When I visited a long-time client, they had just painted visible accent walls on the outside. My main contact asked me if I knew what that color was. “Blue,” I replied. “No, it is Apeshit Blue!” When the CEO saw the color the CFO picked he went “apeshit.”
Working with clients lends itself to funny stories. One narcissistic CEO had a bodyguard/ chauffer who would escort him from the car to the office building. A friend in HR told the bodyguard he was not understanding the biggest risk. There are more people inside the building that want to kill him than outside.
I worked with a very smart and benevolent CEO. One person described him as someone who knows your job better than you do. Although, he was a very nice man, the person who relayed the story said “Here comes Mr. M with his cafeteria tray looking for someone’s lunch to ruin.”
One long time client of mine had one brother as Chairman of the Board and one as CEO. The problem is they openly argued bringing any meeting to a standstill. Their direct reports would just glaze over as they went back and forth. If I was presenting, I was charged with answering their questions in a fashion that did not insult the brother whose position was more faulty. Talk about much needed diplomacy.
One of the funniest stories occurred when I was presenting to a CEO whose conference table chair was looking out. I must have been boring him when he stood up and said “That’s a hawk.” So, we all turned around and looked for the hawk. Now, let’s turn the page…
A truism is organizations tend to take on the personalities of its leader. If egalitarian, the organization will follow suit. If prone to cheating, others will cut corners. And, if the leader is a jerk sadly others do the same. Working for a company with multiple-business units, one unit was notorious for being run by a cantankerous SOB. His direct reports needlessly treated other peers in the company the same way. It was less effective because people avoided them when they could.
Finally, when a colleague was consulting with a tele-evangelical group whose CEO was in trouble, one was at the board doing his presentation when the COO came in and said we are lucky to have our CEO and we all need to pray for him. To a person, everyone dropped to a knee to pray, leaving my colleague sheepishly standing at the board. Another funny sidebar is if the on air TV show did not have enough guests, all employees including those in meetings were called to the studio. If a presenter was there, he or she had to attend as well.
So, to sum up. Know your hawks, know your colors, know how to kneel, know how to clap, know your job and know how to be diplomatic. And, don’t paint external walls without asking the CEO.
musingsofanoldfart 
Note to Readers: The benevolent and smart CEO had a job as a reporter at one time, so he was very big on the efficient use of space in prose. So, he detested one or two words on a line at the end of a paragraph. He called them “widows or orphans.” He would rewrite drafts to eliminate the widows and orphans. After witnessing this, we would alter the tab margins to eliminate such.
Note to Readers II: The CEO needing the bodyguards inside the building was a very greedy person. He was big on using company money to pay for personal matters, not unlike someone often in the news. He had his employer pay for his daughter’s wedding by inviting customers to the wedding. Sadly, there are more stories.
It was said amongst the junior managers at one office I worked that the fellow who ran the building would have the largest attended funeral in the area.
‘Just to make sure the (censored) was really dead’ would be the punchline.
Another one was when he died while still in service ‘The best days work he ever did,’
Ouch
Roger, sounds like a line from Bob Dylan’s “Masters of War.” The 80/20 rule applies to leaders – only 20% are worth a damn. Keith
That’s accurate Keith.
Roger
Congratulations for surviving those challenging times Keith.
For better or for worse my working life was in Public Service. Our environments depended on which party was in government and what type of management by in vogue.
When working for H.M Inspector of Taxes one of the more inane changes I encountered was to refer to tax-payers as ‘customers’. Since to me the term customer suggested an element of choice I challenged the term as it indicated a person could elect to pay their taxes to another nation because there was a better deal – nobody took me seriously, thank goodness.
That said within our system we had our own shares of jerks, inspiring managers, and those who one of my mentors would judge with a sigh were ‘Promoted outside of their capacities’
Roger, I never felt like a customer to the IRS. Your last paragraph could be used as to describe many businesses where measuring results is not done well. Keith
I know Keith. One of the most stupid ideas ever to come out of some obscure office somewhere in the department.
One last word of managers which occurred to me after I sent my previous response.
One section I worked on had there was this manager who was a nice enough fellow, but his perception of Reality was different from his junior management team (not that we agreed on details – certain basics had been taken as read). Meetings were confusing affairs. After one a colleague confided in me.
‘He doesn’t worry me so much. It’s the one who decided to promote him that concerns me’
Roger, that last sentence speaks volumes. Here we have to look at who hired those inane folks in the White House. Keith
Note to Readers III: In the book “Built to Last,” one of the tenets of great long lasting companies is promoting from within. For these 19 companies reviewed, a key data point is 95% of the CEOs over time were promoted from within. They knew who was blowing smoke and who was effective. They knew what had been tried and succeeded and failed. A new CEO comes in and trusts the wrong people and has no history.
Note to Readers IV: Another funny story is when I took a risk to get a meeting off an impasse. A CEO did not like the data my colleague was presenting that showed his company lagged behind others in long term incentive pay. He kept challenging the data. Knowing him for years, I finally decided the humorous approach was needed. I said “It does not matter how you measure it, you are sucking hind teat on incentives.” He said “I don’t think anyone has ever said that to me.” To which the CFO responded “He’s got a lotta goddam data to back it up.” My colleague later said, “my boss is telling me to be more professional and you’re over there talking about farm animals.”