How To Induce Blank Stares and Evil Thoughts When Providing Constructive Criticism
Yesterday I was sitting in a Second Cup coffee shop and I overheard the conversation of a manager with her employees.
Setting the scene — she was on an apparent break, sitting casually at a table sipping a coffee. Lounging like she was on vacation, she barked over to one of the employees and said:
“Now listen to me carefully, I only want to say this once….”
“Blah, blah, blah — (insert Charlie Brown adult-speak) — blah blah…”
“If you don’t do what I say, we’re going to have a problem.”
She then instructed the employee to call over a second staff member, and she repeated the exact same diatribe. This happened a total of 4 times.
Can you imagine what was going through the employees’ heads as they nodded to her blankly? Exactly.
If you can’t do better than that - and say silly, pointless, demeaning and demoralizing things like, “listen to me closely” and “we’re going to have a problem” - you shouldn’t be managing people. Sheep, maybe. But not people.
One of her biggest mistakes was not explaining to the employees why her instructions mattered. She was asking them to do something fairly menial. It was clearly important, otherwise she wouldn’t have used the language she used. But why was it important? I have no clue…I’m guessing the employees don’t get it either…
Is there any chance they’re going to listen to her?
Lousy management 101! Why are service managers notoriously bad?
When we were younger my wife and I had many service sector jobs. My wife once had a boss that got his jollies making waitresses cry. When he hired a new girl, he would repeatedly try to make her cry by yelling at her and insulting her. He did it with every waitress. His final attempt would be a trip to his office where he would go on a threatening and insulting tirade. If you survived that one without breaking down, you were on his A-list. If you didn’t life was hell until you quit.
I hope my kids never have to work in the food business.
I’ve seen that kind of behavior but never had it happen to me before. I would certainly go into instant ‘off’ mode upon hearing that first sentence!
The food industry seems to be particularly brutal. You see some of these chefs on TV and you wonder why anyone works for them. I know a chef and he is completely the opposite and you know what? His employees love him AND they work their tail off for him too.
Tell me about it! Connstructive criticism I welcome, condescension I can’t stand. There’s nothing that can turn people off quicker and close minds who once may have been open to your input than that.
Sounds like someone watched too many movies. My bro and I talk in movie dialogue like that but we’re usually making fun of each other when we’re sitting down and coding.
Too many movies? I’m not catching the reference Yu, help me out!
Well, the way she was talking sounds like a character in a movie (a sarcastic one) instead of a real human being with consideration for other people’s feelings. But then again, it’s sad that a lot of managers choose to talk in that fashion — which not surprisingly just inhibits productivity.
Yu - I get you now. I thought my post title might have had a movie-reference or movie-sounding style to it, but I couldn’t figure it out!
No Excuses … treat people with respect and communicate with honesty and clarity and no need for tricks or threats … in building the foundations of my only venture into the food service business [ http://www.zyng.com ] I exercised those simple rules … my “trick” was simply to ask questions and listen to the answers … the first three girls I hired as waitress ended up the real managers of the my first store on St. Denis and Ontario … i showed i cared about them their ideas and they returned the favour by caring about me, my business and my family
Respect always wins the day. Thanks for stopping by and posting Oliver.