Working with mistakes

[Bigdave_185]

Gents

Many of you guys come from a military background others have done well in the civilian world of employment


How have your overcome others mistakes?

My current position leaves me running a cabinet shop while the boss type installs jobs
Most instances I get a repair or rebuild sheet of parts for some installs that requires me to build things differently.  Original parts from build list are as drawn, only to find out it needs to be the opposite of what the drawing is. 

Not exactly my mistake but I am left fixing them.

How do I overcome or get used to this frustration?




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[stlaser]

You get paid by the hour right? Meaning you don’t own the company or a part of it. So you are only as good as the leaders above you.

I used to fight daily early on with the owner of the steel company I managed. He paid me to “coordinate” just about everything. He did sales and pr which he was great at. Occasionally he would step on my toes. Fight would ensue, then one day I decided it’s his company. I decided I wasn’t going to argue with him. I didn’t for about a month. However, I wear my expressions on my face. It’s a huge negative I have yet to overcome.

One day after a month of me agreeing with him and apparently having a dumb a** look on my face when I did so I was reprimanded in his office. The meeting went something along the lines of you must think I’m the dumbest person in the world etc. My response was exactly the opposite. I told him how smart I actually thought he was and I understood it was his business. I then stated however you hired me to do a job but want to step on my toes often. Since all of that is out of my control I decided the one thing I could control is to not argue about how you want to run your business.

He let me do my job going forward. Control what you can control, the rest is someone else’s issue.

[Bigdave_185]

Have you seen the movie Hitch? Will Smith says to the lady he is chasing in a club

“ you have a giant F$ck Off across your forehead”

I can very much relate and I fight that same battle

Plus added tone of voice is hard to mask.




Anyway

Yes I am a hourly employee but.... only to the extent that I get OT pay.  They have asked multiple times to put me on a percentage of profit program to which I decline.     I know if I accepted I would be in a spot like you were, where I see others pissing my money away.





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[TexasRedNeck]

Regardless of how you are compensated. Understand the business and figure out how to help the business be more profitable. Don’t make the discussions or arguments about you but about the business. Help it thrive, become more efficient and grow. That makes you valuable and the boss should recognize that. Most of my career has been based 80% on incentives which means when the company does well I do well.

Most people can’t put their emotions or attitude aside or their desire to be “right”. Focus on the business and the rest will take care of its self. Depending on the arrangement I’d look hard at a percent of profit arrangement.


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[KensAuto]

Only thing I can add is there's always employees that think they know what's best (been there) and owners that are always right,  whether they are or not. I tried/try to be neither one.

Do we get paid for this counseling session?

[stlaser]

For the record I just argue with myself now and the old timer hot rod guys who come by often....

[cj7ox]

Dave, in the Army we regularly have after action reviews, where we analyze what went wrong, what went right, and how we can improve for the next mission. Is there some way you could figure out how the drawings got messed up, and incorporate a method that will possibly prevent it from happening again? Would your boss be open to a suggested fix to the problem? As an army leader, I encourage Soldiers who bring me problems/issues to also recommend a solution. This creates buy-in to the organization, and encourages critical thinking/problem solving. That doesn't always translate well in the civilian sector. Just some of my thoughts on your situation, for what it's worth.

[TexasRedNeck]

Dave, in the Army we regularly have after action reviews, where we analyze what went wrong, what went right, and how we can improve for the next mission. Is there some way you could figure out how the drawings got messed up, and incorporate a method that will possibly prevent it from happening again? Would your boss be open to a suggested fix to the problem? As an army leader, I encourage Soldiers who bring me problems/issues to also recommend a solution. This creates buy-in to the organization, and encourages critical thinking/problem solving. That doesn't always translate well in the civilian sector. Just some of my thoughts on your situation, for what it's worth.

Yes. We use this in business too. Learned it from some air force guys. Think it still works???


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[Sammconn]

I always hope he who identifies a problem comes with a solution or idea for.
I use it at work.

[Flyin6]

Dave, in the Army we regularly have after action reviews, where we analyze what went wrong, what went right, and how we can improve for the next mission. Is there some way you could figure out how the drawings got messed up, and incorporate a method that will possibly prevent it from happening again? Would your boss be open to a suggested fix to the problem? As an army leader, I encourage Soldiers who bring me problems/issues to also recommend a solution. This creates buy-in to the organization, and encourages critical thinking/problem solving. That doesn't always translate well in the civilian sector. Just some of my thoughts on your situation, for what it's worth.

Yes. We use this in business too. Learned it from some air force guys. Think it still works???


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It works with limitations

Allow me to explain.

With everything being constant the after action reviews are helpful.

The "Everything" being the personnel who are involved. The working environment and other factors you'd probably wish were more constant

However what I learned from that is that every eighteen months or so a new boss comes in. He is full of piss and vinegar and wants his chance of setting new records. He was, however, not at any of the AAR's and has little understanding of the recent history. Additionally, he is bringing in the concepts of what worked for him in his recent assignments.

