By Titan007
Would I rather be feared or loved?
It’s one of those questions that refuses to die. It pops up in boardrooms, in self-help books, in late-night “hustle” podcasts recorded too close to a leather couch. It’s asked like a riddle, as if leadership is a personality quiz you can beat with the right answer.
And the truth is, the question is already rigged—because most people who ask it are really asking something else:
How do I matter to other people without needing them too much?
That’s the part nobody says out loud. The part that sits under the spreadsheets like a little throbbing ache.
Michael Scott says it out loud.
Not in a clean, “TED Talk” way. Not in a way you’d put on a corporate poster next to a smiling stock photo of a handshake. He says it like a man who wants approval the way a plant wants sunlight—no shame, no filter, just full-body need.
“Would I rather be feared or loved?” he asks in The Office. Then, without hesitation: “Both. I want people to be afraid of how much they love me.”
If you’ve worked for any length of time—at a desk, on a floor, in a kitchen, in a classroom, on a set—you already understand the line isn’t just funny. It’s familiar. Because you’ve met this person. Maybe you’ve been this person. Maybe you’ve watched someone become this person slowly, one “quick sync” at a time.
Michael Scott is not a role model in the normal sense. He is messy, performative, impulsive, and often one HR meeting away from being a cautionary poster. And yet, there’s a reason he continues to show up in leadership conversations like a stray cat that keeps finding the warmest windowsill.
Because Michael Scott, beneath all the noise, is relentlessly people-first.
And in an era where work keeps trying to convince us we’re interchangeable—where software tracks keystrokes, where performance reviews reduce human effort to a bar chart—being people-first is not soft. It’s not cute. It’s not optional.
It’s the whole game.
The Great Leadership Myth: That Work Is About Work
If you ask someone what makes a “great leader,” you’ll get a predictable list: vision, decisiveness, accountability, and communication. Somebody will say “culture.” Somebody will say “execution.” Somebody will say “empathy” with the cautious tone of a person admitting they own a scented candle.
But go sit in any workplace for long enough, and you’ll notice the truth hiding in plain sight:
Work is never only about work.
Work is about hunger: the hunger to be seen, to be respected, to be safe, to be useful, to be included. Work is about status and insecurity. It’s about identity. It’s about whether your name gets remembered after the meeting ends. It’s about whether you feel like a person or a password.
If that sounds dramatic, it’s because it is. We spend too much of our lives at work for it to be emotionally neutral. The most common fantasy people have isn’t “I wish my job had nicer spreadsheets.”It’s: I wish someone had noticed what I’m carrying.
Michael notices. Sometimes in the worst possible way. Sometimes with the subtlety of a marching band in a library. But he notices.
He knows the names. He knows the personalities. He knows that these aren’t “resources”—they’re weird, specific human beings who show up with invisible histories and private fears and complicated mornings.
A standard boss asks: What did you produce?
A real leader quietly asks: Who are you becoming while you produce it?
Michael Scott wants his office to feel like a family. And yes, that’s risky—because “we’re a family here” has been used as a manipulative line by companies that want unpaid overtime wrapped in emotional guilt.
But Michael’s version isn’t a strategy. He’s not reading it off a management blog. He’s not deploying belonging as a retention tactic.
He actually believes it.
He believes these people are rare.
Do you thinkStanley'ss grow on tree?s? They don’t. There is no Stanley Tree. Do you think the world is overflowing with Phyllises? Show me the farm where Phyllis and Kevin sprout up ready for harvest.
The joke lands because it flips a modern workplace habit on its head: the habit of treating people like easily replaceable parts. Like you can swap the person, keep the function, and everything will run fine.
It won’t. Not for long.
Because the invisible part of a team—the trust, the inside language, the small rituals, the unspoken favors—isn’t stored in the org chart. It lives inside people. Lose them, and you don’t just lose “labor.” You lose the glue.
