You’ve made it. You’ve just hired employee number 30 in your mega, super, fantastical design agency, and things are definitely looking up. You just landed another six figure client, your spouse is happy you’ve stopped 
leaving your toenail clippings under their pillow, and the new rims on your Escalade look so shiny today you’re about to make love to them. You’re on top. Everything is going your way. Everything… except the fifteen employees about to quit in the next two months and take as many office supplies a Dodge Stratus can carry. That’s right – if you’re in charge chances are – you suck at being the boss, and you need a swift kick right in the sweet-meat.
How many places have you worked for (or will work for) that are sternly helmed by someone who does their job exceedingly well, but have just as much trouble spelling the word “morale” as they do trying to stuff a corpse into a toilet? They hold the title of President, the CEO, the CFO, the CTO, the Founder, the Creator, the Director, the Lubemeister, the Nipplemantra, or the Rumpshaker. Whatever’s written on their business card – they’re in charge. When it’s all said and done – the buck stops with them.
They have company-wide meetings telling you to “think like an owner”, or have ra-ra speeches telling you about all the new clients that just came on board to fill their personal pocket book with sweet glorious cash that you’ll never see. What do you care? You’re too busy getting 1.27% raises and planning evidence-less ways for a seatbelt to cause irreversible larynx damage. These are the “not-bosses”. These are the people who founded and created the company, brought it to what it currently is, and can keep the greenbacks pouring in. What they fail miserably at however is actually running a company with living breathing people in it.
I’ve worked for my fair share of these companies and I’ve heard countless horror stories from pour souls trapped twixt the nether regions of even more. It’s these people who get on top and are so successful they forget exactly what it was like to work for someone else, and what it was like to have a boss of their own. They had their first employee in ten years up and quit, so they bought a couple of management books to solve the problem, failing to realize books are for reading and not for throwing at ex-employees or rolling some ace doobage.
What theses “not-bosses” fail to realize is that some folk just aren’t qualified to manage people. You don’t want to hear “Everyone hates you. You are a terrible boss. I only pretended to like your sugar cookies. They tasted like boogers. Please hire someone who, oh I don’t know, went to school for this type of thing.” Fear not – I’m here to help, and I’ve got vast pretend experience in these matters. Hey – I’m not the head Nipplemantra around here for nothin’.
1.) Don’t hire your buddies for middle-management.
Your buddies may be good at quarter-shots, converting an apple into a bong, and hitting on minors – but good management material they rarely make. Try to avoid promoting from within the company unless you absolutely feel the person is qualified or can at least bench press an even 220. Being bumped up to management just because you’ve been there long enough is something that has perplexed me for eons, and it’s not just the blow talking.
It makes sense on the surface, but you run some serious risks of making things worse with unqualified leaders, or disgruntled mutiny. If you must promote from within – have actual interviews for the job just like you would for any other, and try having a few question and answer sessions with the employees that will be accepting this new leader. This will help prevent more unnecessary deaths in the break room.
2.) Accept that you are terrible managing people.
After watching half of your company turn over inside of six months, don’t waste your time uttering brilliant quips like “everyone is replaceable” or “try and be more efficient”. This is your fault. You’ll sound like a moron, everyone will know it, and the air will mysteriously disappear from your tires. Don’t look for blame and scream at the employee least likely to scream back or quit. Throw away your management books, stop getting angry at the problem and hire someone who has a specialized skill set for managing people.
Look to the outside world and line up some interviews with people with a track record making employees happy. Give them the power to make the changes necessary to raise morale. Find out where the best places in town are to work for, and hire their management away like a vampire… who… who hires people. I got lost on that one. Don’t worry, nobody is taking your ship away – someone else is just going to feed the slaves from now on.
3.) If you crave loyalty, reward loyalty.
If you want to prevent people from burning you in effigy outside your house every evening, open up the company coffers and pay your employees you tight old bastard. Is money really and truly tight around the old company lately? Providing everyone the type of work environment where they actually enjoy coming to work is a start. Don’t follow what everyone else is doing. Give more vacation, make the sodas free, let people go home early if they don’t have anything to do. Try having a lounge room in the company and don’t glare at people in it when you walk by. Oh – and don’t try to design this lounge room yourself.
I’ve always thought that it would be good policy to let people come and go as they please – but be very, very strict if it becomes a problem. Let Joe Worker go home at noon everyday as long as he gets his work done and doesn’t miss meetings. Did Joe not get his work done? Easy – Joe’s fired.
4.) You may need to loosen the oil pan bolts.
Rotate the engine with your ratchet and socket until you can see that the timing marks providing on the gears are aligned perpendicularly. Carefully remove the camshaft bolts and pull forward on the cam sprocket and timing chain to remove the cam sprocket as well as the chain. Grab a three-jaw gear puller and remove the camshaft sprocket slowly. You can slide the new crankshaft in making sure the dot marks on the gear are facing outward. You may have to tap the crankshaft sprocket with a block of wood or thick wrench, but never hammer on it.
The new timing chain can be installed now, along with the camshaft sprocket. Reinstall the camshaft sprocket bolts using a thread-locking compound when doing so. Turn over the cover and tap the new crankshaft seal into the timing cover.
5.) If you aren’t a designer, don’t make design decisions.
If you don’t have a design background, try listening to your designers for once. You’re the boss and you likely have a better feel for what a client wants to see more than anyone – but if the last design work you did was on a bar napkin in borrowed lipstick, leave the design work to your design team. Don’t think you know what’s best because you don’t you communist bastard. If you have a change or suggestion – great, make it open for discussion and get other design staff opinions on it, but never make a change in stone or your designers will eventually start smashing rodent feces between the keys on your keyboard. Also your coffee will gradually start to taste “coppery”.
It’s hard not to take this opportunity to rant and rave about my previous employers – but truth be told if I hadn’t worked where I’ve worked – then I wouldn’t be where I am today… therapy. Haha that was a joke – get it? Therapy? I was saying that if I didn’t… no – that’s not – no I said if I hadn’t worked where… Forget it. No – you aren’t getting it. Stop asking me. You’re getting loud. Honey – people are looking.
At the end of the day if you’ve got a boss that can manage people well, or if you have a CEO who’s made the decision to hire someone to manage personnel and they do their job well – on the way out of the office today kiss them full on the lips or at least give them a friendly grope. If you don’t have a boss who knows their ass from a Snickers bar, I feel for you. All you can do is open up some dialog within the company walls, start small – and bring up your concerns with co-workers and anyone else who’s “cool” or willing to talk about it. Bitching all day with other employees helps let the steam off, but gets you nowhere.
Now, on the way out today I expect a grope or two.
Yeah… right there.