Accountancy & Management: When the boss doesn't care

TWO managers in three believe their organisation pays insufficient attention to their career management and development, while the same proportion are worried about their chances of promotion, according to a report published by the Institute of Management and ER Consultants.

This is the result of companies neglecting their managers' wider development needs and motivation by focusing on short-term gains in performance.

Such short-term policies as working managers ever harder in an effort to ensure immediate survival are at odds with managers' own worries, which are more likely to focus on long-term prospects, says the report.

Moreover, the gap between organisations' rhetoric and the reality experienced by managers could have long-term consequences for corporate success.

For instance, organisations are increasingly linking rewards to individual performance, but half the managers surveyed believe their own pay packets bear little relation to their actual contribution to the company.

In addition, this emphasis on rewarding individual performance neglects the enormous growth in team working.

Roger Young, IM's director general, said: 'This survey reveals disturbing evidence of a widening gulf between organisations and managers.'

Paul Teevan, of ER Consultants, added: 'Managers' increasing frustration stems from lack of communication from the top and worry as to what the future will hold.

'Their prospects for immediate promotion are grim, yet many are not offered other ways in which to develop their career.'