Avoiding confrontations with an idiot boss

Very interesting (Found this article on the ET website who I think took it from BusinessWeek)... -

Dear Liz,

I've been at my job in IT project management for four years and am doing pretty well there, both results-wise and quality-of-work-life-wise. I like everything about my job except the new manager who took over our group in February. We can call him Dan. He is the stereotypical blowhard, autocratic manager who has all the answers—when in fact he knows nothing. And frankly he's pretty hard to take.

Dan is such a poor manager, and says such outrageous, obnoxious things to the staff on a regular basis, that we half expect Ashton Kutcher to jump out from behind the drapes with a video camera every time Dan holds a staff meeting. He's way over his head in the job, rude to his employees, and arrogant to boot. For some reason, although Dan bothers the heck out of me, I'm pretty good at letting his crazy interjections and self-aggrandizing remarks brush past me. My colleague and friend, Amy, is not as mellow about the situation and often confronts Dan directly. I completely see where she is coming from, but I don't see the benefit of going toe-to-toe with the boss, either. Amy feels like I'm not supporting her because I button my lip whenever she and Dan get into an argument. I tell her: "You can't fight City Hall." And anyway, Dan is so bad at his job that the generally competent leaders in our company are bound to move him out of the role one of these days.

I see the tension level rising rapidly enough that I could see Amy getting written up for insubordination or even getting fired, and although I'm very sympathetic, I don't think it's appropriate for me to go to bat for her. I told her I was going to write to you, and both of us are interested in your reply. What's the best way to deal with a situation like this, for Amy and for me?

Thanks,
Nicolas

Dear Nicolas,

It sounds as though you've been blessed with a more temperate nature than Amy has, and having worked for a Dan or two myself, I can see both sides of the issue. I can see all three sides, in fact. From Dan's standpoint, Amy is disrespectful and a threat to his authority. Sadly, but predictably, he doesn't see his own shortcomings. He can't be expected to wake up one morning, magically see himself through someone else's eyes, realize the error of his managerial ways, and overhaul his leadership style on the spot. That isn't going to happen. Your task is to decide how to manage through this tough situation until Dan is out of the picture or until you yourself fly the coop. Amy's task is to quickly figure out how to get a bit of Zen perspective on the bad-boss situation that will allow her to be more sanguine and more productive until things improve.

Your situation is not urgent, but hers is. If she doesn't change her outlook soon and dramatically, she's likely to get fired. As sympathetic as I'd be if I heard that Amy had been "separated from the payroll" for being lippy to her manager, I wouldn't be surprised. Most of us can only take so much, and this Dan of yours doesn't sound like the Gandhi of IT managers.

One way to avoid confrontations with a Dan-type boss is to think: "What's in my long-term best interest?" It is frustrating to work among idiots and jerks—sorry, I meant to say "less than fully qualified and less than humble colleagues"—but it's part of life, and it serves all of us to learn some coping skills to use in those situations. Can Amy learn to hear Dan spout off, think to herself "La, la, there goes Dan again," count to 10, and say nothing? If she stops to think "If I handle this situation well, Dan will hang himself, and I'll have a new, more suitable manager in a month or two," she may be able to learn the art of smiling a Cheshire Cat smile and keeping mum. In fact, she may become very good at it. I hope she can. It would be very silly to get fired by a guy who sounds as if he's an inch away from being removed from the job himself.

A good friend of mine had a hateful boss once, and she fought him tooth and nail. A weekly staff meeting didn't go by that didn't feature the two of them arguing like cats and dogs. "Megan," I said, "he is the boss. This is going to end badly." Megan kept tilting at windmills. One day, Megan was fired. The next day, her awful boss himself was fired. And guess what? No one called Megan to offer her the job back. The boss was a loser, no doubt, but the company's view was that putting up with losers can sometimes be part of the job description. Megan sacrificed a great job over a temporary, frustrating managerial conflict. I encourage Amy to take the long view and find a way to reduce the conflict level, for her own sake as well as the department's.

Most companies are reasonably good at rooting out atrocious managers, but they are notoriously slow about it, too. In my experience I've seen employers take 6, 9, or 12 months to move out people who were clearly out of their depth in leadership jobs. That's because they tend to cross every "t" and dot every "i" when they endeavor to remove a manager from his position. I hope Amy can see that unless headhunters are calling her with offers left and right, she's better off brewing some green tea and chilling while Dan digs his own professional grave. He doesn't need her help.

