I will talk to the Boss / Boss Has Told Me…
“Boss has told me” or “I have spoken to the boss” are some of those phrases that are excessively used in the corporate world.
Who uses it: This is a group of people with below average IQ level. Predominantly, these people are immature, uninformed, less-knowledgeable, incompetent, and usually non-performers. They are big bullies. In a common language these people are also referred as sycophants.
Why they use it: They are attention seekers. Nothing is easier to get the attention of your colleagues than to demonstrate your pseudo closeness with your boss. They try to hide their incompetence and non-performance by demonstrating unwanted and overtly care towards their reporting managers and diverting his or her focus from the core performance issues. In an attempt to demonstrate their closeness to the key-person(s) in the organization, they try to create various power-centers in the organization by exuding the message, “come to me, I will get your work done”.
If we look into the behavioral psychology, these are the kind of people, when they were growing-up they used to bully their siblings at home by saying, “I will tell Mom” or “I will tell Father” and later in school they began to use the phrase, “I will tell the teacher”. Therefore, it is obvious that these people when they moved to workplace, they rephrased it to “I will tell the boss or boss has told me”.
Let’s discuss more about it with a few elaborations.
In an organizational setup, one gets an opportunity to see and interact with all kinds of people. Some are attention seekers and will do anything to be visible (sometimes even an irritating and ridiculous act); some are rebels (they always do what they are told not to do); some are hard working and some are hardly the working kind of people; some are calm and many are very vocal about everything that they see, hear and feel; some always share their problems with everyone that they meet in the office and the rest are the frontrunners in giving free advises; so on and so forth. And then there is this category of employees who do not miss any opportunity to flaunt their proximity with their bosses. Every time they start a discussion; it begins with one of the following:
“I will tell the boss”,
“Boss has told me”,
“I have spoken to the boss”
“I had discussion with the boss”
“Boss has asked me to get ______ from you”
In this write-up we will throw some light on “I have spoken to the boss” kind of people. I do not remember the exact date or time, however, I believe that I began to observe and notice this category of people in the workplace and their behavior in the second half of last decade.
First Incident: The first time I came across such scenario was during the time when Mr. Ashish N. was my reporting manager. Or I must say that I was reporting to multiple heads at work location and in corporate office. Mr. Ashish has had good rapport with many senior managers more than that of the Head of HR, primarily because of the fact that he was one of the long-serving HR professional in the organization. Every time we have any discussion on any subject, he always used to begin with, “I have discussed this with the HR Head” or “CEO Sir has asked me to get this done” or “Mr. VP Operations want you to do this”. Initially, I never countered or cross-checked and on many occasions, during our weekly meetings he reversed his stand and put the blame on the others. Later on I began to cross-check his every instruction with the concerned person or department head and I realized that on many occasions, there was a huge communication gap. His communication with that person would always be different from his communication with me. What the other person would like him to get it done and what he communicates to me would always be different. On observing his behavior more closely, I realized that he has a sense of insecurity. He was of the opinion that if he won’t do what he is doing and if he don’t behave the way he does, he might lose his image. Probably he wasn’t aware that in his absence, people crib about him, bad mouth him and most importantly use him as a tool to divide the team and the department for their own benefit. When your seniors know that you are not a performer but rather a sycophant they begin to treat you as one and you begin to lose your own ground. You begin to doubt your own capabilities and skills.
Second Incident: When I met second such person, I was technically and logically prepared to face and counter such people. He was my colleague Mr. Ashish K. I believe it was the first time in his career, when he realized that probably, he is dealing with a difficult HR Department Head that he cannot con, intimidate, bully or use for his own advantage. As soon as he joined, he began to show his colors. On first occasion, someone from his department applied for leave and he directed that person to me. I said to that individual that as per the company and HR policies, he can take the leave; however, HR cannot approve his leave. His leave needs to be approved by the concerned department head, which is responsible for his deliverables and project deadlines. Later on, Ashish came to me to tell that he do not want to approve the leave of this person, however, he do not want to communicate it to the concerned person but rather want HR to communicate it to him. The reason that he gave is he does not want to spoil his relations with his team-members. He was planning to build his own team and inculcating team-spirit at the cost of HR. Now, because he knows that I am a difficult HR to deal with, so, every time that he would approach me, he begins the communication with, “I have already spoken to the CEO and CTO” or “CEO has asked me to inform you that”, etc. I told our CEO that this person is selling your name on the floor for his own advantage and that may affect the image of the management. Mr. CEO asked me to be careful in dealing with the requirements of Ashish.
Shared Responsibility (To be held accountable): As I grew in the company and in my career, I realized that the best way to handle such people is to make them accountable for everything that they say. In pre-economic reform era, companies have used memos to ensure proper flow of information and to enforce accountability. In an era when emails became a major mode of communication, it become a norm to not to accept any verbal or oral instructions or directions. If anyone comes and says that X, Y, Z has asked him or her to get something from you or to direct you to do some work for him or her, just ask that person to drop-in an email with copy to the concerned person. It has been observed that whenever you ask someone to send an email or give it in writing and make them answerable, many of them change their mind. Most often, people want to take a free bite and use the name of a senior and an influential person to get their work done. They want you to do the work for them and at the same time take the credit for the work done by you. Here, I like to share one more example. “Manager A” asked “Employee B” to do a certain work for him. “B” tried to do it for several days and when there was only ONE day left to submit the report to “A”, “B” asked “Employee C” to do it for her as she could not do it. Both “B” and “C” reports to “A”. “C” asked “B” to send an email to her with a copy to “A”. “B” refused to do so. It was apparent that “B” was trying to hide her incompetence and failure by passing on the responsibility to “C”.
Personality Analysis
It has been observed that those who use the name of their influential and fearsome seniors to get their work done are usually incompetent and indecisive people. They are non-performers and they have a sense of insecurity. They feel insecure about their job, and losing their reputation. They do not want to be held accountable and answerable for any of their decision or act; however, if the act gets a favorable response, they want to take credit for their initiatives, foresight and the success. Such people do not grow in their career and definitely cannot be an Entrepreneur or SBU Head or Member of Board. Boards need performers with a track record of outstanding performance, decision makers and risk takers to head important business units and profit centers.
Corporate Analysis
Companies that inculcate and encourage such culture and do nothing to curb it are the ones that crash-land before taking the flight. Such companies lack proper flow of information and the channel of communication become blurred.
This write-up is based on my personal corporate experiences, observations and research of last 10+ years. I believe that people should take responsibility for their work and be held accountable and answerable for everything that they take-up. Responsibility can be shared but the accountability lies with the concerned individual.
Kindly share your thoughts and opinion on this write-up.
From the desk of Sanjeev Himachali
Disclaimer: This write-up is based on true incidents. All Names, and characters, are either the product of the author's imagination, or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
