During a recent visit with my brother, a retired chemist, he shared some advice that his first supervisor gave him over 35 years ago.
“I’d been there for a few months,” Doug said, “when the guy called me into his office one day and told me I should think of my job and my work in the lab as my own little store in a mall, that I could do whatever I wanted with it. I could grow it and make it successful, or I could just put in my time and let it languish. It was all up to me.”
That supervisor’s advice seemed as excellent a suggestion as any I’d ever heard for someone beginning a new job.
To make that arrangement work, of course, both parties must be on the same page regarding the mission of the organization. In the Army, the staff sergeant commanding a squad of two rifle teams and the lieutenant colonel who has charge of a battalion have very different duties, but the ultimate mission of both of these infantry units—to close with and destroy the enemy—is the same.
A key factor in the success of any mission is trust. The foreman of a large factory must trust the know-how and competency of his subordinates, and they must trust his leadership abilities and decision-making.
Once these elements are in place, then everyone involved in an enterprise really can become the manager of a little store in a mall. Instead of just showing up for work and dragging themselves through the day, they have a shared stake in the enterprise and the freedom to perform the job to the best of their abilities.
Years ago, when I worked for a large restaurant as a waiter, the owner conducted monthly meetings for the wait staff. Here, her agenda might include new items on the menu or a review of customer suggestions from the past month, but she always came back to the mission—to serve up good food with a cheerful attitude and make the meal a pleasant experience. How we chose to do those things was up to us.
The reward for our hustle, manners, and smiles came when the customer left the table with a handsome tip on it. The reward for the owner came when those same customers returned to the restaurant.
This arrangement brings success to a multitude of enterprises. Growing a company, for instance, usually means hiring employees who bring initiative and their own skill sets and talents to the workplace. Once they understand the mission and trust is established, good managers cut them loose to do their jobs to the best of their abilities.
Conversely, supervisors who micromanage the men and women in their charge can easily do much more damage than good. They may see the trees, but their real job is to see the forest, the big picture, and leave the details to their subordinates. By doing so, they allow creativity to come into play and enhance a sense of pride among the employees, which in turn breeds success.
The benefits of this shared sense of mission and trust can be seen as well in other scenarios. Raising children strong in body, mind, and spirit, for example, is best accomplished when mom and dad are on the same page. Both parents may bring different highlights into the picture—dad stresses table manners while mom imbues the children with nursery rhymes and fairy tales at bedtime—but both have the same endpoint in mind, and the kids themselves possess a clear sense of the meaning of family.
“Brighten the corner where we are”: Those words from the old Ella Fitzgerald song apply here.
And my brother? He took his supervisor’s words to heart and made a whopping success of his little store in the mall.
