Hearing of continual problems in New Zealand’s workplaces has prompted this article as a comment on management and leadership. Perhaps the environments where I have worked were not typical of New Zealand’s workplaces, but unfortunately my own observations of management in the Public Service and at one Non-Government Organisation have been extremely disappointing, and I hear numerous accounts of poor decision-making, dysfunctional workplaces and bullying across the country. My belief, or rather my hope, is that most workplaces in New Zealand function reasonably well and that, in general, leadership and management in both the public and private sectors are tolerably good. On that basis, accepting that in most workplaces leadership and management are of a reasonable standard, in this article I focus on those situations where I feel that matters are in need of improvement.
Why, despite repeated media exposure over the last thirty years or more, do poor decision-making and bullying appear to be even worse than ever (Allan Halse, pers comm)? Allan, who owns Cultureshift, an agency that supports people who are experiencing workplace bullying (Cultureshift, 2025), tells me that bullying in our Public Service is much worse than it was a decade ago and he attributes the increase to downward pressure from the political parties, failure to push back and a “trickle-down” effect on more junior staff. Today, Allan oversees numerous cases involving allegations of bullying and I confirm that I too am attempting to provide support for a number of people. In all, over the last three or four years I have interviewed or otherwise tried to assist nearly 70 people who allege that they have been bullied at work.
Allan is aware of the very considerable expenditure of public money that goes towards the legal processes in which our public ministries and departments defend themselves in cases of alleged bullying. I am aware of further expenditures of public money on non-disclosure agreements.
The best that I can come up with is that poor management, and the bullying that so often is associated with poor management, emerge both from poor choices as to who should lead and manage, and from the workplace cultures established by the top executives (see Lillis, 2022a, 2022b, 2024a, 2024b and 2024c). However, in my view the problem is exacerbated by the present cult of managerialism, or the idea that organisations should be run by professional managers rather than by experts – an idea that seems to have established itself across much of the western world. So, while this article is really about managerialism rather than about bullying, my view is that the two “phenomena” are inextricably linked.
The Literature on Managerialism
Much literature on managerialism is available on the Internet. For those interested in exploring the relevant research, I recommend starting with Shepherd (2017), who explores some of the key material. For example, she cites Klikauer (2015), who believes that today managerialism permeates economic, social, cultural and political spheres, and has become so pervasive that it has infiltrated nearly every domain of human existence. Entemann (1993) believes that it has become the predominant ideology of society. With the emergence of more overt top-down corporate management approaches, managerialism has also seeped into every level of education and across every aspect of university life (Deem, Hillyard and Reed, 2007).
Lyons (2023) believes that the only real goal and method of managerialism is to expand management, and that management itself produces nothing except further artificial complexity. He says that managerialism promises human progress and perfection, but then inevitably delivers inhumanity on an industrial scale.
Here we must make the distinction between management as a quite necessary function within organisations, and managerialism as an ideology. The key point about the latter is that very often it involves appointees who have no expertise in the work that their staff undertake. Thus there is a built-in tendency for them to fall back on standard tropes from the management textbooks relating to strategy, the setting of objectives, performance measurement, team building, mediation of disputes etc. There is the further risk of loading essentially non-productive tasks onto their teams. They are also much more prone to use authoritarian behaviour in order to get their way as they cannot do so through demonstration of subject expertise.
Shepherd reminds us that since management can only be undertaken by managers, they acquire complete control over those who do the work. Managerialism is accompanied by the belief that managers must maintain control and exercise their authority at all times over those being managed. Accordingly, the workforce is accountable to managers, rather than the other way around, and the assumption is that individual managers make a positive difference to organisations and impose their personalities upon them (Entemann, 1993).
For Klikauer, managerialism has established itself systemically within organisations and society, while depriving owners, employees and civil society of all decision-making powers. He sees managerialism as an ideology that attempts to justify the application of managerial techniques to all areas of society on the grounds of superior wisdom and insight, expert training and the exclusive possession of the knowledge that is necessary to run corporations and societies efficiently. Decision-making is owned entirely by managers, and managerialism by default deprives many expert people of the potential to influence. Unfortunately, we are seeing this ideology becoming ever further embedded within New Zealand’s universities and Public Sector, but with little evidence of either expert training or managerial knowledge.
