simplerich

Once upon a time I was the manager of a handful of stores in Central Iowa and then I moved away and was manager of a handful of stores somewhere else. I still saw the people that used to work for me but they had a new boss now and our styles differed. The way we did things wasn’t the same, and while our broad goals were the same, specifically our foci were quite different.

There were lots of conversations along the lines of:

Me: “Hey! How’s it going?”
Mongo: “Can I ask your opinion on something?”
Me: “Yep.”
Mongo: “Do you like how I displayed the widgets?”
Me: “So, how’s your day?”
Mongo: “You didn’t answer me.”
Me: “Nope, won’t answer you.”

Another favorite conversation went along the lines of:

Me: “Good Morning! UPS come yet?”
Mongo: “Not yet. I thought we weren’t supposed to count the bandersnatches any more.”
Me: “What time did you think UPS was coming today? Any ideas?”
Mongo: “No, seriously. You said we didn’t have to count them and now…”
Me: “Tell you what. I’ll go pick up the parking lot or weed the gutters and you call me if UPS shows up.”
Mongo: “You’re not going to answer me are you?”
Me: “Nope, won’t do it.”

In every case the new manager was doing something in a way I didn’t do and wouldn’t have done and hadn’t done. The employees were interpreting them as “wrong” and wanted me to take their side against their boss. Never ever going to happen. It won’t happen because it can’t happen if I’m to remain a decent person. If I were to undermine their current boss I’d be asking for trouble. I’d be setting them up for failure as well. I’m no longer their boss and if their new boss tells them to do something then it’s not the wrong thing to do, so long as it’s ethical and legal and within their job description obviously. So for me to tell them to NOT do something would not help them at all. It wouldn’t serve them well as a friend, an ex-boss, or as a co-worker. The only thing it would do would be sabotage them. I didn’t want to do that.

Now, that being said, if it were the case that the new boss was doing something that was profoundly crazy or out of line or wasteful I might mention to new boss how I’m doing it now and maybe they might want to try it that way, and if they ignore me… I’ve been known to mention it to their boss in a “Did you know that Mongo is still doing X” or whatever. If our mutual boss doesn’t mind then I don’t mind. If they knew and don’t care then that’s OK too. But I very very rarely did that. I would hope that other managers would respect how I did things and keep their hands out of my work so I strive to do the same.

This was brought up recently and the store manager who kept asking me to take sides against their new boss wouldn’t let it go… wouldn’t leave it alone. Finally the store manager got mad at me for not siding against their current boss and then their employee told them, my skip, to lay off. The sales associate got it… the sales associate understood that I couldn’t take a side; that different style didn’t mean wrong. The sales associate had worked with me for a long time and I was very proud of them then. That they got it… that they understood not only the situation as I was trying to explain it, but that it would be wrong for me to take a side.

So, when you go back… and the old crew wants you to gang up on the new boss… don’t. And if they DON’T ask you to gang up on the new boss… maybe you’re the crazy one.

In case you’ve forgotten, my birthday is coming up in October and you’ll want plenty of time to get your shopping done. My amazon.com wishlist can be a lot of help so you don’t stress to hard on what to get me.

I was at someone’s house recently and it was time to eat and their son was playing a video game like Mario or something… it was a game with a save point. You couldn’t just save it wherever you were and if you turned it off you lost all your work since the last save point. I’m not a fan of those games and honestly wish they would make an emergency shut off function. The Mom, hereafter referred to as The Evil One, said it was time to eat, and within a minute walked up and turned off the console. The kid was really upset. I didn’t blame him. I reacted as if it’d been me that was kicked in the stomach. That was a massive loss of work and time on his part. The Evil One… she didn’t get it at all. I didn’t argue with her in front of her son. I’m not that stupid. But I did bring it up later. Her response was that it was just a game and he could do it again.

The part where he was doing everything he could to get to the save point, going backwards to save his progress was lost on her. The part where the game was something he cared about and put a lot of time, effort, and practice into didn’t matter because it was “just a game.” I got it though. I understood why he was upset and sullen through the meal. I kind of was too.

It’s just a job. She’s just a clerk. What she does doesn’t matter. If her boss gives her a project to do but doesn’t follow up on it, recognize her good work, and show areas where she could improve or maybe do it differently that would either make her job easier, faster, or more efficient she’s going to notice. She’s going to feel like her job doesn’t matter… like she doesn’t matter. All of that she agreed with, and when I put it in that context she understood that respecting a person’s time, effort, and work was important. She didn’t play video games, but recognized that it took skill, time, practice, and work to achieve anything.

The whole thing brought the idea of respect to me. Not respect for people over us or who have control over us. That can be fear as much as respect and it’s often something that people KNOW they are supposed to do. Respect for people who work for us, and over whom we have some power is vitally important for managers. I’m reminded of the USA Today article CEOs say how you treat a waiter can predict a lot about character. It’s one of my favorites. I have it saved as a file on my desktop to read once in a while. But it’s more than that.

My goto book for things when I’m formulating a post is often Managing with Aloha by Rosa Say. I read her take on it first and sometimes it kills a post because she’s already said it so well I’d just mess it up, or I find that I’m about to write a post that is almost just like something she has said so I don’t rather than appear to be plagiarizing her. To avoid that happening this time I didn’t refer to her book. I really wanted to make this post. What I did find on her website though, about respect, is a great list of things employees want from their employers, and I would argue it’s things that anybody would want from anybody else, and the core of the things is respect for them as a person, an employee, and for them and their work and time. Here’s the post on Rosa’s site. It’s certainly worth a read.

The Mom in the story above, I won’t really refer to her as The Evil One, did recognize that she could have asked him to switch off the TV, or get to a safe spot and turn off the sound and join us. She did recognize that she’d shown him disrespect, and that wasn’t a lesson she wanted to teach her six year old. She didn’t want him to feel like what he did didn’t matter. She didn’t like it as an employee, wife, or daughter, and didn’t even realize she was doing it to her son. She apologized to him and they hugged and it was very cool.

Pokemon Platinum does allow me to save it at any point, which is nice. I play it whenever I get a minute. No save spots for me!