Category: Corporate Games

It is tempting during these challenging times
to lie to employees
and tell them
good times are right around the corner.

Don’t.
You will get called on it.

A loved one helps the sales team sell.
He knows he hasn’t been
on a sales call for a month.
He knows clients aren’t renewing contracts.
He knows current clients
are asking for price reductions.

Yet his boss stood
in front of him and his fellow consultants
and told them that
they’ve made it through the worst,
that good times were coming.

Bullshit.

Good times aren’t coming.
Even worse times are.
Only an idiot would not see those signs.

And now everyone is wondering
what OTHER things the manager is lying about.

You hired intelligent employees.
Respect that intelligence.

Bad news concerning your direct reports
comes from you.
It doesn’t matter if they’re
full time, part time,
contract, volunteers,
interns, aliens from space.
If they report to you,
they hear the bad news from you.
No excuses.

Yesterday, my contract got shortened by a week.
I expected it.
I accomplished what I needed to do
and it didn’t make sense for me to sit there
doing nothing.
If my manager hadn’t proposed it first,
I would have volunteered
(I have a book I want to write).

The thing is…
my manager didn’t propose it to ME.
She got a middle man
to deliver the news.
Then she avoided me for the entire day
until I walked up
and told her I was more than fine
with her decision.

With her decision.
Not the way she handled it.
I lost all respect for her
and I doubt I’ll work for her again.
Chicken shits always bail at critical times.
I’d rather not be around when they do.

Put on your big girl panties
and deliver the bad news yourself.

There is a refreshingly honest
interview with
Jacqueline Novogratz,
CEO of Acumen Fund.

In it,
she discusses parental leave…
“I have four brothers who all work on Wall Street,
and I remember when
one of my brothers’ wife had a child.
And I said,
“Well, is there, you know, paternity leave?”
And he said,
“Oh, yeah.
We have the most liberal paternity leave
on Wall Street—
but I would never take it,
because if I did,
everybody would think I was, you know, wimpy.”
And I think there’s great truth to that.”

I once sat in a board room
while execs discussed an opening.
A woman was considered
and then dismissed
for the position
because she was in her child bearing years
and recently got married.

The first step to solving a problem
is admitting there IS a problem.
If you’re female,
under 40 years old,
and wish to sit in the C-Suite,
address the child issue head on.

One of my buddies had her vacation request denied.
It was approved a month ago,
she managed her workload,
she already arranged coverage,
yet the manager pulled it
for no clear reason.
(other than a power play)

So the tickets already purchased,
her family is going
but
my buddy is staying back.
She’s bitterly unhappy,
sending out resumes,
and arranging interviews
(because she’s good
and talented people are always in demand,
recession or not).
Her unhappiness is spreading to the entire team.

Don’t mess with vacations.
If something comes up,
work with your employee on this ’emergency.’
Let her figure out an alternative
(a responsible employee will).
It could be working remotely
or shifting some vacation
or working 24-7 before and after
or she could even come to
the decision to cancel herself.

But don’t be the one to make that decision.
If you do, you’ll lose your good employees
(anyone able to find another job).

In these challenging economic times,
mentorship in some companies
is viewed as a nice-to-do
that doesn’t need to be done.

Mistake.

Steve Krupp of Delta Organization & Leadership says
“If you just focus on short-term survival
and you alienate your key leaders,
they may stick it out
but they won’t forget.
The best and the brightest can always find jobs;
that particular subset will always have a bull market.”

Keep mentorship of your future leaders
as a priority.

There are two types of managers.
There are managers who listen
and managers who don’t.

Managers who don’t listen
will likely never listen.
It doesn’t matter how loud you are
or how long you talk
or how clever or right you are.
They aren’t going to listen.

The best way to deal with
a manager who doesn’t listen
is to get all her crazy requests in writing
(good to do for all managers),
keep your misgivings to yourself
and do whatever she asks you to do.

Don’t worry.
You won’t have to pull these nutbar moves for long.
Managers who don’t listen
tend to make big, big mistakes.
She’ll then have to quickly move
from that position of authority
(because none of her staff will save her a$$)
and soon she’ll be someone else’s problem.

Of course, if you’re managing people
and you’ve never changed a decision
based on employee insight,
you’re one of these dreaded managers.
That means
your employees are,
right now,
patiently waiting for you to f**k up
and get your a$$ fired.
Yes, you have good reason to be paranoid.

Yesterday, a loved one gets an invite
from his company’s social committee.
They’re organizing a tour of a few different industries
including a sewage treatment plant.
The loved one emails me,
excited,
because he knows this is my type of event.
I get excited too.
Who wouldn’t want to learn about different industries?
Who wouldn’t want to meet
prospective clients this company could station consultants at?

Turns out…
management wouldn’t.
This was an April Fool’s joke.

Another company sets up one-on-one meetings
with managers and human resources reps.
All employees are in a panic.
Lay offs are coming.
Resumes go out.
Calls to headhunters are made.

Ha ha!
Fooled you.
April fools!

At worst, an April Fools prank results in a lawsuit.
At best, you’re seen as a liar.
Neither benefit a career.

Accuracy of shipments is key
in keeping freight costs down
and customers happy.

When a company is small,
that means manually checking
each shipment.

However,
Richard Estalella,
Senior Vice-President at Arbonne,
shares a quicker method.*

“Whereas previously each carton at Arbonne
had to be hand-checked for content accuracy
against the merchandise pick list,
the warehouse control system has allowed
specific weight tolerances
to be established
and scales on the conveyors
allow the company to know that if
the right products were selected
the weight will be correct.”

Can you also use weight
as a double check
on shipments?

*August 2008 CMA Management Magazine

I’ve been given an opportunity.
This opportunity was not and will not be
given to any of my other ‘coworkers.’

So I’m keeping my mouth shut about it
until I’ve taken full advantage of this favor.

Yes, I realize that news will spread
and there will be some push back on the favor granter
and some envy.
That is going to happen
whether I manage this opp openly or quietly.

But quietly allows me to work the opportunity
without any other distractions
and that precious extra time is greatly needed.

If trouble is coming
and it won’t grow in size with waiting
then delay it as long as possible.

One of my coworkers
asked to come in late on Monday.
Her work isn’t time sensitive
and she had no meetings.
Her new manager said no.
The start time is 9am
and she expects her to be there at 9am.

The thing is…
this salaried employee normally comes in at 8am.
She leaves at 6pm.
Now, she arrives at 9am and leaves at 5pm.
The manager lost 2 unpaid hours of work a day from her.

And because the 9am rule response
was shared in public
(the request was made in private),
the entire department has adjusted their hours too.

If you are inflexible with your employees,
they will be inflexible with you.