales world.” Star sellers are accustomed to being recognized for their success, but managers shouldn’t be stars at all; their leadership should never take center stage. “The real focus of that job should be coaching and managing, not taking the glory that salespeople thrive on,” he says. Grossman recommends investing in a psychological assessment before promoting an ace seller into management.

Unfortunately for the Scranton branch, Michael is a glory hog. Before becoming regional manager, Michael was a fantastic sales rep: He was Dunder-Mifflin’s salesman of the year twice consecutively. As a manager, he misses that company-wide recognition. When his most ambitious sales rep, Dwight Schrute, wins the award in season two, he is so jealous of his employee’s accomplishment that he delivers part of Dwight’s acceptance speech for him at the Dunder-Mifflin sales convention. When Dwight finally overcomes his stage fright and makes a rousing speech, Michael barely recognizes his achievement and doesn’t encourage him to go for a second award next year.

“He’s a great salesman because he has a deep need to be liked, and that translates into an ability to work really hard at pleasing other people,” Daniels says. But many of the qualities that make Michael a good salesperson also make him a bad leader. His quest for popularity makes him ineffectual, and he has trouble making difficult decisions for the greater good of the company. When corporate tells Michael he needs to lay off an employee by the end of October, he waits until Halloween, hoping someone “would quit, move or die.” Finally he arbitrarily finds an employee to fire after several failed attempts to dismiss other members of his staff. As a leader, his indecision and need to be liked are liabilities. “He just wants to get a laugh and have everyone get along. Sometimes you have to make choices,” Daniels says.

As a boss, Michael displays gross insensitivity: He objectifies female employees and misgauges their tolerance for sexual humor. But as a salesperson, he is adept at reading clients. In the second season, Michael and his boss, Jan Levinson, who is based in New York, meet with a Scranton-based client for a major deal. While Jan wants to go to a hotel conference room to pitch the sales directly, Michael insists on having lunch at Chili’s before discussing business. Using onion Awesome Blossoms and giant margaritas, Michael gains the client’s trust, and convinces him to purchase from Dunder-Mifflin instead of going with a cheaper competitor.

Michael’s comedic approach to management fails, but worked for his sale. “His boss is disappointed with him and thinks he’s just making stupid jokes, but actually he’s bonding with the person he’s trying to sell to,” Daniels says. “He made the sale where she couldn’t, because she tried to get down to the bottom line too quickly and didn’t build a relationship.”

But Jan has the wrong reaction to Michael’s success. Closing the deal restores her confidence in him as a leader, even though management and sales skills are not the same. The sale also marks the beginning of their on and mostly off-again romantic relationship.

DISTANCE AND DISTRUST. Christy Coaty, an executive assistant at Prime Resource Group, a sales training consulting firm based in Minneapolis, believes the lesson of “The Office” is simple: “Don’t be a Michael,” she says. But the more understated message for corporate managers is don’t be a Jan. Along with developing a romantic relationship with one of her employees, she has a poor rapport with the Scranton office. She rarely visits or calls the satellite office, except to give bad news.

“One of the things that comes across on ‘The Office’ is how out of touch executives are with workers in the satellite offices,” says Susan Onaitis, president of Global Learning Link, a New York-based sales productivity consulting firm. On “The Office” and in the real world, when executives are uninvolved with their satellite offices, it creates division. “[The characters] rightly associate the executives with negative things and it reinforces the ‘us’ and ‘them’ mentality,” she says. To improve communication with a satellite branch, Onaitis recommends e-mailing and calling frequently, not just when there are cutbacks. Executives should also constantly reach out to their staff in other regions for feedback.

When Jan does visit Scranton socially for the branch’s charity casino night, she is able to encourage Jim Halpert, a top seller, to take a better job at the Stamford, Conn., branch in a non-threatening setting. Although her trip to Scranton coincides with her renewed interest in Michael, her personal advice to Jim persuades him (as did his unrequited love for the receptionist Pam) to transfer out of Scranton and move up at Dunder-Mifflin. Her friendly visit to Scranton leads to positive business results.

PRANKS FUNNY, RIVALRY REAL. Dwight, who sits next to Jim, also encourages him to leave Scranton, not for Jim’s professional development but because Jim’s pranks irk him. During the course of the show, Jim suspends Dwight’s calculator in Jell-O, puts his office supplies in the vending machine and moves his desk into the bathroom. Jim’s jokes are funny, but Padgaonkar of Innovative Solutions Consulting believes they are an indication of an unhealthy work environment at Dunder-Mifflin.

“In many organizations, people are set up against each other,” he says. “The pranks are a symptom of it. It’s about rivalry.” Like most sales companies, Dunder-Mifflin holds contests and rewards its top performers. But Michael does not make every salesperson feel equally valued: He clearly prefers Jim to Dwight. While competition can produce better performance, on “The Office” it creates hostility.