Spillane and Joullié (2021) say that to those who endorse it, managerialism represents an effective and efficient approach for the reform and running of workplaces that is based on the principle that organisations pursue goals that are defined by managers on behalf of all corporate stakeholders. Further, the ideology encompasses the belief that managers are equipped with the sorts of specialised knowledge and skills that enable them to devise and implement value-free means for achieving relevant objectives.
Many scholars point out how managerialists have entrenched themselves in all corners of the power structures of firms, government bodies, universities, hospitals and other public administrations (e.g. Stolz, 2017). Managerialism is encountered wherever management, as a form and as a process, becomes an end in itself; in effect, a self-serving entity (Barberis, 2013).
Personal Observations
During my 20 years in the public service, I saw several examples of very young and inexperienced people who were promoted into positions of leadership and management over much more experienced subject matter experts. While a few young people may prove to be effective managers, my observation is that in general such appointments do not work out well. In addition I saw examples of more senior people promoted into management, but who also had no relevant qualifications and very little subject matter expertise. Again those situations created many problems for staff – especially the problem of bullying. For the record, a Canadian colleague who works in a nuclear facility reports appalling decisions made by management who have no background in nuclear engineering or nuclear physics.
My personal view is that managerialism indeed imposes generally negative effects precisely because it takes decision-making out of the hands of those who carry out the mission of the organisation and passes it to people who may have little or no subject matter expertise and may have little life experience or work experience. I hear many accounts of poor decision-making on the part of professional managers who are not trained in the work of the unit or the organisations that they are supposed to manage.
Managerialism in Higher Education
Within the domain of higher education Gordon and Whitchurch (2010) see managerialism as characterized by:
1. Greater separation of academic work and management activity
2. Increased control and regulation of academic work
3. A shift in authority from academics to managers and consequent weakening of the professional status of academic staff
4. An emphasis on generating income
5. Government policy that is focused on universities meeting socio-economic needs
6. Greater market orientation and increased competition for resources.
Indeed, New Zealand’s universities are characterized by managerialism, and it is no surprise that we hear ongoing reports of both mismanagement and bullying of academic staff (Lillis, 2024c). Many colleagues of mine who work in our universities confirm that executive teams and professional managers, rather than the most experienced academic staff, dominate university life and that their impact on the universities can be negative. One highly accomplished professor of physical sciences tells me that his university appears to be “dragging in people off the street” to act as managers.
Today, we see a few courageous staff speaking out on behalf of their universities. Professor Tim Hazeldine reminds us that the goals of the university are to teach students and carry out research, and that no manager can tell the shop-floor academics how to carry out those tasks (Hazeldine, 2021). He reports that in the years since 2000, the number of front-line academics and direct support staff at the University of Auckland grew at slightly less than the rate of increase in student numbers - 49 percent. However, the numbers appointed in other professional and managerial roles nearly doubled, and by 2021 exceeded the numbers of front-line staff.
Year by year they whittle away our autonomy in these matters, and impose rules and regulations that take us away from our core job. It may not be overstatement to worry that Western civilisation is now at threat here. If academic freedom is compromised, then so too is freedom of thought everywhere. Hazeldine (2021)
He says that in financial terms, the excess in spending was around $100 million per annum; money that otherwise could have gone to reducing student fees, funding scholarships or hiring young academics. He believes that the essence of managerialism is mistrust of the workers and he talks of a growing feeling that managers do not trust academic staff to evaluate promotions, run examinations or design courses or develop research agendas.
He sees managerialism as about excessive bureaucracies that focus on cutting costs and making efficiency gains. In contrast, genuine strategic leadership is about positioning the organisation for success, while empowering, caring for, and inspiring its staff.
Hill (2023) reports that universities in other countries, and now in New Zealand, showcase the dangers of managerialism and he points out the general decline in the global rankings of universities in the United Kingdom – a decline that is also evident in relation to New Zealand’s universities. He says that managerialism at their universities has led to increasingly expensive administrations and demotivated academic staff, thus compromising their mission to provide learning environments that are conducive to bringing out the best in both staff and students.
Misconduct Cases and Harrassment
It seems that many serious misconduct cases are in progress against academic staff at our universities but that do not pertain to strictly academic matters. At Massey University several staff have been on the receiving end of misconduct cases for speaking out against university policies, especially against enforced indigenization and against the imposition of equality between traditional knowledge and modern science. Indeed, some outspoken critics have been forced into early retirement (Lillis, 2024c).
