As everybody knows, an executive (or any boss) has practically nothing to do -except....
To decide what is to be done; to tell somebody to do it; to listens to reasons why it should not be done, why it should be done by somebody else, or why it should be done in different way, and to prepare arguments in rebuttal...
To follow up to see if the thing has been done; to discover that it has not been done; to listen to excuses from the person who should have done it...
To follow up a second time to see if the things has been done; to discover that it has been done but incorrectly; to point out how it should have been done; to conclude that as long as it has been done, it may as well be left as it is...
To consider how much simpler and better the things would have been done had he done it himself in the first place; to reflect sadly that if he had done it himself, he would have been able to do it right in twenty minutes but that, as things turned out, he himself spent two days trying to find out why it had taken somebody else three weeks to do it wrong; yet to realize that such an idea would strike at the very foundation of the belief of all employees that an executive "Has nothing to do."
-F.F. Beirne, (Redbook)
To decide what is to be done; to tell somebody to do it; to listens to reasons why it should not be done, why it should be done by somebody else, or why it should be done in different way, and to prepare arguments in rebuttal...
To follow up to see if the thing has been done; to discover that it has not been done; to listen to excuses from the person who should have done it...
To follow up a second time to see if the things has been done; to discover that it has been done but incorrectly; to point out how it should have been done; to conclude that as long as it has been done, it may as well be left as it is...
To consider how much simpler and better the things would have been done had he done it himself in the first place; to reflect sadly that if he had done it himself, he would have been able to do it right in twenty minutes but that, as things turned out, he himself spent two days trying to find out why it had taken somebody else three weeks to do it wrong; yet to realize that such an idea would strike at the very foundation of the belief of all employees that an executive "Has nothing to do."
-F.F. Beirne, (Redbook)