You can do little to change the environment. It will ebb and flow literally with the seasons, or in Dave's example, with the job. Summer will give way to winter. People will come and go. economic conditions will move about the playing field as well. But getting back to this AAR example, in Special Operations the AAR's were brutal to the point of being downright nasty short of lethal! No matter if you saved Jesus from the devil, someone will note the fact that during your flare your angle produced windshield glint which could have alerted a demon to come. It gets ridiculous sometimes.

But unlike the regular Armee, in special operations, the operators are the real commanders and not the guys who come and go. We'd call them corporate raiders as a lot of them would swoop in for a quickie assignment just to get that 160th in their records or possibly (Always) a spec ops combat patch to wear forever more. I was a warrant officer, but in the fight I was an aircraft commander, oftentimes with the actual commander as my copilot. I was often the flight lead (Read: Lead) and many times the actual battle captain. Working for some of the elite forces we have in this country I have found myself under the "Command" of a master sergeant. And Thank God, BTW he was in charge.

So the warriors did not leave. We all stayed in special ops for 10-20 years. I mean once you make it, who wants to go through all that again? And after having it all, a new mercedes every week, who wants to drive used buicks? So the lesson was that with respect to the AAR model, you really need the personnel piece to remain more or less constant. THe bright young harvard and princeton and yale graduates need to remain with other idiots without the keys to the shop if you really want to be successful.

But know this, in the corporate model (Military too) the people in the system will simply twist and use the system to benefit themselves and their friends. Human behavior and all anything you do is likely to be fraught with problems and sometimes work, but other times fail.

[dave945]

When we were learning something similar in the Air Force, it was called continuous improvement process. I know it’s gone through a few more iterations since then.


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[cruizng]

I'll put my 2cts.. I have had a very weird career. Started off construction then trucking ops and then trucking Info Systems.

At an early age I was a manager of people. Many times much older than me. Not so much anymore. I had people that had "WANNA" and I had people that I would have to pick up at their house, get them out of bed, and drag them to work at 5am so I had a staff.  I have always tried to lead by example. Be in early, stay late, do what was needed, try to improve things everyday, and expect the same of others. That created frustrations. Everyone is very different and has different motivations. I had some that just wanted to make enough money so they could FIRST buy their bag of pot and then maybe pay bills or groceries. Others wanted my job. I always wanted people to want my job.

I have rarely been compensated based on incentive. I have almost always had a salary and sometimes a very discretionary bonus. If my boss was mad at me at the time he was doling out $$ I didn't get much. If he was happy I got a little more. Plus one of my bosses was bipolar so you never really knew which one would show up that day.

One company went public that I had worked at for 10 years and the only one that was given stock was a brand new VP of Sales. All of us that help build the business to what allowed it to go public got the joy of purchasing the stock at a discount of fee's. Not discount stock price but just reduced broker fee's. Not a YAY moment. A year or so later I was recruited to another company that lied about their financial viability and eventually went belly up. I went to work fora company in Dallas and was awarded stock options.... but the price o the stock went progressively downhill after SEC investigations and a bunch of other stuff not to be put on a public forum. :) So it was a nice thought but ended up worthless.

So long story... I have basically been paid an annual wage and that is it. The only time I received a significant increase in that annual salary is when I was recruited and changed companies. Otherwise they would try to keep an increase at less than 3% per year. So now... 40 years later I look at every day as unique. Did I provide 100% value to the company for what they pay and if so we broke even for that day. If not why not. The option is most always to change companies. ( I currently can't do that so it is a little frustrating but is what it is)

I have worked for both publicly held companies and privately held companies. Most private companies have a perspective that if they give you a $100.00. It is as if they are giving it to you out of their own personal checkbook. Which in essence they are. They pay you just enough to keep you. That is it. You rarely find one that wants to share the wealth beyond their own family. If I was in their shoes I might be the same way so as long as they pay me a competitive wage I am happy to put in each day and give them 100%.

Seems like I have strayed off of the original question but my point is and I discuss this with everyone that reports to me is that it is their company. We work for them and if they want A we give them A. If they ask for our opinion we provide them with well thought out and defensible opinions and recommendations. If they listen and still want to do it their way then that what we do. If we arrive a not liking that more often than not we find another company to work for. OR go start your own company. :)

In the IT world we have what is called a RCA or Root Cause Analysis. After an event or issue with any of the system we have a process where we go back and analyze what caused the event and more importantly is there anything we could have done to prevent it from happening or moving forward put controls or monitoring in place to keep it from happening again. It is very fact based and not a witch hunt or finger pointing exercise. Just the Facts Jack. It works very well. Plus give ownership and management a high degree of confidence in the department and staff. Transparency. 

[Bigdave_185]

Thank you all for replies.  When I am not hopped up on cough med I will see if I can make sense of this.  Until then I will keep my fingers out of saw blades.  That is all my goal for today is


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