The Hidden Superpower: Believing in the Person Everyone Else Wrote Off
Take Dwight.
In a different show, Dwight is fired five times in the first season. In real life, Dwight is walked out by security with a cardboard box and a stunned expression. The office sends a “best of luck” email nobody reads. The problem is “handled.”
Michael doesn’t handle Dwight. Michael holds Dwight.
He backs him. He shields him. He argues for him. He complains about him, sure—but the complaining is a kind of attachment. Michael sees Dwight’s weirdness and doesn’t immediately label it “a liability.”
He sees it as energy that needs direction.
Some leaders only like high performers when they’re neat. When they’re easy.When their talent comes with a polite smile and a low-maintenance personality. Michael is drawn to the opposite: he collects misfits like they’re rare vinyl records.
And here’s the uncomfortable truth: a lot of great teams are built exactly like that.
Not by managers who demand perfect behavior, but by leaders who can spot the strange, useful spark in someone and protect it long enough to become something real.
That doesn’t mean tolerating chaos forever. It means recognizing that people aren’t finished products. Most employees don’t need a boss who can recite policies.
They need someone who can say: I see what you could be.
It’s easy to underestimate how powerful that is, especially for people who’ve spent their lives being underestimated. A single person believing in you—loudly, consistently—can change the trajectory of your whole career.
Michael Scott, for all his flaws, offers belief like it’s candy. Sometimes it’s the wrong kind of candy. Sometimes it’s delivered at the worst moment. But it’s there.
And in a world full of leaders who manage through suspicion—who assume laziness, assume incompetence, assume you’ll take advantage—Michael’s default is trust.
That trust is not always wise.
But it is oxygen.
What Machines Still Can’t Do (No Matter How Many Features They Add)
There’s a reason this conversation hits harder now than it did when The Office first aired.
We’re living through a period where work is increasingly mediated by systems: dashboards, automations, AI tools, performance trackers, productivity “insights.” The promise is efficiency. The pitch is: the machine will handle it.
And machines can handle a lot.
They can summarize meetings. They can assign tasks. They can forecast. They can generate slides with perfect spacing and the emotional depth of a toaster.
But there’s one thing they still can’t do—not in a way that feels human:
They can’t make you feel like you matter.
Not really.
A system can tell you you’re “on track.” It can award you a badge. It can send a celebratory emoji when you hit a target. But you know the difference between recognition and a notification. Your nervous system knows. Your body knows.
Human recognition has weight because it comes with risk. A person noticing you is a person choosing you. It costs something: attention, vulnerability, emotional labor.
That’s why the smallest moments of real leadership are often quiet. A manager remembering a detail. A leader checking in without an agenda. Someone saying, “I saw what you did there.” Someone defending you when you’re not in the room.
These moments look tiny from the outside. From the inside, they can be life-altering.
Michael Scott lives for these moments—sometimes too much. Sometimes he confuses recognition with worship. But he understands the central truth:
Life and business are built on human connection.
Everything else is scaffolding.
The Dark Comedy of Recognition
Michael’s obsession with awards is one of the most ridiculous—and revealing—parts of his leadership style. He makes recognition into a spectacle. He creates ceremonies. He tries to turn Tuesday into the Oscars.
It’s easy to mock.But strip away the cringe, and you find a core insight so sharp it almost hurts:
People will destroy themselves in silence if they feel invisible long enough.
That’s not a metaphor. It’s not a “motivational quote.” It’s a human reality.
In workplaces where recognition is scarce, people don’t just work less. They shrink. They stop offering ideas. They stop taking risks. They stop caring. They do the minimum, not because they’re lazy, but because they learned their effort doesn’t land anywhere.
They show up physically and leave emotionally.
Then leaders panic. They call it disengagement. They blame the employee. They schedule a mandatory “culture workshop” featuring a slide titled How to Take Ownership.
Michael’s version is absurd, but at least it’s honest: he knows people want to be appreciated, and he refuses to pretend they don’t.
