Moses and Managing Employees

The scene:
Moses goes up the mountain in response to God’s call and, after a whole long while, comes down with two tablets on which are inscribed the ten commandments. In his absence, the people in the valley are carousing and carrying on like there’s no tomorrow. Worst of all, they’re worshiping the statue of a false god they created themselves.

Moses is furious! And in his fury he hurls down the tablets which become so much mountain rubble. Uh oh. Big trouble. The Boss sends Moses on a mission to deliver an important protocol and what happens? He loses it. Righteous anger and all that, but he did hit the delete button and wipe out the Boss’s message. Now Moses has a couple of choices: abandon the mission and join the revelers, carry on and hope for the best, or take courage to go back and ask for a duplicate copy.

How many times have you been in the position of Moses? I’ve been plenty. Misplacing important phone numbers or e-mail addresses, not taking accurate notes on oral instructions, stuff like that. It’s certainly not easy going back and admitting you messed up. But when the consequences are great, seems like courage makes the best business sense.

It’s not always easy being the boss either. When an employee messes up and comes to you asking for a duplicate of a document because the first one accidently wound up in the shredder what’s your usual reaction? Do you sigh, roll your eyes, yank open and slam a couple of file drawers or agonizingly search through multiple disks trying to find the right document, all the while making the poor employee stand by helplessly, feeling more and more foolish, maybe vowing to hide the mistake next time? Been there more than once, too.