KEYNOTES

Bad Boss Stories

Some years ago I worked in a small packaging business where the owner was a bully. He took great delight in intimidating staff, shouting over anyone else who spoke, verbally abusing those who were easily frightened and constantly holding the threat of dismissal over the heads of everyone.

After I left, I heard that he had crossed the line into physical abuse one day, when he walked across the loading dock specifically so he could step on the fingers of a young man who had only been working there a short time and was leaning on the platform of the loading dock.

Here is another example, in one senior team we worked with, the MD had developed a negative view of his sales director, regarding him as lacking in "big-picture understanding". Every time the sales director tried to raise urgent issues, it was seen as further proof of his short-term view. In fact, our discussions with other members of the team confirmed that there were real performance issues in need of pressing attention. This created divided loyalties, since team members liked the general manager but also believed that the sales director had a point.

Unfortunately, the HR director's allegiance and closeness to the MD also blinded him to the sales director's contribution. Instead of questioning the boss's unfavourable label, he endorsed it. Thus, the HR director failed the top team on two counts: first, by not challenging the boss on his assessments; and second, by blaming the ineffective group dynamics on the sales director, and missing all the deeper causes. The resulting malaise within the team was distracting, energy- sapping, and contributed to delays in problem-solving.

I’d been engaged to provide executive coaching services to the senior management team. During the individual sessions, the executives brought up difficulties they were having on a range of areas including, for some, dealing with pressures from the CEO.

Often people, even at this level have limited depth of communication skills for the situations they encounter. So when individual instances arose, I helped them to look at alternative responses in order to get the best out of situations involving pressure from others – including the CEO.

One instance was relayed to me about an email sent by the CEO to two of the senior managers which I felt should to be dealt with differently. I knew I was seeing the busy CEO within the week. During the meeting I asked him if I could give him some feedback. He was a little tentative – most CEO’s don’t expect this sort of conversation, so his reaction was understandable, but, of course he agreed.
“Can I make a suggestion ? Can you take the word ‘brain-dead’ out of your emails ?”
His immediate response was to say “When did I say that ?”
I asked him if there was a chance he’s said it recently and after a pause he became defensive.
“Well, they made the wrong decision…”
And he continued to tell me what he thought of what they’d done.
I told him it wasn’t about the decision and I wasn’t interested in the details. I asked him how he would feel if someone had used that description to him. I said if he really cared about his people would he describe them that way ?
He said “But it’s not about the people.”
But it is. And he realised that as soon as he said it.
Some people might use that word - or other similar words - as a joke. As a joke it’s hardly ever appropriate but when there is an emotional charge behind it, it is highly insulting. It is the dialogue of a bully. It is disempowering and dishonouring of the individual.

His senior managers reported to me over the next few weeks there was a significant change in the style of his communication to them. He is now aware of the effect of the words he uses but, like many of us, he needs reminders as the behaviours we have developed over many years need time – and guidance – to change. Careless and reckless use of words has an impact beyond what we mean. Bad bosses are really good at this. Good bosses work at using less emotional words and avoid words that personally attack.

Contributed by -Graham Moore An Australian Speaker located in Melbourne Australia

A leading trade union is threatening to name and shame employers who fail to tackle bullying at work. Amicus said it received hundreds of complaints every year from members who claimed they had suffered bullying in the workplace, and would start naming firms it felt were not adequately dealing with the problem from 2005. It is estimated that almost 19 million working days are lost every year in the UK as a result of workplace bullying.

Mandy Telford, anti-bullying campaign co-ordinator at Amicus, said: “We know that in the worst cases victims suffer from similar trauma to soldiers after combat. The resulting economic damage to the UK in terms of sick days and lack of productivity is increasingly serious. We held back from naming firms overlooking their duty of care to their employees in 2004, but next year we will take no prisoners.”

Amicus set up a special hotline over the summer for staff at Gatwick and Heathrow airports to contact with complaints. It revealed a “horrendous culture” of bullying, including at least five airlines, it said. Amicus is already involved in a government-sponsored campaign to investigate the causes of bullying in the workplace. The union also hopes to have bullying made illegal and wants companies to sign an anti-bullying charter.

(Source: BBC News 28.12.04)

Whilst working on a project for a large multi national company I witnessed one of the worst examples of poor communication I think I’ve ever seen. The company published a monthly newsletter via an outside communications business. HR had submitted a story on an employee who spent hundreds if not thousands of hours working as a volunteer in the Coast Guard. They did a big splash including a photo, about his wonderful contribution to the community and how he was a model citizen and loyal employee. On the day they published this particular edition he was made redundant after 20 years service. Now there’s timing for you.

A colleague of mine was engaged by the CEO to help the company deal with some management issues. The consultant was meeting with the Financial Controller and the CEO joined the meeting. The Financial Controller asked the Consultant "So, how long will you be here?" Before the Consultant could reply, the CEO jumped in: " Well, you don't need to worry about that, you don't know how long you'll be here." This is a true story, how discouraging to the Financial Controller, then again he may have meant it to be discouraging.