Leadership: Good Boss Turned Bad

As soon as the word bad boss is mentioned most people start imagining pictures of a wicked person, a crook, a tyrant, a scheming backstabbing individual, a selfish ogre, etc. And typical textbook definitions of a bad boss is one who screams, threatens, intimidates, grabs credit, fires people, throttles people’s necks and so on.

While this could be true in some cases, it is not so in a large percentage of cases. Actually it is not necessary to be a wicked person at all to be called a bad boss. Ironically, a good natured or normal person can also fall under the category of a bad boss without exhibiting the standard boorish behaviors.

Here are a few common mistakes good people do to slowly transform themselves into bad bosses.

Lack of Knowledge: A good person can become a manager of a department for various reasons, but may have no knowledge necessary to run the department. Often many employees get promoted to stratospheric levels too fast, but without the required knowledge, maturity or skills to run a bunch of diverse departments.

Avoiding learning: It is understandable that a manager cannot be expected to have an accurate knowledge from day one. To gain knowledge one must get into deep water to understand the nitty-gritties of a new department's work, irrespective of their earlier experience. And no matter which department you manage there will be some amount of new learning every day to keep abreast of latest trends and happenings related to that particular industry.

Unable to shield their team: Often for many managers maintaining the status of a good and diplomatic person who will not antagonize customers and clients becomes more important than being right. So they may not be able to shield their team from hostile situations, unfair accusations or demands. They will start saying yes to every demand and put their team members in trouble or excessive workloads. Very soon team members will stop going to them for help - Jeff Rich, the CEO of ACS says, "I think the day that your people stop bringing their problems to you is the day you stop leading. They've either concluded that you don't care about their problems or that you cannot help them. And leaders have to be in a position to help.”

Distorted view: Customers and clients don't appreciate a plain exhibition of good nature. Just because a person is good, customers will not take things easily or dilute their demands. They need value for their money, solutions, answers, guidance, etc., for their problems. A good nature and lots of smiles cannot be used as a shield for delivering bad results. And if a person cannot provide that, he or she automatically becomes a bad manager.

Finally we can conclude this article with a quote from Thomas Arnold, “Real knowledge, like everything else of value, is not to be obtained easily. It must be worked for, studied for, thought for, and, more than all must be prayed for.”