As for you, I'd say your policy so far is absolutely the right one. You can be a sympathetic ear to Amy, and you can reinforce her efforts to stop letting Dan push her buttons. If she makes a plan to stop her cage matches with Dan, you can help her keep that commitment. For starters, I'd show her this story. My message to Amy: "Dear Amy, do not trifle with the Dans of the world! You are too smart and too capable to waste your time, your mental and emotional energy, and your breath on the likes of him."

Cheers,
Liz

What made Gandhi tick?

Watched Gandhi the nth time this 2nd Oct. While I have always been very impressed by him - one question which no Gandhian has been able to answer for me is how Gandhianism can help us deal with terrorism - the 26/11, the Kashmir issue, 9/11 etc etc. I guess why Gandhi was so successful was because he was dealing with one of the most civilized society - of course Jalianwala Bagh not withstanding - and thats why his strategy to showcase pain and suffering helped him generate a lot of sympathy in the enemy camp - not something which I think can help under the current circumstances. Anyways, the relevance of Gandhianism in today's world is an ever-raging debate more apt for news channels with screaming anchors and commoditised "Breaking News".

The fact that Gandhi was able to maintain his dignity and self-respect in face of severe adversity and abuse is the reason I think made him tick and makes me wanna give him a standing ovation everytime I watch Gandhi. The importance of "grace under pressure" is something which I am learning to appreciate with each passing day. While it is very easy to lower your standards when it comes to dealing with the idiots your come across in your daily life - it really does take a lot of effort if you want to stick to your principles and stand by your values - and Gandhi was able to do just that which to my mind is a much bigger achievement than the whole independence thing.

Living 59 hours per week

When I was boarding my flight at Hyd airport, I did a quick math to see how many hours I have this weekend to be at home. Given that I am taking a 9 pm flight on friday and flying back again at 8 am on monday - I get exactly 59 hours to do as Amrish Puri said in DDLJ - "Jaa jeleay apni zindagi!". Its 10.30 pm now, I am still hovering over Mumbai and looks like it would another 30 mins before I land - damn that's already one additional hour lost!

Its funny how priorities change in life so rapidly - there was a time when I was struggling in a KPO job and would have given everything to get a consulting gig - now I would give anything to get an assignment in the same city where I live - life has come full circle - well almost as it is yet to do complete 360 degree - which I hope it would be on an upward spiral!!

So how does my weekend look like? Well nothing great - I have a full day meeting tomorrow (ie saturday) which I think I would survive since my wife would also be working and then sunday would be spent looking for the right kind of furniture for our new place.

The toll that this job is taking on my life and health is not funny - I have not done any physical activity for last one year - and for last few weeks been suffering from acute shoulder and neck pains which my doctor tells me is an early stage of cervical spondylitis. Thankfully, I have an understanding wife and so she has not yet threatened any legal action - but can happen anytime!!And before that happens I need to do something ..soon...so keep watching this space for updates...

Manmohan Govt. - Oldies suffering from extreme myophia???

The Manmohan govt seems to be on a major blunder spree - major because anyways UPA Govt seemed to have made minor blunders a way of living (for eg a cabinet minister threatening the Madras HC judge). Two major blunder I am talking about are - the Union Budget and the Govt's joint declaration with Pakistan on the sidelines of NAM summit.

While the Union budget has totally ignored our fiscal deficit and gone on a renewed spending spree with some very precarious assumptions on Govt.'s income in a recessionary economy, the declaration with Pakistan would ensure that Pakistan would keep kicking our ass while our Govt would be bending over their backs to kiss Pakistani and American butts.

What the budget does is that it puts us in a very similar situation as in 1991 as far as fiscal situation is concerned. And Govt. not allowed to monetize anymore (or is it that they can but won't?? - not that monetization would our our problems), the Govt. borrowing is going to be a big recovery killer. It looks as if Govt is a big mood to splurge and very clearly they don't want to think about the long term implications - in particular, the pressure on Rupee and trade especially since trade is already at abysmally low levels.

Similarly the joint declaration with Pakistan means that we need to be prepared for more terrorists attacks and still keep talking to Pakistan to resolve the outstanding issues - I just hope in accepting the US diktat on this we have been able to get at least some concessions on some areas and are prepared to beef up our internal security. This situation is like a migraine now - you know that a one time high precision brain surgery would solve this problem for ever but you have settled for waking up with a splitting headache every morning, pop few aspirins and go on with life! I guess the terrorist threat does not really mean anything to our Govt since all of them have those Zplus covers!

