Cool. Tell me when and where!!

 

The only person I ever feared was my dad. Never feared anyone since.

 

At the prominade in 15 minutes!

 

15 minutes!!!!! Give me an hour and it's a date!!

 

You can beat a dog to make him stay but he will stay out of fear, not respect.

I was shop foreman where I work for three years. When i took over production went up, attendance improved, people volenteered for overtime, quality improved, and not one single accident.

The owner is a ****headthat has no life. The only way for him to feel better is to try like hell to make everyone around him miserable. I earned the respect of the workers by going out on the floor when all my office work was done and busting my ***** to work circles around everyone in the shop. He didn't like the fact that people like me and didn't think that it was right for me to joke around with the workers so we were always arguing about it. He finally had enough and started fabricating a bunch of BS so he could fire me. He tried to slip in my replacement as a fabricator but I pegged him on his first day so I gave him special treatment and kept my mouth shut about the fact that I knew.

When the day finally came for the *** to call me to his office, I knew he intended to fire me to make an example of me. I walked into his office to see him with a big smile on his face. He told me to have a seat. I said I think I will stnd cause what I have to say will only take a second.

I siad befor eyou decide to fire me you should maybe stop and think about it for a minute. I gave him a very long list of things that I do that nobody else in the building could donot even the stooge that he hired to replace me. I then told him he would have to hire another 4 people to do all of the jobs that I do by myself. I then said I am going home now and if I don't hear from you tonight I will be back tomorrow as a worker and nothing more. I didn't even give him a chance to get a word in, and walked out.

Unfortunatly I still work there and in the last 6 months he has had to hire another 3 people to take up the slack of a few things that I refuse to do. He still has yet to find an electrician, plumber, maintence tech, TIG welder, and a few other things.

The new shop foreman won't lift a finger to do anything. He knows absolutly nothing. Anytime someone has a problem figuring something out he send them to me to get the answer. He walked up to me the other day complaining about how much he has to do and there isn't enough time in the day to get it done. I just looked him in the eyes and said. "Take everything you have to do and add to it what I do, and then I pointed out the other 3 guys and said add to it what they do, and that is what I had to do everyday all by myself." He stood there like a deer in the headlights cause he knew he had nothing to say that would justify his complaining.

This guy is a spineless coward as well. The other day he and the owner were interveiwing someone to TIG weld and they couldn't figure out how to make it work so again I got the call for a rescue mission. The owner was complaining that it wasn't getting any gas while the dumbass was holding the TIG torch up to his ear. All of a sudden he pushes the foot pedal all the way down and that thing shot an arc about an inch all the way to his cheak. I burst out laughing my *** off while the chickenchit rat bastard foreman just stood there. Later on I asked why he didn't think is was funny. He told me it was but he wasn't going to laugh at him. I just said I'm not afraid of that fat bastard and I ain't afraid to laugh in his face.

Enough of my venting. Sorry I got off track but I do feel better. Thanks for the ear.

 

feared, if they fear you than they have the instant obedience to orders that could save a life durring a firefight they wont even think about it they will just do it, at least it is best to be feared in my profesion i dont know about yours

 

I'm Machiavellian.

Feared but not Hated.

Now I'm going to read the rest of the thread...

 

I think some of you guys are taking the word "feared" too literally...

I don't mean fear of a ***-whipping, I mean fear of retribution. Not so much revenge, but as in consequences of your actions.

I mean, if you are the kind of person that doesn't give a blank about your career, then no amount of discipline a manager tries to enforce will sway you. You will still do what you want to do, how you want to do it, until you get fired. Then you'll go to the next job and do the same thing until you get fired there... That's not a good employee anyway, so no amount of influence will change them.

I'm talking about the fear of losing a job that motivates people with responsibilities to do the right thing, even when the boss is not looking. I'm talking about the pride in doing a job the right way even though the boss is not looking. That's the kind of fear I think the Professor was looking for.

I agree, no one should be "scared" or "fear" any man, period. I'm just wondering if, as a manager or leader, do you think it's necessary for your employees to have the "knowledge" rather than the word "fear", that you're cool as long as things are goign well, but, if things go badly, there will be repercussions. I think that's the best way. But, you have to be consistent, and you can't be wishy-washy. If you write this guy up for failing to open a trouble-ticket on an outage, then everytime someone misses one, you've got to write them up too.

I think consistency is the key. They have to know that what you said yesterday, applies today and will apply tomorrow as well, until you say otherwise. Not only that, but you can't be an a-hole today, and a friend tomorrow (That's the kind of MGR I don't like). Be an A-hole 24 x 7, or be cool 24 x 7, but don't change up day to day, or hour to hour.

 

THat's who he quoted in the question... Machiavelli....

 

Photog95....I hear ya man. I was in a similar situation a few years ago. I'll spare everyone the boring details. But I decided I would leave. I couldnt stand working with a bunch of back stabbing two faced people. Once I left, they stopped almost all service work, are down to 4 guys, 2 of which are ready to quit and I talked to my old boss last week and he's struggleing big time with the whole department. I just smiled and said " well Im pretty happy where I am now"


BREW

 

Bighersh--With that clarification, I would have to say the best organizations I've worked for everyone knew that if the work didn't get done they were going to face some consequences. So whether you call if fear, respect, or knowledge that is the way to go. I have received numerous complaints of EEO, favoritism, and other b/s violations. However when the complaints were investigated I was always exonerated and enough evidence was compiled to take corrective actions against the person complaining. I never took those actions or pushed to have them taken. My boss or the EEO investigators took the corrective actions without my input.

