How important is it to get rid of bad bosses?

Want to determine how satisfied, engaged, and effective employees really are? It all depends on the answer to this question: “Who’s your supervisor and how well are they doing their job?”

How well a boss does their job is key to finding out just how well a company’s employees are really doing, according to a recent Harvard Business Review study.

After evaluating the effectiveness of 2,865 leaders in a large financial services company, the study found that the better the leader, the more engaged the staff will be. There is a straight-line correlation between levels of employee engagement and the measure of overall effectiveness of their supervisors.

These types of results aren’t unusual either. These trends can be found in other countries and in companies of all sizes. Sixty percent of government workers report being miserable at work because they don’t know what is expected of them, a result of bad leadership. This is a bigger issue than pay, benefits, or vacation days.

Benefits suffer with bad bosses

A bad boss will completely negate the positive aspects of whatever wellness or benefits package your company touts. When employees are miserable due to ineffective leadership, it’ll all just seem secondary when it should be brightening their decision to work for you.

Good bosses = Good revenue

Harvard Business Review has done other studies involving major retailers who see an increase in revenue thanks to great leadership.

In a study published more than 15 years ago, HBR identified “the employee-customer-profit chain” at Sears. This was a dynamic in which employee behavior affected customer behavior, which affected the company’s financial performance.

In Sears’ case, when employee satisfaction improved by 5%, customer satisfaction improved by 1.3%, which led to a .05% improvement in revenue — That’s an extra $250 million in sales revenue for Sears.

Do you have any real life evidence of a bad boss affecting your workplace? What did you do to fix the situation? Let us know in the comments below.