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I was an engineering
manager/supervisor in the '80's. I sensed some
resistance, almost sabotage, by the workers, and shared
that feeling with my Director in my performance review
meeting. The Director told me that some people found me
intimidating -- which was a total eye-opener. I had not
been aware of that characteristic in myself at all. As a
result, I took a Dale Carnegie course and my whole career
orientation changed. |
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I wonder when do you
speak the truth? To what extent? And with whom? With
autocratic upper management? I was responsible for a
corporate survey where employees wrote in many comments
about their manager, who was very autocratic. I wanted to
talk about their comments in discussion sessions, but the
manager ruled the survey results off- limits. His report
to the VP was a whitewash. I exercised the company's open
door policy, that allowed me to go over his head -- but I
was eventually punished for it. When I decided I had to
confront this manager, I asked "Would you have
allowed any of your subordinate managers to ignore this
kind of feedback?" I also said that the survey is
the company's tool to evaluate its health, so I feel I
have to do something with these results -- either on my
own, or the two of us together. He completely refused,
and I had to go ahead against his wishes - which led to
some serious consequences later. |
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I left a very large
patriarchal corporation in 1990. I was looking for
creativity and diversity, rather than an Old Boy network.
I discovered Peter Senge, and thought I'd died and gone
to Heaven... so I took a lower level position and was to
be part of a retreat in Maine with leading edge thinkers
and the corporate power brokers. All of a sudden,
permission to go to the retreat was rescinded by my boss.
But others expected me there, so he finally relented --
but told me to be "Seen but not heard". I told
to be invisible, and not speaking my truth in this Circle
(supposedly focused on authentic conversation) was
extremely painful. |
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I was at a gathering of
(male) Hotel Managers for a posh French chain, being very
professional and hoping they wouldn't ask me to do
anything dishonorable (don't ask why I even expected
that!). The hotel director, an elegant French man, called
me in, and listed the good-looking, shapely women on
staff (while excluding the rest), telling me to have them
dress up in sexy costumes to make the other hotel
managers feel welcome at breakfast. After considerable
anxiety, and with some trepidation, I finally told the
boss he would create a problem for himself with friction
among the staff, and so I was given a reprieve. Later,
when I was with a consulting firm, there was a constant
demand for "quick and dirty" analyses, and
pressure to recommend layoffs. I kept trying to hide,
avoiding the issue, until one day finally got angry when
pushed on the subject. The result was a more rational,
revenue-based approach. But I still find it very tempting
to hide, duck, be compliant, and (seemingly) avoid the
pain… |
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I produce trade shows
as part of my job. Once in New Orleans, with it hot and
humid as usual, I wanted to take a break, have some fun.
So I played as well as worked, and had a good time. But
during the show, my long-time friend wouldn't talk to me,
so I sensed that "something was up". I agonized
for 30 days, and kept asking and getting non-answers
about the problem, while still feeling a distance between
us. Then finally I said I'd never speak to her again if
she didn't speak the truth. My friend finally shared that
some people didn't want me on the team at the trade show,
and then she fired me... although eventually our
friendship was renewed. |
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I was taught by my
father and my boss NOT to tell the truth... and I retired
when I couldn't take it anymore. The message from my boss
was always run faster, work harder, put in more hours -
and I think that's bullshit. For example, there were four
people in my department, and we were faced with
exponential growth of our workload. Finally, after lots
of negotiation, we farmed off the backup function to
another team. Later we found out that it wasn't being
done, and this is absolutely critical for data security.
But when we spoke up, no one heard us, or thought we were
whining. Meanwhile, other departments kept getting more
and more people, and we just got berated for not keeping
up with our growing workload. |
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I was always pointing
things out as a kid about how something was wrong. In 6th
grade I remember going to the principle about something.
One day, I discovered that others found me difficult
because of that. Now I'm finding freedom in letting thing
unfold, not pointing out every issue I foresee. Also, it
seems that a major fear around speaking the truth is
losing rapport with the person. But you can often keep
rapport just by matching energy. Like I sometimes shout
to my boss, who is always frenzied, "I really need
to stop and talk sanely about this!" and then, boom,
he slows down and says ok. |
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