Book review: The Rise of the Player Manager by Philip Augar and Joy Palmer

In a new book, Philip Augar and Joy Palmer, careers agony aunts for Financial News, detail how 'player managers' - people who manage teams as well as managing clients - can come unstuck.

Augar, a former group managing director at Schroders says: "If you are put into a player managing position, it is a normal reaction to accept it as a promotion. But not everyone is cut out for this kind of thing."

Augar and Palmer use 'Nicola', a bond sales manager in an investment bank, to exemplify some of the pitfalls. In the parlance of the book, Nicola is a 'Players' Player.' She leads by example, setting high standards for herself in the hope that others will follow.

High achievement, high performance and high levels of personal charisma come first.

'Players' Players' are common in financial services, says Augar; in American banks they are known as producer managers. '"It has always been part of the City culture that the best producers are given managerial roles. The first instinct is often to do the job oneself and to manage in the spare time."

As Nicola discovers, this doesn't always work. Her preoccupation with revenue generation means favoritism towards other high flyers, but neglect of struggling team members. Weak players are sidelined and disillusioned. Her team is fractured by political infighting and there is no long-term strategy.

Although Nicola contributes 20% of her team's revenues, she comes to realise she could be more effective if her energies were instead used to improve the performance of other team members and to communicate strategy.

'Players' Players' are not the only kind of player manager examined by Augar and Palmer. They interviewed more than 500 people. They encountered: 'Player Coaches', who formed close ties with individual team members; 'Play Makers' who facilitated change; 'Rookies', or first time player managers; and 'Veterans', expert managers who could also play when necessary.

All had their strengths and weaknesses: Player Coaches nurtured talent but neglected their own revenue generation role; Play Makers could cause chaos as well as change; Veterans could be too wedded to the status quo.

But the most interesting types of player manager were the people had given up their managerial responsibilities and gone back to playing. They risked lower pay and loss of face. But Augar and Palmer found that they sent out a valuable message to everyone else: up is not the only way.

The creation of player managers is good for organisations; they can combine two roles in one and eliminate middle management. But it can be bad news for individuals, whose workload may double.

At a time when costs are being cut, Augar and Palmer's book carries an important message: think twice before accepting promotion.