12/2/2012–“What matters for us is management”–direct report in a one-on-one (O3).
I hear that idea once in a while and it becomes clearer each day. A book I just started “First break all the rules” makes the same claim and it’s backed up by a 25-year study. The reason I’ve come to believe it is that every O3 I ask what they like about our place and so far everyone has mentioned the management team as a main reason. They go on to explain how their past managers had been jerks. I rarely hear about incompetent or lazy or ineffective bosses. This tells me 2 things: 1) employees do notice jerk behaviors above all others, because there are–must be–some lazy/incompetent managers out there. If they’re jerks too, that’s what employees dislike most about them. 2) I also learned that the saying “people don’t leave jobs as often as they leave bosses” is true. I hope my career will be an example of the converse being true. Not only is the jerk an unpopular manager, but the jerk coworker is just as loathed, as Kelley put it in her O3.
QOTW: “I’d rather work with a poor performer than a jerk.” –Kelley
?FNW: What does my “float manager” title mean? –Something in-between help where it’s needed, management consultant, and analyst for the region.
11/11/2017–Yes, people leave bad bosses not bad jobs. Still trying to prove the converse, that they stay for good bosses not good jobs. It could be the case that liking a boss is necessary but mostly insufficient to staying. Also true, in my experience since writing this, is that we can stand poor performers with good attitudes much longer than anyone with a bad attitude. By the way, “attitude” is just a collection of observed behaviors (smiling, body language, specific words) which are what the effective manager names and manages, not attitude.