Even though office tension is exaggerated, many aspects of the show are real, says Bob Cohen, director of human resources at Paper Magic, a finished paper product supply company also based in Scranton. The depiction of Pennsylvania’s sixth-largest city has been mostly accurate, according to Cohen. “I really like their attention to detail. They don’t just make stuff up,” he says. The Froggy 101 bumper sticker in Dwight’s cube is a reference to a real country western radio station; there is also a take-out menu from a local restaurant, Nico Bella, on the bulletin board. Cohen is quick to add that the antics on the show don’t happen at his paper supply company. “That stuff wouldn’t be tolerated in our office,” he says. “But it’s funny.”

Jim’s pranks would be considered harassment at Paper Magic, and might even lead to his termination. In season three, the staff finds out that Oscar, an accountant at Dunder-Mifflin, is gay. Angela Martin, his supervisor, acts coldly toward him after learning his sexual orientation. At Paper Magic, her behavior would be unacceptable. “That would be a sit-down conversation with Angela,” Cohen says. “If someone were making comments that had nothing to do with performance, we wouldn’t tolerate it.”

Though the city is teased on the show — Hooters is the local hotspot — Cohen doesn’t think the show is too negative about his hometown. “I don’t think it puts the city in a bad light,” he says.

CYNICAL, BUT ALSO HOPEFUL. Likewise, “The Office” might joke about the dreary jobs of office employees, but it’s not mean-spirited. “I don’t feel like we’re teasing people with office jobs. I feel like we’re the voice of people with office jobs,” Daniels says. Even Michael has sympathetic moments on the show.

Optimism is also an unspoken requirement in the sales profession, believes Tyrone L. Cypress, the Ellicot City, Md., author of “Say It Loud…I Sell and I’m Proud.” Successful reps must learn to accept rejection on a regular basis. “In sales, persistence becomes second nature,” Cypress says. “No matter how bad that last call was, you know if [the sale is] not the next one, it’s going to be the one after that.”

If anything, the show’s dark portrayal of office life is a reminder that an office environment does not have to be, and shouldn’t be, miserable. As Daniels puts it, “The show may be bleak, but maybe the point of that is to say, ‘Hey, it doesn’t need to be like that.’”

The preceding article originally appeared in the November/December 2006 issue of Sales & Market Manager (S&MM) magazine. S&MM articles are used with permission of Nielsen Business Media.

Lessons from the Office Staff

The Dunder-Mifflin staff may not be the happiest workers in the world, but there is a lot to learn from their melancholy.

Pam Beesly, Secretary
Don’t pass up good opportunities at a bad job.
Pam is the receptionist at Dunder-Mifflin, but she’d rather do something more creative than answering phones all day. She is so disappointed with her job that she wouldn’t mind being fired from it. But when the chance comes to move up at Dunder-Mifflin and do something more artistic by taking a company-sponsored graphic design course in New York, she decides not to take it, following the advice of her fiance. Even if your job isn’t ideal, it might offer exciting prospects.

Dwight Schrute, Assistant to the Regional Manger
Don’t suck up to the boss.
Dwight is eager to succeed at Dunder-Mifflin, but his idolization of Michael is a transparent grab for power. Though he calls himself the assistant regional manager, Michael has only given him the meaningless title of assistant to the regional manager. Everyone at Dunder-Mifflin, including Michael, knows Dwight’s intentions, which have only impeded his progress at the company. Don’t let your ambition get ahead of your sense.

Ryan Howard, Temp-To-Perm
Don’t save your enthusiasm for your dream job.
Ryan is in business school and hopes to run his own company. Although he has big dreams, he is unmotivated at Dunder-Mifflin. He doesn’t want to build a career there, and it shows. Instead of changing his attitude or his job, he remains passive and moves up from a temp to a full-time employee only because it’s the easiest thing to do. Without working hard at bad jobs, you’ll never get to your dream job.

Jim Halpert, Sales Rep
Don’t stay at a job you hate.
Jim is smart, creative and funny. But these skills rarely help him as a sales rep at Dunder-Mifflin. Jim’s long tenure at the company is mostly due to his apathy and fear of finding a fulfilling career. If you’re unhappy at a job, don’t stay there. Take a risk, and find something you love.

Angela Martin, Accounting
Don’t try to control everything.
Angela likes working at Dunder-Mifflin, but very few of her colleagues enjoy working with her. She micromanages group projects and criticizes or dismisses the help of others. At Dunder-Mifflin, her distrust of others isolates her from her coworkers. You might like things a certain way, but no one will like you if you impose your taste on others.