Lewies Blog

When I first joined up with the company I am currently working with, I had a guy (Mr. N) who I worked under, and then there was a guy (Mr. T) who he worked under. I always referred to this upper-management guy as my boss’s boss, so that my wife could understand the hierarchy easier.

I got the job through Mr. N - he was my room mates friend. Mr. N was a young guy who was just … Faced paced and not meant to be a manager (not yet at least). Mr. T was a guy with a cool personality and the desire to embrace new technologies. I don’t want to say anything mean about Mr. T, because there was nothing mean about him. My problem is with the evil Mr. N. I don’t think he realized the damages of his actions and inactions.

Anyway, Mr. N was not great. In fact, he was horrible. Any time I had problems with him, I always CC’d Mr. T on the emails that we had back and forth to keep him in the loop. It got to the point where I didn’t enjoy coming into work at all and would search for reasons in the morning why I should continue coming into work.

The biggest reason … I had just purchased a house and couldn’t afford to lose my job. This alone was the reason why I would continue into work every day and bear with the stuff that had gone down.

I had later moved within the company to another location and heard stories from another co-worker about there horror stories with Mr. N. They even got there boss switched with someone else. I didn’t even know that was an option!

Anyway, later on, Mr. T became a normal co-worker and had even transferred over to my location. He was no longer my superiors superior, but my equal. How weird is that? I still refer to him as my boss’s boss (even though it should be my ex-boss’s ex-boss who is now my co-worker).

Now, Mr. T has left as well as more then half of the people that I started out with at this new location. Everyone had different reasons. I just discovered that Mr. T has his own blog and has a theory that managers drive people away (not companies). He related this to a co-worker that had just transferred to another location. I just couldn’t see this latest co-worker as having problems with my current manager, Mr. P.

Actually, I have left many companies because of management. I would never stay longer then a year with them. However, this company is different. I’ve been here for three and a half years. My current manager is great - primarily because he can understand my skill sets. Most of my managers in the past didn’t know what they had. Also, Mr. P acknowledges my skills and encourages me along with my co-workers.

Mr. P is also sincere when acknowledging my skills. In the past, when other managers would say something, they would say it without understanding. I guess Mr. N would say things with meaning, but I don’t recall any acknowledgements except when raises and reviews came around.

Sometimes I would get worked up with Mr. N’s reviews. They would be so damning, but worded with nice words. With Mr. P - it is a consistent acknowledgement and I’m the go to guy for many problem solving tasks. I get great reviews every year with him.

This entry was posted on Friday, January 28th, 2005 at 1:02 pm and is filed under Miscellaneous. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.