Purser (2024) reminds us that subjects under the influence of power become more impulsive, less empathetic and able to put themselves in someone else’s shoes, and less risk-aware. Does the negative influence of power explain the unscrupulous behaviours reported to me and Allan Halse, or do those behaviours result mainly from an already established bullying culture and expectations of “tough” or “courageous” management?
As a management professor, I’m familiar with all these psychological tricks-and the disturbing history of how we got to a point where management gurus have refashioned the manager as a coach, counselor, and visionary leader instead of the power-hungry exploiter and emotional manipulator that he or she often is. It’s a story of poorly executed research, medical quackery, public manipulation, and overrated business schools. Understanding the history of managerialism is critical . . . Ronald Purser (2024)
It is all the more surprising that bullying is so pervasive today, given that it has been exposed many times in New Zealand’s media. Already over 20 years ago New Zealand’s Andrea Needham was a pioneer in exposing bullying in the workplace. I had the pleasure of meeting and talking with Andrea shortly before her very sad and untimely passing, and I recommend two of her books (Needham, 2004 and 2019).
How did We Get Here?
I confirm my belief that the majority of New Zealand’s workplaces are managed and led pretty well. However, poor management and bullying are not uncommon in New Zealand’s Public Service or in our universities. In my view certain of our senior executives bear great responsibility for setting cultures in which such behaviours are allowed to flourish and even expected. However, in my view, creating a management class of highly-paid individuals, who all too frequently have limited experience and little subject matter expertise, precipitates the problem.
My suspicion that this situation was pervasive within our Public Service was partly confirmed during a meeting in 2019 with the Public Service Commission – a meeting that I had demanded very forcibly. One Commissioner at the Public Service Commission informed me of a widespread view within the Public Service that subject matter expertise is not necessary for management. So, if managers know little about the work that they are supposed to manage and if they have little interest in creating positive environments, then what exactly is their function? Could it be that their true purpose is as instruments of control?
Staff who are newly entering the workforce know very well that the management stream offers higher remuneration and greater prospects for further promotion than analytic work such as policy, administration, research or statistical analysis. Naturally, many aspire to a career in management because of the money, often bypassing the critical phase that involves learning their trade as junior staff. Too often, people are promoted into management on the basis of personality – frequently dominant and ambitious people. Once there, they stand to make damaging mistakes in relation to the people they manage and the organisations for which they are the critical decision-makers.
Some of them are bullies by nature and they get away with bullying their staff if the organisational culture is itself bullying and hierarchical. Thus, during my time in a research and statistics unit in one Government entity, several highly-trained people left. By comparison, to this day, the very badly behaved under-qualified manager and completely unqualified team leader have enjoyed an uninterrupted run of success in their careers as highly-remunerated research and statistics managers.
What sort of reward structure is it that promotes the least qualified, least skilled and least experienced to highly-paid positions in management and leadership? How exactly are staff subjected to bullying supposed to react without compromising their positions even further? On what basis can a person who has no subject matter expertise judge the merits of the work of highly-trained experts? What of the quality of decision-making of our executive teams when those teams become populated with poorly trained and inexperienced people who have migrated upwards from middle management?
Does managerialism account in part for some of the problems we have seen in education over the last 20 years and the evident willingness of the relevant public institutions to impose various ideologies, often damaging ideologies, across every level of our education system?
Addressing the Problem
Possibly, managers who do not have the requisite skills or experience fall back on throwing their weight around to impose authority. Perhaps they feel threatened by team members who show up the manager’s lack of knowledge.
Where we appoint non-subject-expert managers and leaders, as far as possible we should ensure that they demonstrate a keen desire to learn, a degree of empathy and a sense of natural justice. It goes without saying that very senior roles cover a wide range of functions and so it is impossible for the very senior person to have complete subject expertise. What is critical is they have an open mind, respect the expertise of those below them, listen to and act on expert advice after reflection on its quality.
Specifically, Plimmer et al. (2023) suggest the following measures whereby organisations can address bullying:
1. Leaders commit to and prioritise psycho-social safety
2. Tighten up recruitment processes to avoid employing the wrong people
3. Support managers for dealing with poor behaviours – training, performance reviews
4. Clear and easy-to-use complaints processes
5. Support recovery for individuals who have suffered from bullying.
The authors say that complaint investigation processes must be clear, embodying multiple points of entry, so that people can choose who to complain to. Mediation can help if undertaken early in a conflict, but often a fundamental power imbalance underlies harmful behaviour. Managers must be trained in conflict management and complaint investigation because too often, they hide behind legalisms, such as requiring a written complaint before taking any action.
