I did not turn into a good employee until the year before I stopped being an employee and started being a boss. Which is a shame, because there is almost nothing more valuable to a company than a good employee (other than a good boss, but I need another ten years to even dream of writing about that). But yâall, when I talk about being an employee, I am in no way talking down to you as someone whoâs lived a cushy life of management. I started working at thirteen (um, obviously not super legally), and have had all kinds of jobs, from pumping gas, to filing medical records, to frosting cupcakes for minimum wage, to working in offices where my bosses screamed at people till they cried, to navigating the particular hell of the super-corporate investment bank.
By the time I quit working for other people, Iâd learned the basics of being a good staffer: be diligent, be responsible, ask questions when you have them, own your mistakes, and keep your emotions out of the workplace when you can. Iâve spent the six years since then managing my own employees, and what Iâve learned is that people walk into the same self-destructive traps over and over in their jobs. So to save you two decades of employee practice, plus half a decade of management experience, weâve partnered with Squarespace and written up ten rules for being a good employee. Please add yours in the comments.
(And before you worry, it was my staffâs idea that I write this, so donât pity them too muchâeven as I let you learn from all of our mistakes.)
Do the work. Last summer, the press was full of articles wondering about the American workerâs drop in productivity. I kept wondering if the articles were a joke, because Iâm pretty sure we all know whatâs hurting productivity at work, and itâs the Internet. (Shhhh, we wonât tell your boss youâre here.) Once you get settled into a desk job, it can be easy to start feeling like your salary is the thing thatâs owed to you, and in return you show up and do the basics. While there are jobs you can survive on that way, itâs rare that youâll earn your way into your bossâs heart (or get a promotion) by feeling like the world owes you a living.
So by all means, surf the Internet when you have down time. Sneak into APW Happy Hour on your lunch break. Check in on the fun when you need a break. But think about it this way: somewhere, someone put your salary down in a budget line, and said, âI really hope this person will be worth the money, because we need them to be.â Be worth the money.
Know what youâre accountable for. Many of the mistakes that I see come down to one fundamental problem. The employee in question thought the buck stopped with someone else, didnât check on that assumption, and dropped the ball. There is nothing worse as a boss than asking where the project is only to find out⌠the project never happened. So if youâre not sure whoâs in charge of something, check. You donât want to find out it was you⌠way too late.
âYes, andâ not âNo, but.â Back when I was twenty-six, someone pulled me aside to explain that I needed to stop telling my boss his ideas were bad, and try to figure out how to solve his problems. The boss in question had a lot of awful ideas, so I rolled my eyes and then quit the job. And while quitting that particular job was definitely the right call, years later I realize that the advice was also spot on. When I ask an employee to solve a problem for me, I need ideas (plural) on how to solve it. Often the problem is difficult (or I would have solved it myself), but still has to be solved. So having an employee say âNo, but thatâs not going to work,â makes me want to slam my head into the wall. What I need to hear is, âYes, and we can think of a few ways to approach solving that.â
Own your mistakes. Once, back in my days of secretarial work, I managed to totally screw up an important trip for my boss. I thought Iâd booked his hotel well in advance of a major conference, but I hadnât. And at that point, the only option was to make a man who spent four nights a week on the road away from his kids stay in a godforsaken airport hotel miles from where he needed to be. I was mortified, but it was too late to fix it. So I got up, marched into my bossâs office, told him exactly how Iâd screwed up, the best options I had, and that I was profoundly sorry and would try not to make that mistake again. I stopped talking and stood there bracing for the worst.
My boss blinked, thought for a second, and said, âThanks. I guess thatâs what weâll do. No problem.â What I realized in that moment is that this is all any decent boss wants. Mistakes happen to all of us. When they happen to people we manage, we want them to own them, apologize, do everything in their power to fix them⌠and probably most importantly, leave their emotions at the door.
If you screwed up, your boss has every right to be (appropriately) upset. Donât make them manage your emotions too. Which brings me toâŚ
Be very careful how you bring your personal life into work, otherwise known as the âdonât cry at workâ rule. If youâre lucky enough to have a great job and a great boss, you may well be friends with your boss outside of work. Maybe you guys get together over drinks and bitch and cry about your life. Thatâs fantastic. However, no matter how lovely your boss is, be very careful how you bring that behavior into the office. When you become a boss, your ultimate responsibility shifts to the organization, not the individual. That may sound heartless, but itâs the company that writes the checks that supports peopleâs familiesâoften many peopleâs families, not just yours. And that means that your boss needs to be able to act objectively, without worrying about whatever personal drama you just dragged in the door.
