Overemphasis on the bottom line can drive down employee performance

Managers who focus mainly on the bottom line fail to get the best performance from their employees, a Baylor University study concluded. Matthew Quade, Ph.D., assistant professor of management in Baylor's Hankamer School of Business and lead researcher of the study, said in a statement that a "bottom-line mentality" (BLM) is detrimental to employee-manager relationships. In Baylor's poll of 866 people — half of whom were supervisors and the other half workers — researchers asked supervisors questions about workers' performance, and they questioned workers on their supervisors' views of the bottom line. Results showed high-BLM managers created poor relationships with their employees, and employees reacted to high-BLM managers by holding back on performance. When workers had a low BLM, this correlation was more evident, researchers found.