Being a manager is a pretty thankless job, so I have a great deal of respect for those who take it on and are good at it. I have had many a good manager and have even had to manage an office or two myself, so I know from where I speak. And in all honesty, I remember having more good managers than bad ones.
The good managers have made all the difference in the world for me. They have recognized my abilities, nurtured them, encouraged me and gave me opportunities that have helped me in my career. These managers have guided and helped me when I behaved badly and made mistakes and were always there when I needed help.
I had one manager who started off good, became bad and unfortunately, was always ugly. Some one even recommended she try wearing a bit of make-up to look better. She took it all in stride but I could see she was a bit hurt by that. No one deserves that type of advise. Her good points were her enthusiasm and strong belief that what our team was doing, was truly helping Canadians. And she was right, the team was doing a lot of excellent work but they also took advantage of her good nature. One person would go off on her own, travelling as she wished and taking on projects with out so much as discussing it with the manager, let alone getting her approval. Contracts were poorly created and even the contractor would receive far more than they would normally get. Coming from a financial background, I cringed at the way things were managed. I knew it would be an auditor’s dream to go through all those records.
At one point our Director’s administration officer sent us an email asking each of us to send her our passwords (something we would never do now). My manager did a “reply all” sending her password to everyone in our directorate. I pointed this out to her (mistake #1) and told her she will have to change all her passwords (mistake #2) but she bluntly refused. I was never impressed with her managing style and was happy to see the back of her head when I left. When my term was up I was asked to help out at another division rather than return to my home base.
The manager of that division wasn’t that great either, at least from my point of view. Her advice to me when I started was to avoid one gentleman, as he was bitter and grumpy, and to do everything the senior project officers asked of me (except for the grumpy guy). As you can imagine, I ignored her advice and befriended the grumpy guy and clashed with the senior project officers. The senior project officers used me as their gopher. I would have to type up their hand written memos, although they all had computers; deliver packages to other buildings; and organized their resources of old journal clippings and reports. I was miserable. They laughed at my mistakes, pretending it was all in good fun. When I brought this to the manager’s attention, she simply told me I was mistaken. She defended the senior project officers and assured me that the team thought highly of me but the only person who was nice was the grumpy guy, who by the way, was never grumpy with me.
As luck would have it, I won a competition for a higher position (3 levels higher) in another branch. It was only a one year assignment but at least it was an escape from my miserable job. Since I had only worked for this division for a few months (felt like years) the manager and her wicked team decided not to have any sort of going away activity for me, like a lunch, or tea and coffee. One of the secretaries mentioned it to me, so I knew not to expect anything. I simply stopped working there one Friday and started elsewhere the following Monday.
The one year assignment was in an office where I had first started, so I was familiar with the type of work they did. I must admit, when I originally left that office I vowed never to return as I thought they were all crazy but since they were offering me a higher position with more responsibilities, I went back. Instead of being the office clerk, I was now the executive assistant in the director general. I was to run the office and manage the support staff.
I thought I had learned from the good and bad managers how to work with employees but nothing could have prepared me for this bunch. It was truly a trial by fire with back stabbing women who were determined to take me down. I would go home in tears every night wondering why this was happening. When I went on vacation I realized I had to take control for the betterment of the office and for me. I just refused to give up without a fight. I was determined to make this right.
The first thing I did was meet one of my former managers. She had experience working with a difficult employee. She gave me solid advice and a strategy on how to handle the situation. I recruited support from my manager and the senior officers. The employees didn’t know what hit them. All they kept saying was “you’ve changed.” By the time our new DG arrived, the office was running smoothly, so much so that they created a new position for me so I could stay on after my assignment was over.
Ever since I had that job, I avoided applying for managerial positions. I did have to manager another team but they were all excellent employees who worked together at solving problems. I really had a dream team.
The people make all the difference. How they behave, interact with others and do their work. If you have a good manager, treat him or her right and be the type of employee you wish you were managing.
Colette54's Blog 
These are absolutely brilliant, dear Auntie. I really wish you could write them more often.
Thanks for the encouraging words. I shall try to write more often. I am encouraged by my colleagues to continue and often suggest ideas. I suspect when I return to work, I will be inspired with more stories.