| Business Management |
Happy Boss |
|
||
|
|
The Boss has a right to be happy, too! Simultaneously his wife smiled and said, "Yes, it's very satisfying" and the owner scowled and said, "Bull!" It's unimportant to know whether the husband was temporarily in a bad mood or whether his response truly indicates how he feels about being a florist. The point is, two persons involved in the same work on the same day reacted oppositely to the same mental stimulus. A consultant-friend of mine is one of those persons who make an effort to be obviously kind to taxi drivers, waitresses, washroom attendants, hotel maids. From my point of view he is so effusive that it strikes me as phony. My friend disagrees with me about that, but he does agree that both his effusiveness and my more restrained courtesy encounter the same range of reactions from such workers. First, a minority responds in kind, obviously pleased at being treated as a person, not just as a function. Second, The majority responds indifferently, neutrally, showing neither pleasure nor any recognition that there can exist a person-to-person relationship in the brief functional encounters characteristic of most service situations. Third, another minority reacts antagonistically to what it perceives as condescension on the part of those of us who are trying to be polite. The message for business owners and managers is clear: Don't expect any leadership concept or human relations style to work every time with everybody. It may not be fashionable to admit it, but there are workers who react most productively to a Dale Carnegie approach and some who prefer authoritative leadership. So long as the owner or manager knows how to operate profitably, a business can succeed managed as a country club or as a concentration camp or as anything in between. Conversely, the nicest boss in the world can manage a business into failure. What happens is that financially successful owners or managers in time surround themselves with people who can work in the psychological environment they generate. That's why Versagi Consulting's leadership workshops, attended by both workers and bosses, are named "The boss has a right to be happy, too!" It is counterproductive -- and ulcer-producing -- to fake a democratic management style or to try to be tough if being tough goes against one's temperament. All leadership styles succeed and fail. There is no one right way to lead or to manage. Versagi Consulting . 248-542-7449
|
Select a 90-minute private tutoring session In business or family Problem-solving, Resolving Differences Control Growth, Manage by Exception, The Boss has a right to be happy, too! Use a 1-to-5 rating scale to evaluate options Personal & Organizational Development tools |