Here are two facts that should open your eyes. First, more
than a decade of Iraq and Afghanistan warfare has increased the mental health
diagnoses in the U.S. military by 65 percent. Second, a mental health provider
will recommend treatment of an
unstable soldier, but the military commander can still send the soldier out on
a mission – fully equipped with service rifle, grenades, and sidearm. This
sounds like an extreme case, but it is actually an example of a common problem.
Organizations use experts for many purposes, including those who control risks
to human life, equipment, or finances, but the experts are often just advisors.
The actual authority rests with the line manager in charge of operations.
The difficult relation between the non-authority
expert and the authority non-expert is important to understand because the
whole point of experts is to take advantage of their expertise when needed. Now
we know more, thanks to an article by Julia DiBenigno in Administrative Science Quarterly. She investigated the example I just gave: U.S. Army mental health
providers and their relationship with line managers (commanders) who decide how
soldiers are used or treated. This is a follow-up of an earlier article byDiBenigno showing that organizational procedures can be used to help create a more successful relationship. But even in organizations that are set up
correctly, individual experts can still fail to reach the powerful line
command.
The main difference between success and failure was
timing and speed. The mental health providers had a wide range of tactics to
gain access to the commanders and subsequently gain their trust. What tactics
they used depended on their resources. Because the army values military
experience, anyone with military service or endorsement could use that to be
recognized as an insider. Because the army values manhood, participating in
rigorous training signaled commitment. Because the army values rank and
protocol, learning and strictly following these helped communications. Doing each
of these things quickly was essential because any specialist will sometimes
make recommendations contrary to a commander’s wishes, and it is essential to
build rapport before the first conflict happens.
A worrying implication of this research is that so
much depends on the personal characteristics and initiative of each expert.
Two-thirds of the provider–commander connections were good enough that the
commander often followed the provider’s recommendations. What about the
soldiers under the command of the other one-third of the commanders? One-fifth of the providers were currently
serving in the military, giving them a great advantage in gaining commander
trust. What about the other four-fifths of the providers? Half the providers
were female, in a context where gender is very meaningful. They would start out
at the bottom rung of the trust hierarchy but could climb by, for example,
participating in training. The men started out higher on the trust hierarchy
but might fall quickly if they didn’t prove their manhood.
All these findings suggest that the expert’s path to
influence is a complicated one in organizations. My intuition is that it is
probably worse in many other organizations than the army, for two reasons.
First, the army is a pretty nonpolitical organization if we go far enough down
the ranks – its culture of valuing “straight shooter” communication rather than
intrigue reduces intra-organizational politics. Second, an army at war has an
external enemy and an understanding that all insiders – even mental health care
providers – are on the same team.
The best advice to line managers from this research is
to pay very careful attention to the experts, because many of them will not
know how to gain trust and communicate their concerns. They need managerial
attention and help, and you need their expertise.
