Manager Sandwich: The Middle Manager's Survival Blog

from www.advertlog.com These past two days have been a bear for me.  As much as I have gotten better at reading my surroundings and coworkers, I completely went off course.  I went as far off course to say that I have been in a two day silent freakout!  Only this afternoon did I get the opportunity to reconcile my understanding of a serious work situation, but not until after it felt like my head was going to split in two pieces like a ripe melon.  It was an experience of misplaced expectations, so alarming that had accelerated my pace enough to be farther ahead in my work than I realized. The most repeated advice I have given at work is managing the expectations of others.  This doesn't mean controlling or manipulating other peoples' expectations. To me it means gaining an objective mapping of what others expect me to do, say, or deliver.  The difference between knowing what is wanted by others, and giving them what is needed is the pro...

An increasingly amount of one-on-one communication is no longer face to face, but rather via email or its special-needs cousin, texting.  The proliferation of smart phones and pads have made it very easy for most of us to depersonalize one-on-one communication by using pure text.  Back in the day, before phones were everywhere, professionals needed to find each other physically to discuss plans, conflicts, and solutions.  With the widespread use of telephones in the 1940's and 50's face-to-face was replaced with picking up the phone and letting your fingers do the walking.  Our body language is hidden on a telephone conversation, but our subtle verbal cues and sighs at least convey or betray our true feelings. The age of text communication not only takes on more degree apart from one another by filtering out the verbal and non-verbal, but it allows for us to take that much less responsibility for what we communicate. This high-tech / low brains approach to com...

from http://www.cincinnatichildrens.org/ As a youth, I don't remember ever having the right comeback when caught by surprise by a schoolmate making an antagonizing quip.  In high school, most of us were mising a lightning quick wit, and thus were subjected to indefensible attacks from those few who did.  A time did come however, when I did develop a quick wit, and the ability to stun an antagonist with lightning fast remark.  It is a well known fact that working in a steel mill can be compared to being in the 8th grade for life.  There is something about heavy industry that can bring the juvenile idiot out of each of us. In this world of never ending immaturity and adolescent humor; quips and zingers zip about at times like speeding electrons.  It is always fun, until someone loses an eye.  The problem I have experienced is that observers in the periphery can at time take great offense to the ping-pong like banter that results fro...

I can remember the day when I learned I was going to become a father.  It was over seventeen years ago, but it really does seem like just yesterday.  The thought of being responsible for a new life, someone completely dependant upon me was overwhelming.  I remember driving down to the local K-Mart to pick up some house items, walking through the aisles in a daze of confusion.  Something caught my eye, and it brought everything into perspective (yeah, just like that).  A young couple, younger than me, pushing a stroller with a young toddler; meanwhile the young woman was pregnant (and very close to delivering).  They walked through the store like it was any ordinary day.  I knew from watching them for three minutes that I would be able to raise children as well. from www.almightydad.com Life became challenging right away, and hasn't gotten any easier since.  Each step along the way, I kept telling myself that it was going to get easier, but mu...

from snarkerati.com The past few years have certainly been a reality check.  Following one of the greatest economic booms of recent years has been a financial calamity.  The year 2009 was certainly the hardest in my career, and probably harder than most people have endured past 1980.  A great many jobs were lost as companies that weren't strong enough to weather the storm crumbled under the force of the collapse. It is easy to think only of ourselves when these things happen.  Most people have families and financial obligations that often feel daunting when the threat of joblessness is looming.  It is times like these when we need to leave a trail behind us to guide us back safely.  The old saying "knowledge is power"will always be true, but true knowledge isn't what we keep only for ourselves, but what we share with others.  I have met many coworkers that keep "vital" work related information very close to their chest.  They may have sma...

    About twenty years ago, I purchased my first house.  I remember all of the houses that my wife and I visited and looked at before we decided to put in offer on the one we liked.  One house we saw stuck out because of the owner's peculiar collections.  On the walls of his house were framed shadow box collections of all sorts of items including : matchbooks, shot glasses, playing card decks, thimbles, hotel note pads, you name it.  I found it almost mezmorizing how many different things this man chose to collect and display.  Personally, I collected baseball cards as a youth.  I used my lawn-mowing and paper route money to purchase cards that I knew would appreciate in value, as well as certain players that I fancied.  Thirty years later, I am not sure what to do with the cards.  Combined, the entire collection is theoretically around $5000, but realistically, I wouldn't be able to get half that amount by selling them to dealers o...

A while back, I endured the results of miscommunication between myself and a coworker.  There was a serious accident at work.  Fortunatley, there wasn't anyone hurt, but quite a bit of equipment damage did result.  I received the call late in the evening, about an hour before I was going to sleep.  My coworker was a bit frantic with his description about what happened.  I tried several times to get detailed information, but he was unable to answer my questions clearly.  It could be that he hadn't seen the damage himself or that he had a tough time describing what had happened.  Either way, while driving into work, I called a few other people in the plant to gain a better understanding about the mess I was walking into.  I finally reached someone who knew what was going on, and thankfully received better details on what really happened. During the last twenty years, I have received hundreds of calls from work about mechanical ...

About seven years ago, I went to a club to see a Guns n’ Roses tribute band.   As we walked in through the front door and past the bouncer, we strolled through the Karaoke bar next to the main room.   Low and behold there was some poor sap up on stage singing “Sweet Child of Mine”.   Painful, is putting it lightly.   Karaoke is an example of a fun activity to get friends together or inhumane torture depending upon who is holding the microphone.   As we scurried into the main room, we were able to escape the screeching of a poorly executed falsetto.   The tribute band, on the other hand, was excellent.   The singer did a better job than Axel Rose himself ever could have done. Go figure, presentation is everything.   The difference between torture and pleasure is skill, experience, and training.   This rings even truer when it comes to supervisory communication.   As supervisors, we are required to communicate necessary operational changes...