What your boss REALLY wants you to do

May 7, 2012

8 WAYS TO KEEP YOUR BOSS HAPPY – ACCORDING TO YOUR BOSS
Last week, the Time Business online had a great article by Geoffrey James titled “8 Ways To Keep Your Boss Happy.” The tips are very practical and for all intents and purposes should be instinctive for any good employee. I thought I would share the same here, but with the added advantage of emphasizing what I think your boss REALLY wants you to do. Here goes:

1. Be true to your word . What your boss REALLY wants you to do though is deliver when you say you will deliver and when you don’t, just fire yourself and make life easier for both of you.
2. No surprises, ever. What your boss REALLY wants you to do is keep her informed about everything going on in the business. The good, the bad and the ugly. She never wants to go in front of her own boss and be floored by information you knew and should have told her. If, by the way, you knew and did not tell her, fire yourself and make life easier for both of you.
3. Be prepared on the details. What your boss REALLY wants you to do is always be prepared for a surprise test, a snap check, an unholy communion where mind meets memory with shaky results. He needs to know that you know what you say you know. He doesn’t want you to make him look bad in front of clients or his boss. If he gets to know that you don’t know what you say you know, fire yourself. It will really make life easier for both of you.
4. Take your job seriously. What your boss REALLY wants you to do is to take your job seriously. Yes, your job. Not the monthly TGIF “drinkathons”. Not the staff Christmas party “after party” that happens when the CEO leaves. Your boss knows that you take drinking seriously. And dancing. And flirting with the girls – or the boys – whatever your inclination. Seeing you bleary eyed and dry mouthed from retching your dinner in the bushes outside is not a pleasant sight, but I daresay it is a memorable one. So memorable that it is the only picture your boss will have of you when doing your performance appraisal at the end of the quarter. The ONLY PICTURE. So do yourself a favour. Fire yourself. It will make life easier for both of you.
5. Have your boss’s back. What your boss REALLY wants you to do is cover her when she looks bad. When she makes a presentation full of mistakes, don’t point them out. Just smile and nod furiously while surreptitiously jotting down a note alerting her of the mistake. And as Geoffrey James writes, if your boss is about to make a foolish mistake it’s your responsibility to try and convince her to do otherwise. But make no mistake, if she’s headed to hell on the non-stop Orient express, by all means jump off the train and take care of yourself. If she survives the trip to hell and back realizing that you jumped off the train, be ready to fire yourself. It will make life easier for both of you.
6. Provide solutions, not complaints. What your boss REALLY wants you to do is stop being a whiny namby-pamby and man up. It really gets old when you keep complaining about the same thing over and over again and don’t want to provide a solution yourself. In fact, here’s a solution: fire yourself. It will make life easier for both of you.
7. Communicate in plain language. What your boss REALLY wants you to do is speak and write your emails in the Queen’s English that you were taught in both primary and secondary school. Not your coded slang or your SMS abbreviated language. And just in case you had a business law elective in your university education, showing off that Latin gobbledygook that you crammed into your over stimulated mind doesn’t help either. In fact, you should look up the words “fire yourself” in Latin. It will make life easier for both of you.
8. Know your real job. I like what Geoffrey James says about this objective. He writes that your real job is to make your boss successful and that there are no exceptions to this rule. What I think your boss REALLY wants you to do is make him look successful. From A to Z. Alpha to Omega. Sunrise to Sunset. Your job is to make him rise up the corporate ladder. And rise. And rise. And if you are really good at your job, he might let you ride on his coattails and drag you up with him. However, if you make him drop, look bad, or get creamed by his superiors he will kick you like a rabid dog. He will chew you up and spit you out. He will wipe the floor with your face and pour fire and brimstone on your head. Well you know the drill by know, after removing the wheels from his swivel chair when he takes a bathroom break, fire yourself. It will make life easier for both of you.
Geoffrey James ends his article with a great parting shot. Your boss’s real job is to make you successful. What I think your boss REALLY wants you to know is that indeed his job is to make you successful. Successful at doing your work on time. Successful at getting to work on time. Successful at working all the time without those incessant bathroom, coffee and lunch breaks. Your boss wants you to be successful all the time. But if you can’t be successful then you need to, you guessed it, fire yourself. It will really make life easier for both of you.

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Twitter:@carolmusyoka

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