Recognition is not extra. It’s not a sprinkle on top of “real work.”
It is real work.
Why Michael’s Branch Works (Even When He Doesn’t)
Here’s the part that makes traditional managers uncomfortable: Michael’s branch does well.
Not because he’s organized. Not because he’s optimized. Not because he’s a master strategist. None of that.
It does well because the people around him, despite being exasperated, often feel like they belong to something. They have inside jokes, grudges, loyalty, alliances, and small moments of care. They’re invested in each other.
In other branches, managers try to squeeze performance through control: more rules, more approvals, more monitoring, more pressure. It creates compliance, not commitment.
Michael—almost by accident—creates commitment.
He challenges the norm constantly. He tries weird things. He breaks the monotony. Sometimes it’s painful. Sometimes the experiments flop.
But teams don’t thrive on perfection. They thrive on energy.
And Michael, for better and worse, is energy in human form.
He doesn’t lead from behind a spreadsheet. He wants to be on the front line. He wants to sell with the team, joke with the team, suffer with the team, and celebrate with the team.
In modern leadership language, he’s practicing something close to transformational leadership—not because he read a book, but because he’s wired to make meaning out of everything.
He wants the office to feel like a shared story.
And people, almost against their will, respond to that.
The Warning Label (Because Yes, We Need One)
Now let’s be clear: becoming “more like Michael Scott” does not mean becoming chaotic, inappropriate, or allergic to boundaries. Michael does plenty that shouldn’t be copied—things that in real life would cause real harm.
A people-first leader isn’t someone who makes everything about themselves. A people-first leader doesn’t demand emotional caretaking from employees. A people-first leader doesn’t use “family” language to blur lines and guilt people into staying late.
Michael crosses these lines constantly.
So the lesson isn’t “imitate Michael’s behavior.” The lesson is to steal his priorities and leave the rest in Scranton.
Here’s what’s worth stealing:
- See your team as human beings first. Not functions. Not headcount. Not “capacity.”
- Protect potential. Especially the weird kind.
- Give real recognition. Specific, earned, and human.
- Lead in public. Don’t hide behind targets—show up at work.
- Create belonging. Not as manipulation. As a real commitment.
And here’s what to throw directly into the HR furnace:
- Making yourself the emotional center of everyone’s day
- Performing care without practicing responsibility
- Mistaking attention for leadership
- Confusing closeness with trust
- Ignoring boundaries because “it’s funn.”y”
The goal is not “be Michael.” The goal is: be the kind of leader Michael accidentally proves is necessary.
The Real Answer to Feared vs Loved
So, feared or loved?
If you want the grown-up answer, here it is:
A great leader is respected—not because they scare people, and not because they chase affection, but because they create an environment where people can do honest work without shrinking.
People don’t need a leader who is feared. Fear creates obedience and silence.
People don’t need a leader who is loved. Love—especially forced love—turns into performance.
People need a leader who is safe.
Safe enough to speak.
Safe enough to try.
Safe enough to fail and recover.
Safe enough to be a person.
Michael Scott doesn’t always create safety. Sometime,s he sets the building on fire emotionally, then tries to fix it with a jok.e.
But underneath the chaos, he’s reaching for something essential: connection. Recognition. Belonging. Meaning.
And that’s why, years after the show ended, when we talk about leadership—real leadership, the kind that sticks—we keep dragging Michael Scott back into the conversation like a confused king who wandered into the meeting holding a “World’s Best Boss” mug.
Because deep down, we’re still trying to answer the same question he blurted out in a single ridiculous sentence:
How do I lead people without forgetting they’re people?
If you want more character breakdowns with real-world bite, share this with an Office fan, a future leader, your bin man, or your cat. I’ll take whatever views I can get.
This was part two in the Unlikely Role Model series. If you’re into Rick and Morty, go hit episode one.
But for now…
It’s time to get Schwifty.
— Titan007
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