So why is Govt on this Blunder spree - to my mind the explanation is very simple - if you look at the average age of the cabinet - it would be easily over 70, now most of these buddas know that they may retire by next elections, some may even not survive and so this is easily their last stint in public life. And what do you do near retirement? Try and make your last few years peaceful and thats the reason why this Govt is taking a simple, spineless approach on all tough issues. My biggest fear is that while these Buddas would happily rest in peace by 2015 - we would be left with a nation which would be grappling with some every serious economic, international and internal order issues - something worth pondering over especially since our dear Nehru Chacha has already given us a permanent headache in the form of Kashmir!

Back after a long haitus

As I write this post, there is a sense of deja vu - perhaps I have written this before - that why I was missing in action - not that there was a lot of actions any which ways to start with. So I thought I would try and list few reasons as to why I this blog has had so many failed starts -

1. Firstly, writing perhaps doesnot come naturally to me - I was inspired to take up blogging after reading few of my friends' blogs - so it always always take me time to get myself started and therefore, so few posts
   
2. I view this blog as an opportunity to share my stories and my views and in the process enrich myself - often such a thing can go hay wire (I know from experience!!) - so I try and be more careful and therefore, fewer posts
   
3. I need something to really charge me before my creativity gets going - I just cannot air my opinion if I do not feel strongly about something or I do not have enough data to put forth an argument - another reason why I am not so regular (and why some of the posts now read so silly in the hindsight!)
   
4. I lack discpline and if there is a problem brewing or a task in hand - I just cannot divert my energies and get the creative juices flowing. Therefore, since there has been a lot happening in my life lately - marriage, moving bases (from Delhi to Mumbai), forced to work for an abusive, ill-informed and arrogant boss (yes my boss trouble continue- more on him later - the guy is a very lethal combination), ran into client trouble (I realized that my ability to kiss asses sucks - an essential prerogative if you are a small firm and want repeat business from a client!) - therefore, there has been no activity on this blog!

Now that I am done giving excuses (funny thing is - I am writing as if there is a huge fan base out there clamouring for a fresh piece of writing !), I think I must accept that this blog would remain the way it is - long periods of lull peppered with some spurts of curious musings. The good thing is that I know where I stand and can only hope to improve from here.There are a lot of things I want to write about - some of those I have mentioned above- there are many more on my mind - lets hope I get atleast few of them on digital paper!

Indian Premier League to be played in England

Just saw on the news that Indian Premier League (IPL) would be staged in England as GoI will not be able to provide security due to elections. Few quick thoughts -

1.If the govt falls in a year and we go for mid-term polls, would we cancel the commonwealth or the 2011 world cup too?

2. A bunch of gun-toting youths have been able to achieve what perhaps even the Pakistan army has not been able to do for the last 60 years - get our nation to bend on its knee and acknowledge defeat - as an Indian I am ashamed and yet again we have undone the valor of our brave soldiers who died in Mumbai - in a matter of just few months (last time it was Kargil followed by IC 814 hijacking)

3. We have given the LeTs of the world more ammunition by not holding this tournament - going forward all our big events would come under severe threat now that the terrorist know that we can buckle so easily under pressure!!

What's next?...Probably a nuclear terrorist attack!!

No...I am not into crystal gazing...but from the time I can remember India has been an easy target for terrorist groups. I still remember right from mid 80s how Khalisthani groups lined up hindus at stations and on roads and gunned them down, how Delhi was known for "radio bombs", how kashmir (which is much more closer to my heart than probably Delhi) became the hottest spot in the world, how mumbai saw 13 blasts and went back to work next day,how Kargil saw ~500 of our soldiers laying down their lives to fight intruders on Indian soil, how IC 814 hijackers forced us to release terrorist who is now breeding more hatred for India, how couple of gunmen went around firing bullets in our parliament, how terrorists opened fire on vaishno devi pilgrims about a week after I came back from there, how all our cities have seen at least some blood thanks to occasional bombings including all the big ones which happened this year (so much so that bombings have become a part of our lives)- so we had mumbai 26/11 coming for a very long time. Why? Because when you ignore a disease or appease a threat it usually ends up becoming a cancer or a Hitler - something which causes massive destruction. Everytime we get angry and seethe for some time and of course, as news channels become more savvy they fan more anger but sooner or later we just go back till the next such event happens - it would be good to see how long this bout of anger lasts. Is the government gonna do anything - well they better this time not because of the widespread anger but because if they don't do anything this time - you might see world's first terrorist nuclear attack somewhere in India - and from what I have seen over last 25 years - pakistan is capable of doing it - anyone who thinks otherwise deserves another 26/11!!