Going Forward
Hill (2023) believes that decision-making within universities is largely restricted to the need to comply with policies made by central leadership in a top-down manner, and that destructive managerialism manifests as an excessive bureaucracy that loses focus on enabling the core business of teaching and research. While managed change and restructuring may be substantial, there is a lack of demonstrable evidence that better teaching and research are achieved. In tandem, we see disproportionately high recognition and reward for taking up managerial responsibilities, and high quality researchers replace teaching and research time with time that must be spent o administration and management.
Hill reminds us that university academics serve society by encouraging multiple points of view, co-creating and disseminating knowledge, challenging orthodoxy, critiquing government policy and calling business and international organisations to account. They need a strong and collegial culture, preservation of academic freedom and professional autonomy, minimal bureaucratic burdens, as well as empowering, empathetic and inspiring leadership.
In New Zealand it is time to back away from our present cult of managerialism. In my view has proved to be nothing short of a disaster and continues to be so.
New Zealand’s employers must become kinder and live up to their claims to provide positive workplaces, especially our Public Service and our universities that of course are funded by the taxpayer. Accordingly, managers and executives must be selected not only on the basis of personality, but on the basis of work and life experience and genuine expertise in the areas of work that they superintend. Ideally, our workplaces should provide the opportunity for experienced staff to graduate from working as discipline experts to management of others, given appropriate collateral training, with oversight only in their areas of expertise - at least initially. Otherwise, we continue to proceed headlong down the same old trajectory. Surely, it is quite easy to create harmonious workplaces if the will is there, and many online resources give good advice on how to achieve such environments.
Surely, a balance between work and personal life leads to greater job satisfaction. Surely, hard work should be rewarded because a positive workplace environment is one where employees feel that their effort is valued and recognised. Rewards encourage positive attitudes and strong performance. Rewards need not be financial, and often the solution can be as basic as thanking employees for their industry. By recognising hard work employees feel valued. In turn, feeling valued motivates staff and engenders a positive and productive environment.
Surely, open and honest communication establishes trust on every side. Naturally, managers should listen to employees’ concerns and engage in meaningful dialogue. Personal and professional development are also critically important and create the preconditions for superior performance and long-term benefits to the organisation. Open and honest communication includes being receptive to feedback from employees and putting systems in place whereby staff can record concerns. Open communication involves encouraging collaboration and team spirit, connecting with all employees and fostering positive relationships.
Dr David Lillis trained in physics and mathematics at Victoria University and Curtin University in Perth, working as a teacher, researcher, statistician and lecturer for most of his career. He has published many articles and scientific papers, as well as a book on graphing and statistics.
References
Barberis, P. (2013) ‘The Managerial Imperative: Fifty Years’ Change in UK Public https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0952076712458789, Public Policy And Administration 28(4): 327–45.
Cultureshift (2015). https://www.allanhalse.com/
Deem, R., Hillyard, S. and Reed, M. (2007). Knowledge, Higher Education, and the New Managerialism: The Changing Management of UK Universities. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Entemann, W. F. (1993). Managerialism: The Emergence of a New Ideology. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press.
Gordon, G. and Whitchurch, C. (2010). Academic and Professional Identities in Higher Education: The Challenges of a Diversifying Workforce. Abingdon: Routledge.
Hazeldine, Tim (2021).'Managerialism doesn't belong in universities'
https://www.auckland.ac.nz/en/news/2021/08/02/opinion-tim-hazledine-let-academics-run-courses.html
Hill, Phillip (2023). The perils to our universities from the rise of managerialism. The Post.
https://www.thepost.co.nz/nz-news/350097483/perils-our-universities-rise-managerialism
Klikauer, Thomas (2013). Managerialism - a Critique of an Ideology. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan
Klikauer, Thomas (2015). “What is Managerialism?” Critical Sociology 41 (7 - 8): 1103–1119. doi: 10.1177/0896920513501351
Lillis, David (2022a). Workplace Bullying in New Zealand. BreakingViews.
https://breakingviewsnz.blogspot.com/2022/01/david-lillis-workplace-bullying-in-new.html
Lillis, David (2022b). Sorry - but “nga Mihi” isn’t good enough!