The supervisor must prove their technical skill. If it is discovered by a subordinate that the boss doesn't know what they are doing the respect, fear, whatever goes out the window. I have had several people I supervised try to get on my team when we deployed, not because I was easy, but because I knew what was supposed to get done and wasn't afraid to stand up to a Colonel or General to tell them what was what. Unfortunately the bosses don't like that in a junior NCO. I never lost a job, but I failed to use the appropriate tact and normally irritated the bosses enough not to not be placed in the really gravy jobs. Although my immediate supervisor and I did have to go in front of a Colonel for something I screwed up. By the time I walked out my supervisor was getting yelled at and I received an apology from the Colonel for my screw up. On the way out my supervisor was asking how I was able to screw up and have a Colonel apologize to me for it. I just smiled and said respect. The only time I'd seen the Colonel was during emergency situations and I was in charge.

 

Yeah, I know what you mean about that. In my first foray as being "in charge" I was a brand new Corporal, maybe 30 days old, my SGT had just got out of the Army, so this as my first time taking the entire team out, solo. We were at Ft. Hood.

The "computer" checked the terrain, and calculated azimuths, and gave us (The battallion) our individual grids to go to to meet up with the units we were supporting (an Apache detachment~ damn I wish I'd had a camera ~, as well as an azimuth to shoot in order to put in the LOS telecom network.

My team went out, and we set up. We put the antenna up, lined up the azimuth, put the switch in, ran the cables, installed boxes at the TOC and everything. Nothing... We thought we were ahead of the main nodes, so we waited... Nothing. The Avaition TOC had a signal NCO (E-8) with a topo map, so I went to his tent. We did some intersection and resection and found where exactly where we were, then I plotted our azimuth from our antenna base and there it was (On the map), a 130 meter hill right in our line of sight about 6 clicks away.

We relocated as far as we could, and still have enough line to reach the TOC, and we still couldn't shoot around that hill. I got on the radio, and told the CO I needed a relay-van in order to make the connection. He told me I was wrong, the computer said this & that... Get that shot in, now! I said, Yes-sir! (Knowing it wasn't gonna happen.)

We changed from horizontal to vertical orientation, picked up a bar or two, but not enough to establish the network. Monday passed, no shot, Tuesday passed, no shot, by Wednesday, I said "F" this, we went in on a "shower run" and my roommate just happened to be a Corporal as well, in charge of teh platonn's relay van. He was not needed for this mission, so he was on the stay-back roster. I asked him to come back with me, which he did. We reoriented our antenna and put our shot into the the relay van, he shot to the Node, and boom- shot came in.

On Friday, we were back in the rear and the CO was talking about how good everything went, with the exception of the fact that it took 3 days for my team to get the link in. He went on to say how difficult it was to prove his point to the Colonel that a relay was needed, and right when that came out of his mouth- he looked right at me. Then he said, OK, it was CPL BigHersh's idea. Then he commended me for taking appropriate and decisive action in the absence of orders to make things happen, and I got an AAM for that.

THe next month, I heard the words all Corporals want to hear when they are standign in front of a formation...

Attention to Orders, The Army has...... He is hereby promoted to Sergeant (E-5), with an effective date of rank of......

That incident (the second-guessing of the computer) had nothing to do with me getting those chevrons pinned on, but for those 2-3 months, it was a very nice ending...

 

at the age of 17 started work in a small stone masons yard 2 other staff there the owner aged 70 and his son .The owner very old school no mod cons .But the son sat on his **** all day doing paper work used to allways get me to answer the phone and tell people he was not in .Then after about 6 years another bussness in the area went under and we took on there work I got put in charge of the work stone work orders.The son gives me the folder with all orders and i start to look through them some of them were 2 years old i had to call these people and ask if they got there stone and if they still wanted it lol.The bussness grew and took on three more guys that i had to look after output from the shop increased over all from when i started i used to work all the hours would go in ill never took hoildays if the orders were not up to date .The son went out bought himself a new rangerover the wife an audi a4 there son had all the best off stuff never wanted for anything.Xmass time came before the other guys came to work he used to give me a weeks wadges as an bonuss not now told me he could not afford to give me and the other guys it,
in the next 2 months i sold my car house and most things i owned and bought a plane ticket to canada it gave me great delight to tell him I awas leaving and it was my last week .
At the end of the week i left 1 hour early we said our good byes and so on
he gave me a small bag which i opened at home it had a wallet in it no cash
no good luck card or thanks for the 11 years service and when i went to get my pay the hour i left early and been docked from my pay .He got his in the end though after i left 2 of the other guys left the dad retired and now he has all this work and no 1 to do it

 

-----------------------------------------------------------------------
There's a lot in that statement for sure .....
I never talk to anyone in a way I myself wouldn't want to be talked to, and I
never ask anyone to do something I wouldn't or haven't already done myself.

My crew and I get along excellent,they help me look great at what I do but I ALWAYS give them the credit when asked by Corporate who was responsible for what. Also WE ALL dislike the Corporate dweebs equally ......

 

where i work now and i'm not the boss anymore i've kinda brought the "ex-boss" with me

i worked there from '78 to '89 and went back last april

these "workers" that are there now?
they walked all over the owners for years because the owners are real down to earth people..

some that i've never seen take so much crap from people that work for you...
and let live and let live...

but when i came back after have been a foreman i took the "attitude" with me
and the owners love it
i keep telling by boss to let me be the foreman for 1 week...

i work in the "bizzaro" world

in the real world 1/2 of these guys wouldnt last 5 min in a real shop...

oh well i still make good $$ but to have to watch what goes on around me on a regular basis just blows my mind




just one week

...zap!