TL;DR: If youâre going to have a conversation at work that involves crying, itâs probably a conversation you shouldnât be having in the office. In fact, itâs probably a conversation you shouldnât be having with anyone even close to their boss hat.
Communicate clearly with your boss. (Otherwise known as: donât let your superiors be surprised, and if you have a problem, let your team know right away.) This one speaks for itself, but seems to be broken on a daily basis. If youâre having a problem, anything from feeling unmotivated by your work to seeing a mistake happening in a key part of a projectâlet your boss know. That said, itâs important to figure out how and when to communicate to your manager. Is it an emergency? Tell them right then. Is it something they need to know sooner rather than later? Maybe bring it up at your weekly staff meeting. Is it super big picture? Make an appointment to sit down with them when they have time. But word to the wise: your boss canât read your mind. You have to tell them whatâs on it.
If you donât want to be there, leave. (And if you canât leave, donât bring that mess to work.) Who among us hasnât been stuck at a job we didnât want to be at? (If you havenât been, light a candle and say a prayer of thanks). The one thing that I have learned (over and over) as a boss and as an employee is that if you donât want to be at a job, you need to do everything in your power to GET OUT. Yes, some part of your brain will say things like, âThe devil you know is better than the devil you donât,â and, âYouâve only been here six months, what will that look like on your resume?â but the truth is that life is too short to make yourself (and everyone around you) miserable. That said, there are times you just canât leave a job⌠God knows Iâve lived through those moments (Iâm looking at you, recession). If that is the case, suck it up. Bitch at home. Sob into your drink. Punch your pillow. Do what you need to do. But when you show up at work, have the integrity to do the very best that you can. At the very least, youâll have your dignity (and a paycheck).
Donât self-sabotage. It was only when I became a boss that I realized how self-destructive humans can be. The bizarre thing that Iâve noted is that self-sabotage often happens when things are going well (not just when an employee really wants out of their position, see above). But when I have a staff member killing the game, and ready for a promotion, itâs very likely that theyâll start to demonstrate self-sabotaging behavior. Theyâll turn down increased responsibility, theyâll start causing drama, theyâll miscommunicate, theyâll make huge mistakes. In fact, the list of damaging behavior is literally endless. Why? I can only guess that theyâre scared of moving on up. Worse? I donât think they have a clue that theyâre doing it.
Keep an open mind. You might be hired for one job and get moved into another one. Your team might decide that a strategy that seems strange to you is the one to pursue. You boss might decide youâre gifted at something you never even thought to try (and are not sure youâll even like). Best advice? Keep an open mind, and give it a try. Worst-case scenario? You hate it or decide you were right in the first place⌠at which point you can try to backtrack. Most common outcome? Someone else saw something in you or in a project that you didnât⌠and youâre about to be delightfully surprised.
Be open to feedback. I know, I know. Feedback is a bitch. Take it from me, since I lived through investment bank performance reviews that resulted in people being fired. Pretty much nobody likes hearing what theyâre doing wrong. But learning how to acceptâand giveâconstructive feedback is one of the most important parts of continuing to improve in your job. If this is something you struggle with (waves!) try to come up with less threatening ways to practice getting feedback.
Maybe set up a time to sit down with a trusted colleague, and tell them all the things you think you could improve on, and then have them respond. First, itâs always easier to go hard on yourself than to hear it from someone else (and we generally all know what our real weaknesses are). Second, it can be nice to hear that X way that you thought you were totally underperforming is actually just a story you made up to torture yourself. (Flashback to me thinking everyone thought I was the laziest intern at the theatre development office⌠only to find out that every other intern was in awe of my 24/7 chipper conversations with high-level donors, and wondered why they didnât have as much work as I did. Whoopsy, with the self-flagellation.)
what would you add to this list? whatâs one thing youâve seen people do over and over again (Or whoops, done yourself)âand whatâs your best advice for being an A+ employee?
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