https://breakingviewsnz.blogspot.com/2022/07/dr-david-lillis-sorry-but-nga-mihi-isnt.html
Lillis, David (2024a). Exposing Workplace Bullying in New Zealand - Part 1
https://breakingviewsnz.blogspot.com/2024/02/david-alexander-lillis-exposing.html
Lillis, David (2024b).Exposing Workplace Bullying in New Zealand - Part 2
https://breakingviewsnz.blogspot.com/2024/02/david-alexander-lillis-exposing_22.html
Lillis, David (2024c). New Zealand’s Universities - Bullying and Other Issues
https://breakingviewsnz.blogspot.com/2024/06/david-lillis-new-zealands-universities.html
Lyons, N. S. (2023). The China Convergence. The Upheaval.
https://theupheaval.substack.com/p/the-china-convergence
Needham, Andrea (2004). Workplace Bullying: A Costly Business Secret
Penguin Global
ISBN-10 : 0143018817
ISBN-13 : 978-0143018810
Needham, Andrea (2019). Andrea Needham Leadership Charitable Trust (2019). Workplace Bullying: A costly business phenomenon
ISBN 9780473463946
Plimmer, G., Haider, A. and Zhou, A. (2023). Bullying and Rudeness in the Public Service
https://ipanz.org.nz/Article?Action=View&Article_id=150444
Purser, Ronald (2024). Against Managerialism. Current Affairs.
https://www.currentaffairs.org/news/2024/02/against-managerialism
Shepherd, Sue (2017). Managerialism: an ideal type
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/03075079.2017.1281239#abstract
Spillane and Joullié (2021). The decline of authority and the rise of managerialism
Article in Organization. December 2021
DOI: 10.1177/13505084211061242
Stolz, S. A. (2017) ‘MacIntyre, Managerialism and Universities’, Educational Philosophy and Theory 49(1): 38–46.
6 comments:
There is an old adage -
"People join companies and leave managers".
This has and will always be the case for those who want to advance their careers or at least seek better pay and conditions.
Thank you for the thesis but no one has time to wait for some utopian managerialism to materialize in an organization with incompetent management.
We swiftly move on and to hell with the idiots who foster toxic work environments.
Good article. I wonder if the issue of managerialism is simply a pushback to the proliferation of promoting people simply because they were good at their job and often terrible dealing with people? I had many such managers as a younger worker and frankly, a gently-spoken, “Lead with Why” kind of boss is a lot easier to work under. Hiring people is expensive, pick the nice manager.
I think this is the key line in your article "but with little evidence of either expert training or managerial knowledge."
Although you are calling out an ideology in the article, I think a lack of skilled managers is a much bigger problem. You do refer to promoting the wrong people, which I totally agree with but their status as management graduates or subject matter experts is irrelevant if they are bad managers and leaders.
On decision making, subject matter experts are just that, experts on a subject however managers are often called upon to make decisions across many domains. Wise ones take notice of the advice of the subject matter experts on the relevant subject, the bad ones believe they have all the answers.
There are many organisations that are well led by professional managers as you make reference to many companies in NZ being well managed.
The problem is the lack of accountability for bad managers. There are many underperforming CEO's who just seem to stay put and what's the bet the rest of a bad CEO's team are likely as bad as them.
How many public sector chiefs can you recall ever getting fired even when the performance of their area is woeful.
An acquaintance who was a psychiatrist from overseas said NZ is a very bullying society.
Where did this come from ? What is the nature of our society that this should happen ?
A good start would be to stamp out all bullying in our schools for which we have internationally a bad record along with bad classroom behaviour towards the teacher and other students.
The' golden rule ' is powerful and universal and all children should be taught it for a start. The Min.of Education is an exceptionally bullying organisation so they have created this climate in our schools as well . They have forced evil ideologies instead of good teaching practice on teachers , by bullying and blackmail.
Manager = power = potential (probable) bully.
Hello Gaynor. Reluctantly, I am forced to agree with you. For many years I have heard that the Ministry of Education is a bullying place and several of their staff have confirmed it. Unfortunately, so was NZQA when I was there. The bullying from unqualified managers was truly despicable and sometimes the most highly-trained were the ones on the receiving end and getting abused out of employment. Physical intimidation; lying about good staff; barring disliked staff from meetings and other fora; pressuring disliked staff to resign with no job to go to, and plagiarising the work of disliked staff. Also - removing peoples' names from their reports and other work after they had been pushed out.
I could be polite about all of this but then what will change if good people fail to speak up? Besides - those managers and executives are not polite to anyone they dislike and, by the way, take a good look at their fabulous salaries.
No surprise that with people like them in charge that education has declined over many years. It is way past time for a real shake-up. David Lillis
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