Managers Good and Bad

          During my 30-plus years in the world of business and industry I reported to over a dozen managers and observed many others.  Some were good, some were poor, some were just plain awful.  I learned from all of them.

          Among the good ones was one executive who gave me valuable advice on how to improve my writing skills.  Another challenged me to solve problems creatively (“thinking outside the box” in today’s vernacular).  Yet another deliberately assigned me work I was not qualified to do, so that I would experience what it means to “sink or swim.”  I never forgot these lessons.
          The bad ones included a consummate salesman who, as the saying goes, could sell snowballs to Eskimos.  He had risen through the ranks on the strength of his personality, but he had no expertise beyond his ability to shake hands and make speeches.  He hired an MBA to “do the numbers” for him so that he would look good.  When it became clear that he was nothing more than a smiling impostor, he was fired.  Ironically, the MBA was promoted in his place, but immediately proved that an ability to manipulate numbers is not much help when you have the people skills of a clam.
          Another manager was brought in to inject new life into a moribund division.  I really liked this guy.  But he never quite understood that a mandate is not a free hand to  change the nature of the business.  When he made up his own rules, spent huge sums without authorization, and exposed the company to potentially ruinous liability, he was sent on his way. 
          And then there was one guy who was worse than all the mediocrities and abject failures I ever knew put together.  No words can adequately describe this miserable human being:  arrogant, brutish, mean-spirited, abusive, these are just a few that come to mind.   Everyone who worked for him despised him.  A narcissist of the first rank, he spent lavishly on himself and demanded that his vendors pay tribute.  But that’s not what did him in.  Personality aside, he proved to be unethical, dishonest, without any scruples whatsoever in his business dealings.  When top management found out he had refused to honor a contract, he was fired on the spot.
          I’m retired now, so I don’t have to deal with losers like these anymore.  But wait!  Don’t they remind us of some of our leaders in Washington?  If only we could fire them on the spot, too, for overspending taxpayer money, for masking incompetence with smiles and oratory, for refusing to enforce the laws of the land, for abusing political opponents, for shameless mendacity, for trying to fundamentally change this country into something our Founders never intended.
          One of the worst aspects of our federal government is our inability to get rid of the crooks, the incompetent, and the corrupt.  Look at the IRS and the VA.  As for our elected officials, we only have ourselves to blame for voting them in.