Bosses’ Responsibility
by Miki Saxon
Monday was about dealing with jerks in your workplace and yesterday about managing lazy co-workers.
What about bosses? Where are they? Why is it being left to workers to deal with problem co-workers?
Over the years (decades, actually), I’ve heard all the excuses — ‘I can’t be everywhere’, ‘I’m working on it’, or the ubiquitous ‘I’m busy’.
Those are the “good” excuses; here are the bad ones — ‘they’re really good at [whatever]’, ‘they’re a friend/relative of X’, ‘they’ve been here since the beginning’, and, in some ways, the worst ‘deal with it’.
Being self-motivated and self-managing should not include having to manage your colleagues.
That’s the boss’ job and why they make the bigger bucks.
I’ve never forgotten what Terry Dial, who eventually became vice chairman of Business Banking at Wells Fargo, told me decades ago when I was a recruiter, “People are 90% of our costs as well as the key to customer service and satisfaction. The only thing that should take priority over hiring a new employee is keeping a current one.”
That hasn’t changed in all these years.
Which begs the question, what are the bosses doing?
Avoiding direct interactions by hiding behind social media and chat apps, just as they hid behind email and, before that, memos.
Sometimes it’s because they are promoted in spite of not being a “people person,” which has nothing to do with whether they are extroverts or introverts.
Good bosses know that when someone is messing up, hurting or one of the other myriad causes of less than optimum behavior, it’s their responsibility.
Period.
No ifs, ands, buts, or excuses.
Image credit: Jordan Davis
