Guy Kawasaki gives us some innovative advice on getting a better handle our prospective managers/leaders. In his post on LinkedIn and the Art of Avoiding an Asshole Boss, Guy points us to a tool from LinkedIn.
The game is changing. I’ve been writing about this for some time and things are changing. Don’t get me wrong, we’re not going to rid the work world of "asshole" managers overnight, but maybe more people are saying they won’t work for someone who fits that description. This will increase as we move into the coming worker shortage. I think another factor is that after 9/11/2001 many began to understand the brevity of life. Who wants to spend a significant portion of their life working for a…
Here are some tips on being a selective potential employee:
- Be and/or become as valuable as you can. Be a sought-after free agent.
- Ask your prospective manager how many books (growth and development specifically)they’ve read in the last year.
- Ask your prospective manager if they have a personal growth plan for the year.
- Ask your prospective manager if anyone follows them besides those they have authority over. In other words, is anyone following them because of their character and not their position.
- Stay away from desperation…it kills perspective and focus.
I have been intrigued by the problem of how to avoid accepting a new job in a jerk-infested organization, and I think I’ve found an excellent and unique way to avoid this costly and painful problem.
I just finished developing a website called http://www.ebosswatch.com that allows people to rate their current or former boss so that people who are considering a job change can search for bosses at potential workplaces and can receive reports detailing the ratings that each boss has received.
Bob Sutton, author of the best-selling book The No Asshole Rule, has called eBossWatch “fantastic, a great idea.” I hope this helps some of you avoid asshole-infested workplaces.